Hosting Problems: Donation Drive

[Erk]

Update: Our friends at slacked.org and donations from our users have combined to pull us out of the fire. If you would like to donate for .org's security and slush fund for the next time we have a problem, it will certainly not go astray. However, we seem to be out of the red now.


Hello everyone! Today our host shut us down without warning for using too much processor power. I have shut off a few things, most notably the new download manager and the smily selector thingy, because they were apparently high-processor-intensive (I have no way of telling these things myself).

To get our features back, we are going to need to upgrade to a dedicated server (or a virtual private server, which seems to be a better deal in our price range). So, without further ado, the most detailed view of RMXP.org's finances you will ever see.
Estimated cost of 1 year servage with a dedicated server or VPS: About 100 USD a month, or 1200 USD. This is a high estimate. If you know some good, reliable companies offering dedicated servers within the under-115 price range, please PM me. Don't post in this thread about it.
Total accessible savings: about 470 USD (we have a bit more, but it is going to the Childs Play donation sometime closer to christmas. If we tap into it it has to get put back).
Donation from Erk: if we need it, I can fork out pretty sizable chunks of my savings, but I am pretty tight so the more you guys can help buffer me the better. Plus I have no credit card, so I am not entirely sure how I will get money from my real bank account onto the forum paypal.

GOAL: We need at least a few hundred more USD to buy servage on a decent dedi, and 700 or so more to get a full year of hosting. I am probably going to keep rmxp.org's current account as it is and use it for our download manager as-is, and move only the forum and wiki to the new server, so we can't squeeze money out of what we have already put into our hosting... even if that was a significant amount, which it really isn't.

FOR FUN and PERKS: Anyone who donates more than 7.50 will get a subscription, and more than 15 will get a sponsorship, same as always. If you already have a sponsorship, or if you donate more than 15, you will get a special little badge. The top 3 donators will get an extra special badge, custom-made for them. Anyone who donates a surprising amount (over 50 USD, I would say off the top of my head) will get other perks as well, such as chunks of hosting on our dedicated server and things like that. Since I am writing this at the 11th hour and this is all unexpected, that's all I can say about it for now. I will get some samples on here as soon as I can.

ASCII BAR SINCE I KNOW YOU GUYS LOVE THAT KIND OF STUFF: (maybe I will draw a better one later)

$0 |##$500###||-------------------| $1200
Update: Thanks to Alexanderpas, CTM and an unidentified donor for bringing in another 100 dollars!

 

[Tdata]

I know that no one does this anymore, but why not just buy a server?

I'm not talking state of the art or anything, An old p3 computer would work. Install Linux or M$Server on it add Apache and just buy dsl. I've done it before. Works wonders. And it only costs about $300 (for the server itself) + Whatever DSL cost in your area. I ran a server this way and instead of paying $100+ a month, i payed $30.

It is just a thought.

 

[Erk]

Frankly, that's not an option. For one thing, I will be moving out of Japan in a year and can't move a server with me. More importantly, though, RMXP.org is not a homeowner type website. A p3 server simply wouldn't have enough power to run it, nor would a home pipeline have enough bandwidth. Right now, we are using about 2 gigabytes a day.

 

[Anonymous]

I know that no one does this anymore, but why not just buy a server?

I'm not talking state of the art or anything, An old p3 computer would work. Install Linux or M$Server on it add Apache and just buy dsl. I've done it before. Works wonders. And it only costs about $300 (for the server itself) + Whatever DSL cost in your area. I ran a server this way and instead of paying $100+ a month, i payed $30.

It is just a thought.

a) It would be slow as FUCK.
b) Most ISPs aren't very open to the idea of someone hosting a popular website on a home DSL/cable account, as it puts a pretty major burden on their servers.
c) P3s are beyond obsolete. RMXP.org at its current traffic would fry the motherboard in a matter of days.

Buying a dedi is roughly the same thing as "buying a server", only it's a monthly fee, the hardware is quite a lot better, and you have 24/7 support right at the datacenter. Put in a ticket and you have professionals tripping over themselves to help. Unless the datacenter sucks.

I (read: shadow and I) have some ideas regarding a potential hosting solution that would be quite a lot cheaper than going out and buying a dedi, but I can't say anything just yet because it might not fall through very well! I'll PM you if anything gets set in stone, though.

 

[Tdata]

2gb of bandwidth a day isn't all that much when you run a popular site. Running a Unreal 2004 gameserver i used that in under 3 hours.

I just doubt we need a to spend so much for a server that we won't used most of it's potential.

 

[Erk]

It is not much compared to a UT2k4 server, but it is plenty when most ISP's get uppity about more than 10gb of upload a month. Also, the very reason we are changing servers from shared to dedicated is that we are, in fact, using a crapload of processing power. Far, far, FAR more than a p3 could hack.

