Via this WHT offer. xenSmart is a UK based — guess what — Xen VPS hosting provider that “provide low cost, powerful and reliable UK Virtual Servers”. It is part of PC Smart Hosting that has been around since 2006. It has recently launched its Xen HVM based products and is offering a special 25% off recurring discount when you use coupon code HVMLAUNCH. Its cheapest plan is now £3.75/month after the discount.
- 128MB memory
- 10GB storage
- 150GB/month data transfer
- Xen HVM/SolusVM
Direct link to the ordering page here. From the traceroute it seems that the servers are with RapidSwitch in BlueSquare in UK.
As I have not yet tested a Xen HVM VPS — how is it comparing to KVM or VMWare based solutions?
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The Founder at LowEndBox
The original owner of LowEndBox known as LowEndAdmin or LEA for short founded LowEndBox in 2008 and created the concept of hosting applications on low resource Low End Boxes. After creating the roots of the community that we know today, LEA stepped aside and allowed others to carry the torch forward.
Latest posts by LEA (see all)
- 5 Reasons Why You Want a Low End Box - May 26, 2021
- Dead Pool January 2012 - February 2, 2012
- exit(0); - January 19, 2012
I have this VPS with them for a few weeks now and it has been running rock solid. Performance is superb.
Support is also very decent, response usually within a few hours (also on the weekends). These guys really know what they are doing.
From my experience Xen vs OpenVZ is not too terribly different… how the work is completely different but end users should not notice very much difference. This statement has one requirement, the servers must NOT be oversold and must be managed correctly. There is much debate about this, some swear by Xen… but I believe that is due to soo many servers being oversold to the breaking point.
Xen vs KVM – no comment, don’t use KVM enough to know!
Thats not correct Patrick. Especially memory usage counting on OpenVZ is very different from Xen/KVM/VMWare. OpenVZ counts VSZ memory not RSS. Can be a very unpleasant surprise if you run python/ruby/java stuff.
Thats the primarily the HUGE fence (more like Berlin Wall) between the two sides. Xen (and others) does a better job of managing memory, I do admit that. I’m on the OpenVZ side and that probably has something to do with the fact I learned it first in previous jobs. Xen I know, but just not as much.
OpenVZ is great if you know and operate all the VEs — I use that for the dev boxes at work (a software company) and can achieve great utilization (or in the hosting term, “overselling”). However for web hosting or in the case when each VPS is outside your control, Xen would probably be better due to better isolation.
And memory accounting difference is just one thing. The fact that all the VPS runs on the same kernel can be scary (again, especially when those are not managed by you).
I have purchased VMWare/ESX based VPS and some KVM based before, which allow you to run distro’s stock kernel. A big plus against Xen’s recommended 2.6.18. I am just wondering how would Xen HVM stack up against the two.
Yes most OpenVZ hosts and Xen PV hosts run 2.6.18 which is very very old. You can however run your own kernel with Xen PV too, if the host supports pvgrub.
I’m not sure how Xen HVM stacks up against KVM and VMWare. Xen HVM has a little more overhead then KVM and VMWare, but I don’t think you would really notice it in practice. VMWare of course has excellent management tools but comes at a higher price due to licensing.
Xen HVM is also nice if you want to run BSD or Solaris stuff since this often doesn’t run to well on Xen PVM.
Sequential nameservers, woo-hoo.
Hi:
I hired a vps services the 27 of July to be used as a asterisk server. I spent a week migrating my previous asterisk from a usa vps and everything went perfectly until the 15th of August… My account and vps was deleted without a single warning. I opened a support ticket(had to create a account in their support system because my client acces was deleted) asking if there was any problem. They told me my order was a fraud and my vps was used to scan ports. I paid the service by paypal with my businnes domain and both paypal and client account had same email . They sent me a litle log who was sent to them by an isp were my ip was supposed to contact the port 80 of a few servers but the never checked my vps, i wasnt warned to fix it if it was true(we will never know because they deleted it without cheking it) and the only answer to my ticket was “your order is a fraud and you have been using our vps illegally”. I opened a ticket in paypal and suddenly they started to treath me like a human been. They apologise but dont want a refund since i was using the vps for 19 days, the only offer me clean vps for the rest of month. Since asterisk is open source maybe there was an exploit that allow someone to exec a script, but the normal actions are supend the service and warn user to fix it. My businnes phone was off for 2 days because of this issue and i feel like a criminal. Fast support answer but worst support i had in 10 years working with vps and dedicated servers.
I’m sorry you had to deal with that, I hope you are able to find a service provider that is able to keep your phone systems online soon! Good luck!
There’s a few “providers” like that here who delete first and no matter what you say can’t be true because they know that they’re right. One provider canceled my box because I connected from a coffee shop and, while the IP address showed that I was still in the same city, they didn’t like that.
I ordered 3 days ago and installed FreeBSD 7.2
Package: HVM-128 (128MB)
Benchmark results are not bad I think.
No problems so far.
