I recently discovered that it is possible to rent a decent VPS (good enough for at least 5 SL-class regions) for as little as 15$ a month so i decided to try them out. When I told friends about this I noticed there is a huge interest for this.

So I decided to write a blog guide for how to setup a rented VPS (Virtual private server) install OpenSim server and connect it to the OSgrid. My aim is to write a really easy an step-by-step-guide. Maybe it can be of some help for someone?

http://usvemo.wordpress.com/

On that blog there is also a guide for how to install and set up OpenSim on a server at home and some other tips and tricks....
Us

Great info and research here, having a look thru for the name of the VPS provider you used at $15 a month, cant find it in your blog, went to the forum and searched for 1/2 hour but it is huge, you have already done the research, could you please provide the name of the hosting company you used to save us a lot of time.
Much appreciated.
Cam.

Cam, I decided not to promote any special one the blog as I try to stay objective as I dont have enough experience of them yet to recommend them. But so far all has been perfect for me.

But here I think it is OK. I used this offer http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=1069714
However I think they just have stopped that offer but for 17$ they have a similar offer now: http://up2vps.com/

But as I said on the blog you can find lots of other offers.....

Good Luck and please let me know how this works out for you.

Great tuto, thanks Us.

Cam, you can have also dedie starting at 15€. See eg. http://www.kimsufi.ie/ .Maybe those dedies are even better option. Some authorities are telling that VPS is not really made for continuous processes like is OS. See eg. what tells Snoopy:
http://snoopypfeffer.wordpress.com/2010 ... s-opensim/

Bo

Interesting article, Bo. I was a bit reluctant to post the name of the providers I am trying out and I did not do so in my blog as I did not want this to be some kind of advertising thing.... ;o)

I agree with much in the article but I think you have to include the cost as well. The three main alternatives are:

1. Run from your home. Cheap, maybe problems with uptime and bandwidth
2. VPS. Cheap but maybe unpredictable performance
3. Dedicated server. Best but maybe not that cheap

My idea is to form my own opinion about the second alternativ based on real experiences and not theoretical ones. From my profesional life i have a lot of rl virtualization experiences of running huge VMware clusters and Xen ones. Everybody in that business knows that some application and IO-active services are best keept out of the virtual world. That is no news.

BUT for me the interesting point here is to try to establish what kind of behavior and performance can be expected from theses really cheap VPS offers when running OpenSim software? What are they good enough for? What can we expect to get for 15-20$ per month?

So I really think it would be interesting to set up som kind of "standard performance testing OAR" that can be loaded into different setups to actually measure the performance. Maybe something like that already exists that I am unaware off... if so please point me in the right direction.

If any of you are interested in participating is something like this please let me know.

Thanks, i didn't studied the VPS enough deep to be able responsively confirm all what Snoopy tells, but it sounds reasonable to me. Just to give complete information Snoopy runs a hosting company but i think the article is not affected by that much.

I don't think that it is a problem to tell name of your hosting hosting company as long as you are not their employe Actually the better hosting will people have the better OSG for all!

To your sim scale
1) home hosting
- "free"
- malicious (you see no lag others do!)
- laggy (line limits + distance from Internet bone networks)

2) VPS
-much better than 1) but still problematic

3) own dedie
- almost best option but limited by wish learn yourself a lot or by general technical skills. Poorly configured dedie may give more troubles than home-hosted sim!

4) a sim from reputable hosting comapany with instance price starting above 20€ and 1 GB RAM.
-best option for those who are not IT skilled. A good configuration means a lot..
-PS i don't sell sim hosting

Bo

This is a great idea, in fact it should be put into the Suggestions topic, a standard OAR makes a lot of sense and would be the only way to get reliable comparable results for a test.

Hi everyone
I can talk about 2 of those things.

I've rented from a few server owners, for different prices. One thing I noticed moving from one to another, was there is always some kind of problem. I got every answer from " you must be doing something wrong " to " it must be the scripts you are using ", "it's your AO".
One owner even shut down the sim instead of just restarting it. He just shut it down. I always paid a few months in advance and it was frustrating. I had this feeling of deja vu in SL ... ewww

With one server owner, it was the sim kept crashing. Another was I kept having double almost everything on the sim every time there was a restart. Another was the scripts would just not work. I can keep going but ...
Gawd it was so much fun waiting for the owners to get online. At times I was offline for 48 hours.

I was ready to give it all up. But I had never tried a standalone, so I figured I would try that and see?
WOW, that decision opened up a whole new world for me.

Then, after a month, with the help of some terrific people here, I dared connecting to the OS grid.
DOUBLE WOW

Having my own sims, connected to OS grid is the best thing that ever happened in my Virtual Life.

To all those owners that I've rented from, I can say this ...
I'm still using the same scripts (taken here at this forum) for all my scripting needs.
I'm still building the way I used to.
Still samo samo AO from Casper.
I am not doing anything different.

But I am updating as soon as there is an update from Nebadon. I follow this forum and get a lot of tips from some awesome people.

My main sim is Selea's Elf Art Gallery. It has scripts all over. Of course some of them I tweaked for the need of some prims. I have terraformed that sim inside out a few times. I was born with the right to change things as I want and gawd I do just that ... lol

All this to say ... I now have sims running from my own PC. I never have problems. Scripts work just great. No lag.
Updates are nice and easy because Nebadon makes it that way. You keep a few files, then just update right out of the box.
All these problems I had before are just not there anymore.

I can't say why I had all these troubles before. But since I do not have any problems now, at times I think these owners are just not doing a proper update or something, and newbies like me are getting blamed.

I'm grateful I did not give up. I'm grateful to so many here in this forum for their help and guidance.

I wish others would try to connect instead of renting. Because of all this, I am a better builder and have a better understanding of how to properly run a sim. You can save your whole inventory, your whole sim, anytime you want. You don't have to ask and pay for that service. The benefits are just huge when you connect yourself.
Believe me, if someone like me can connect from my own PC, me that barely knows how to start my PC ... anyone can ... LOL

Well that was my 2pennies ... lol

Selea

Selea, just to clarify for you, you are talking about renting a pre-configured sim from a sim provider, compared to setting your own sim up on your home computer (and connecting to OSGrid).
When we talk about VPS, it is not renting a sim from someone, it is renting (like) a computer from someone and setting up your own Opensim, so its the same as setting Opensim on your home computer except you rent (computer) space from a server provider and set Opensim up on that.

The benefits are,
Doesnt need your home computer running 24/7,
you get an industry standard connection instead of a home connection (can have more avs),
doesnt need your home computer exposed,
you dont depend on some company to restart or upgrade your sims,
leaves your home computer free to run standalone to test stuff, and when OSGrid is offline (not often),
much cheaper than dedicated server (which is needed to run a medium to large grid),

The drawbacks are,
costs money, well, for less than the cost of a cup of coffee each week, you can host your own sim(s)
You need to set up a Linux type system but lots of help available here for that. (Windows usually costs around $15/mth extra for license fee)

So the pros outweigh the cons, for a few regions on OSGrid, VPS seems the way to go.

Hi Cam

OK, now I have a much better understanding of the VPS thinghy

Sounds real good. Better than renting from sim providers. Much better.

I hope this thread keeps going till you knowledgeable guys / galls do all that testing ... giggles

Selea