Sales Questions

[Sitting-Duc]

First, we currently have a couple of BF4 servers with you and as far as I'm aware they have been happy with your service and servers in general.

As a little preamble to these questions so you know where I'm coming from.. we currently have around 21 game servers over a variety of hosts, I can't help but feel we can supply our players with better quality of gaming by hosting ourselves, in the sense that we are on shared hosting at the moment.

I also can't help but see if we are spending on average $20pm per server, so three servers being $60pm. And you are offering a VDS for $50pm Four cores and 4GB of RAM. We could host three servers per VDS while saving $10pm, or even 4 servers and save $30pm.

I really would have preferred a dedicated server and we did get a trial one last month from a different host 6/core 16GB RAM etc for $110pm but the network just wasn't good enough to support the game servers and we had to bug out. Your costs are a little pricey for us.

I have been taking a look at your VDS setup and especially at your boast that they are essentially as good as a dedicated server. I would never want to go down the route of a VPS where you share all resources with other users but if you are saying that we have dedicated cores then that seems a viable option to me.

So, lets say we started renting the four core package with 4GB or RAM from you and moved 2 COD4 servers and 2 COD5 servers over. Lets say that went well and all our players had a good service.

If we then got another VDS same specs, chose the same data center etc and did the same - 4 servers from various games. etc. etc.

The questions are:
- Can the VDS be upgraded on the fly as far as RAM goes, without restarts?
- If the host machine runs out of hardware to supply, would we be moved to a different box?
- Would we suffer IP changes in any upgrades?
- Can we specify that each VDS we get would be on a different physical box?
(this is to prevent all eggs in one basket).
- If we chose Windows OS - am I to assume that I would have to account for 1 - 2 GB of OS memory, (therefore 4GB server would need to be 6GB really).

Thanks, Duc

EDIT: Some additional Questions:

I'm assuming you don't supply a game panel? game files? etc and that's all up to me?

[.=QUACK=.Major.Pain]

I can help with a few of the questions.

If you go with a managed vds, you have the ability to use the auto game server installler.
Unmanaged, then you do all the work in uploading and setting up yourself.

When upgrading, your existing files and ips should remain the same.

When upgrading to a higher tier vds, you just submit a change order.
eg. from 4-core to a 6-core vds.

Same as you did when you placed the original order, but at the bottom of the order page, you would select "change to existing server" or something similar to that.

[Sitting-Duc]

Thanks for your reply I would rather us go with an unmanaged as I would like to run some additional programs on there that we use to both monitor and manage the servers.

Once I have had a confirm on all of my questions and I have spoken to a couple of people I think I will definitely go with a trial at the very least. I do currently have a TCAdmin setup on our main dedicated server and am familiar with installing and managing games through that so will most likely add this VDS to that. Although this does bring the costs up.

Thanks, Duc

[kraze]

As a little preamble to these questions so you know where I'm coming from.. we currently have around 21 game servers over a variety of hosts, I can't help but feel we can supply our players with better quality of gaming by hosting ourselves, in the sense that we are on shared hosting at the moment.

That is very dependent on who you're hosting with. In our case our standard shared hosting plans are normally the highest performing due to the strict load limits we use and fast machines. We only recommend users move over to VDS's or dedicated machines if they need every last ounce out of their CPU or if they plan on running a lot of medium sized servers which generally aren't too bad on resources.

I also can't help but see if we are spending on average $20pm per server, so three servers being $60pm. And you are offering a VDS for $50pm Four cores and 4GB of RAM. We could host three servers per VDS while saving $10pm, or even 4 servers and save $30pm.

In some cases going with a VDS can be cheaper, but it really just depends on what you're running. Such as it wouldn't be more costly to run BF3/BF4 from a VDS since it's pretty CPU intensive. It'd be cheaper, but your performance would suffer with anything over 48 slots. Now running 4 TF2 servers on a VDS would make sense. It's not too bad on resources so it's unlikely you'll run into a single server eating up an entire core or sucking down GB of memory.

I really would have preferred a dedicated server and we did get a trial one last month from a different host 6/core 16GB RAM etc for $110pm but the network just wasn't good enough to support the game servers and we had to bug out. Your costs are a little pricey for us.

Our dedicated server prices are actually extremely competitive at the moment, especially the E3-1270. Though, unless you truly need an entire machine. I don't recommend it. It's a lot of power and unless your game is one that's eating up entire cores(NS2/BF4/Arma2-3) a VDS should do you fairly well.

I have been taking a look at your VDS setup and especially at your boast that they are essentially as good as a dedicated server. I would never want to go down the route of a VPS where you share all resources with other users but if you are saying that we have dedicated cores then that seems a viable option to me.

Since we're selling VDS's and not VPS's they are 100% dedicated. No matter if you're using it or if they're sitting idle for days, they are always dedicated to you and you only. We talk a bit more about our VDS performance here, if you're curious.
http://www.nfoservers.com/forums/viewto ... =47&t=5099
http://www.nfoservers.com/forums/viewto ... =47&t=4940

The questions are:
- Can the VDS be upgraded on the fly as far as RAM goes, without restarts?
- If the host machine runs out of hardware to supply, would we be moved to a different box?
- Would we suffer IP changes in any upgrades?
- Can we specify that each VDS we get would be on a different physical box?
(this is to prevent all eggs in one basket).
- If we chose Windows OS - am I to assume that I would have to account for 1 - 2 GB of OS memory, (therefore 4GB server would need to be 6GB really).