======================================================================== BYTE UNIX Benchmarks (Version 5.1.2-custom) System: ******** : FreeBSD OS: FreeBSD -- 7.3-RELEASE-p2 Machine: i386 (********) Language: en_US.utf8 (charmap=, collate=) Compiler: gcc (GCC) 4.2.1 20070719 [FreeBSD] CPU 0: hw.model: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3460 @ 2.80GHz (0.0 bogomips) CPU 1: hw.model: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3460 @ 2.80GHz (0.0 bogomips) CPU 2: hw.model: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3460 @ 2.80GHz (0.0 bogomips) CPU 3: hw.model: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3460 @ 2.80GHz (0.0 bogomips) CPU 4: hw.model: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3460 @ 2.80GHz (0.0 bogomips) CPU 5: hw.model: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3460 @ 2.80GHz (0.0 bogomips) CPU 6: hw.model: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3460 @ 2.80GHz (0.0 bogomips) CPU 7: hw.model: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X3460 @ 2.80GHz (0.0 bogomips) 6:44AM up 2 days, 20:07, 2 users, load averages: 0.04, 0.01, 0.00; runlevel ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Benchmark Run: Thu Aug 19 2010 06:44:52 - 07:08:41 8 CPUs in system; running 1 parallel copy of tests Dhrystone 2 using register variables 10667812.3 lps (10.0 s, 7 samples) Double-Precision Whetstone 2146.7 MWIPS (10.2 s, 7 samples) Execl Throughput 2595.6 lps (30.0 s, 2 samples) Pipe Throughput 1107084.4 lps (10.0 s, 7 samples) Pipe-based Context Switching 32397.4 lps (10.0 s, 7 samples) Process Creation 6970.7 lps (29.9 s, 2 samples) Shell Scripts (1 concurrent) 7035.1 lpm (60.0 s, 2 samples) Shell Scripts (16 concurrent) 497.3 lpm (60.4 s, 2 samples) Shell Scripts (8 concurrent) 1083.1 lpm (60.0 s, 2 samples) System Call Overhead 678662.4 lps (10.0 s, 7 samples) System Benchmarks Partial Index BASELINE RESULT INDEX Dhrystone 2 using register variables 116700.0 10667812.3 914.1 Double-Precision Whetstone 55.0 2146.7 390.3 Execl Throughput 43.0 2595.6 603.6 Pipe Throughput 12440.0 1107084.4 889.9 Pipe-based Context Switching 4000.0 32397.4 81.0 Process Creation 126.0 6970.7 553.2 Shell Scripts (1 concurrent) 42.4 7035.1 1659.2 Shell Scripts (16 concurrent) --- 497.3 --- Shell Scripts (8 concurrent) 6.0 1083.1 1805.1 System Call Overhead 15000.0 678662.4 452.4 ======== System Benchmarks Index Score (Partial Only) 609.7 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Benchmark Run: Thu Aug 19 2010 07:08:41 - 07:32:45 8 CPUs in system; running 8 parallel copies of tests Dhrystone 2 using register variables 50031564.4 lps (10.0 s, 7 samples) Double-Precision Whetstone 14084.4 MWIPS (10.3 s, 7 samples) Execl Throughput 1276.1 lps (29.8 s, 2 samples) Pipe Throughput 6299630.7 lps (10.0 s, 7 samples) Pipe-based Context Switching 1615642.1 lps (10.0 s, 7 samples) Process Creation 8851.9 lps (29.9 s, 2 samples) Shell Scripts (1 concurrent) 6351.2 lpm (60.0 s, 2 samples) Shell Scripts (16 concurrent) 304.4 lpm (60.8 s, 2 samples) Shell Scripts (8 concurrent) 645.3 lpm (60.2 s, 2 samples) System Call Overhead 3497645.1 lps (10.0 s, 7 samples) System Benchmarks Partial Index BASELINE RESULT INDEX Dhrystone 2 using register variables 116700.0 50031564.4 4287.2 Double-Precision Whetstone 55.0 14084.4 2560.8 Execl Throughput 43.0 1276.1 296.8 Pipe Throughput 12440.0 6299630.7 5064.0 Pipe-based Context Switching 4000.0 1615642.1 4039.1 Process Creation 126.0 8851.9 702.5 Shell Scripts (1 concurrent) 42.4 6351.2 1497.9 Shell Scripts (16 concurrent) --- 304.4 --- Shell Scripts (8 concurrent) 6.0 645.3 1075.5 System Call Overhead 15000.0 3497645.1 2331.8 ======== System Benchmarks Index Score (Partial Only) 1776.1In response to Michael and Drmike:
I would like to clarify that we openly admit we messed up on this occasion due to some internal issues, and the clients service shouldn’t have been cancelled without first being fully investigated. We acknowledged that a mistake was made during the original communication with the customer, and that point we could only offer a clean VPS as the data had been destroyed.
We have since put additional measures in place in order to prevent any issues like this in future, and it has never, ever been our policy to cancel accounts without first investigating them fully. If there are any queries or concerns you are welcome to email me personally using: chris {(at)} pcsmargroup.com
Regards,
Chris
Director (PC Smart Group t/a xenSmart)