Couchy wouchy has already gone into enough reasons we would rent, rather than buy, and the primary reasons buying servers is mostly out of style. Not many admins (me included) have the time to run a site and manage a server for it, nor the resources to run a powerful server.

 

[holloway]

Hosting is really not my forté, I prefer to use whatever is available, so I'll stay out of that. However, have you not considered two non-dedicated servers? As you said, you'd be keeping this for the download manager so couldn't you go for a similar package again, or with a different host, for the forums and wiki? I'm sure that would clock in a lot cheaper.

Edit: And on big vB forums, the main power leakage comes from thread subscriptions.

Edit 2: Hehe, leakage.

 

[Erk]

Our big leakages are all over. Downloads and the skinning replacement variables we were using for smileys and some other things were big factors, but the biggest overall server load is just plain loading files from the skin images directory. Given that pixelvoodoo is all indexed colour, that basically amounts to "the server we have is not powerful enough to keep uploading so many small images to so many users".

We don't strictly need a dedi right now, but I was already going to upgrade to one in a few months. We could get a "semi-dedicated" server where it is shared with only a couple other accounts, for example. However, that just means another upgrade in a few months and I just don't have the time to keep doing server moves all the time. It generally takes two full days of my time to get everything backed up, moved, reinstalled, and working well on the new server.

 

[EvanCross]

Crap... forgot I wasn't supposed to talk about how much I could donate here....

 

[Roph]

To be honest I was wondering why your host hadn't done this sooner.

good, reliable companies offering dedicated servers within the under-150 price range

I don't really think there is such a thing.

I can tell you though that you don't need a dedicated server, and I don't think you should get one. You'd be much more suited to a VPS.

Dedicated servers are rubbish unless you're serious on one and are willing to shell out for a more expensive one; it's alot better to get a decent quality VPS than a barebones dedicated.

[edit] pm'd =p

 

[Ceroscuro]

Uhhh...

If you know some good, reliable companies offering dedicated servers within the under-150 price range, please PM me. Don't post in this thread about it.

 

[Roph]

meh when I started my post I wansn't gonna mention but it sorta slipped in :p

 

[Anonymous]

One thing I'm wondering too is if you guys have any sys admins, or do you plan on paying for the server management too? If not, I'd be glad to be one, considering my formation, although I'm sure there are other members with equal capacities.

As for donating money, I probably will when I know what's going to happen and when.

 

[RavenTDA]

Not to seem like a complete idiot but is there a direct link to where I can donate?

 

[Erk]

Donations page

Re: silverline, I have no strong qualms about a VPS if the power is appropriate. Perhaps I should have said "looking for high-power hosting" or something more ambiguous along those lines.

Short list of servers so far
Thanks everyone who offered links I have not listed everything that was suggested, as some companies didn't match our needs for one reason or another.
http://www.1and1.com --> no personal recommendations for their dedi service is a bit of a negative against them though.
http://www.servint.net --> for a VPS rather than a dedicated server
http://www.asmallorange.com --> also has some very nice VPS deals and a high recommendation
http://www.ace-host.net --> SaKaRi uses this, and while a bit smaller they are definitely in line with what we are doing. That's a pretty good recommendation.

update: After some research into pricing, I think we can get a VPS that suits our needs for about 79-100 a month. I have updated the first post to suit this.

 

[Anonymous]

If we buy a sponsorship, I assume the money goes into this as well?

 

[Erk]

Yep. All donations go into the same pot

 

[Roph]

I'd strongly recommend against a company like 1&1. Pretty much any shared host that does dedicated ~on the side~.

ServInt has a unique system, and upgrading (if you ever needed to) is seamless and takes like a minute. You can do that all the way up to the solo one, where it's you alone on the machine =o. I'd recommend you just get an essential (see my PM for resource example) and it'd be easy to scale if you ever needed to =)

Though I think you're thinking too large. Even a tiny VPS is a great leap up from normal shared hosting. I used to use dreamhost, and after a few shell commands I got a list of every account on the box I was on. There were thousands of names :/

Also lol, I'm not trying to get you to signup because of some scheme or anything either; unless you specificlly said to them I referred you I wouldn't get anything, I just love those guys for their service and quality <3

 

[Erk]

Hi folks, thanks to our numerous contacts "in da field" it seems we have landed a pretty great servage deal with our pals at slacked.org, who have just picked up a dedicated server with more than enough power to run both our sites. It's better for me, because I can talk directly to the people managing the server but don't have to run it myself (something I know next to nothing about), gives the site more power than a VPS would, and it will cost us a lot less. With the donations we have received and the savings we already had, I think we are in the clear for now.

Thanks for your support. Whenever something bad happens, you guys band together to show me what a great site this really is. You're a fantastic community.

I'm closing this for now. When there is more news about the new servage I will create a new topic for it.