For the sake of length, I'm just going to answer this in order without quoting.

1. Ram can be upgraded but a reboot of the VDS is always required
2. In the case of an upgrade, yes. Our system would automatically move you to a new machine while retaining your files and IPs.
3. For a generic upgrade(ram,ssd or additional cores) you would not lose your IP.
4. You cannot and generally don't need to since all resources are fully dedicated(Though, we can move you to a new machine at no cost if needed)
5. That's a bit high, but yes, you would need to account for OS memory. For Win2k8R2 you'd likely be looking at 300-600 megs~

I'm assuming you don't supply a game panel? game files? etc and that's all up to me?

For managed we supply everything. You get our standard game server control panel, plus a new VDS control panel. We'd also automatically install the game files of your choosing. Unmanaged you'd still get a VDS control panel, but would be responsible for everything else.

[.=QUACK=.Major.Pain]

You could find the same hardware for cheaper elsewhere but it's on very poor networks which in the end you would be cursing the lag or freeze ups.

You will find here for the price your paying, your provided the best of everything. You won't find any issues.

[Edge100x]

For CoD-series games, a VDS here will work very well. Those games are light on CPU and use a reasonable amount of memory, by modern standards. You could likely fit a couple per CPU core with room to spare.

Since you can upgrade at any time and all of your files are retained, I recommend starting small and upgrading if you find that you're running out of resources. When you submit the upgrade request (before you finalize the changes), the system will let you know if you need to be moved to a new machine as part of the process, and about how long it will take.

[Sitting-Duc]

Thank-you for your prompt and thorough responses

I'm kind of in a limbo over managed/unmanaged. Also Linux/Windows. I know there are some issues with Linux and COD4/5 that the game will not load maps over a certain size and as we run custom maps that's a problem. So ideally it would have to be Windows.

managed vs unmanaged... we run bigbrotherbots and ideally I would have them run on the local machines. Do you support their installation at all on managed setups? If not I have to go unmanaged and that adds in a TCAdmin additional fee, which isn't really a problem but I guess just less savings.

In the end with either managed or unmanaged I think that due to the amount of servers we have that we should be able to supply a higher quality of service to our users and I think a VDS is the way to go.

Thanks, Duc

[.=QUACK=.Major.Pain]

They don't offer big brother bot so that is something you would have to install.

[kraze]

Thank-you for your prompt and thorough responses

I'm kind of in a limbo over managed/unmanaged. Also Linux/Windows. I know there are some issues with Linux and COD4/5 that the game will not load maps over a certain size and as we run custom maps that's a problem. So ideally it would have to be Windows.

managed vs unmanaged... we run bigbrotherbots and ideally I would have them run on the local machines. Do you support their installation at all on managed setups? If not I have to go unmanaged and that adds in a TCAdmin additional fee, which isn't really a problem but I guess just less savings.

In the end with either managed or unmanaged I think that due to the amount of servers we have that we should be able to supply a higher quality of service to our users and I think a VDS is the way to go.

Thanks, Duc

We don't support B3 at all on our manged systems. There is also a bug in it which causes it not to retrieve FTP logs properly on Wink2k8R2(which is what we use internally). As for running it on an unmanaged VDS. You can do so, but it doesn't necessarily need to be ran locally. We've actually seen problems with customers who run B3 on active servers since it's disk intensive. So ideally you should put the database on an SSD.

[soja]

On managed, NFO does not support the COD series on linux. If you decide to go managed, it must be windows.

Have you looked at some free game panels? I haven't personally, but they do exist, and it may be something worth checking out.

[Sitting-Duc]

We currently have a dedicated server that has a Hex-core CPU @ 2.8Ghz, 16GB RAM, 1TB HDD that we run our communities websites, filehosting and the B3 Bots (around 12 of them) from.

I have come across the FTP bug with using B3 and Windows servers before, our workaround is to have the host open the log file (requiring authentication) to be accessible via HTTP. If we went with a managed server and kept B3 where it currently is could this be done for us?

Thanks, Duc

EDIT: @soja I have looked at the free panels and although some good ones exist for Linux the free ones for Windows (which is what I use) are not great. /offtopic Have you done modding for Crysis/Wars in the past?

[.=QUACK=.Major.Pain]

Have you tried ezugcc? We have used it for several years now. It has a free version and is simple to install. Licensed version is $25 per server per year but is negotiable if you have a lot of servers if you pm the owner. He also provides quick support via his forum.

He is currently adding auto installer but not ready yet.

[soja]

We currently have a dedicated server that has a Hex-core CPU @ 2.8Ghz, 16GB RAM, 1TB HDD that we run our communities websites, filehosting and the B3 Bots (around 12 of them) from.

I have come across the FTP bug with using B3 and Windows servers before, our workaround is to have the host open the log file (requiring authentication) to be accessible via HTTP. If we went with a managed server and kept B3 where it currently is could this be done for us?

Thanks, Duc

EDIT: @soja I have looked at the free panels and although some good ones exist for Linux the free ones for Windows (which is what I use) are not great. /offtopic Have you done modding for Crysis/Wars in the past?

I have not done any crysis modding I have played both a significant amount though.

[Sitting-Duc]

Could I get an answer on if it is possible to open up the log file to HTTP access (with authentication) if we went with a managed VDS?

Thanks, Duc

[kraze]

Could I get an answer on if it is possible to open up the log file to HTTP access (with authentication) if we went with a managed VDS?

Thanks, Duc

Doing so would not be possible on a managed system.