Does anyone have an opinion on which is better for a dedicated server host?
Hivelocity
Codero
Or any other suggestions? I am looking at (to start with) a E3-1230 v3, 16GB, dual s/w RAID 1 SSDs running Node.js as the web server.
On Hivelocity, I figure I can write frequent backups over the 1 Gbps private VLAN to the server mountable CloudStorage, in addition to the RAID 1 redundancy.
I have some tricks to maximize SSD performance and to track changes more efficiently because I am writing everything to files (absolutely no LAMP!) and always extending the file (with periodic batch file "defrag").
The two hosts above seem to be roughly the same price, but Codero includes the "Essential Management" service at no charge and Hivelocity requires cPanel to be bundled with management, but it seems these standardized LAMP monitoring solutions aren't going to restart Node.js if it crashes. Hivelocity provides the superior Intel data center SSDs (Codero the inferior Samsung 840):
http://www.storagereview.com/intel_ssd_dc_s3500_enterprise_reviewHivelocity seems to more completely detail their data center and Tier 1 connectivity.
I am a bit perplexed about server monitoring, as I've never done it before. Do I have to stand by my mobile phone 24 x 7? (Good luck with that, when I haven't taken a shower in
a monthtwo months, haven't opened my email in a month, and my mobile phone is under the seat in my car and check it once a week!) Aren't there any third party 24 x 7 services which can do customized monitoring for a Node.js set up?
Hivelocity allows you to buy down a server's monthly price by up to 35% for $500 per $50 buy down. I wouldn't do that until I was sure the project was scaling as hoped.
I am leaning towards Hivelocity, because they appear to be a more contained unit whereas Codero appears to have grand aspirations of competing with Amazon AWS:
http://www.codero.com/blog/cloudopoly-why-we-need-an-alternative-to-aws/Edit: I also looked at VPS offerings with SSD such as Host9, but it doesn't seem to make sense to attempt to save $70 a month but have much less precise baseline to compare resource utilization when deciding what to scale up to next. VPS resources seem to be somewhat nebulously specified.
Edit#2: I run a Ubuntu derivative on my desktop (in addition to an old Windoze XP machine), but seems CentOS is the standard for dedicated servers. I've read up on this, and so unless you can say something I didn't likely already read, then no need to comment about which OS is better. I figure it doesn't really matter much in general. I just know I don't want cPanel because it doesn't interopt well with manual edits to configuration files.
Edit#3: also Hivelocity has some moderate-level DoS protection service, but it is quite expensive and DoS is most effectively squelched with decentralization by not giving attackers only one NOC to attack and then using clever filtering strategies that minimize resource usage: