Recommended high performance servers

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Geriatrix

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I'm working on a app that might or might not be really popular.

It's going to rely heavily on Facebook through Open Graph but would also require some data to be stored and loaded in my own database and of course handle the traffic associated with those activities.

Now the nature of the app would mean that if it's successful(big if) its growth would be crazy. Maybe from 200 sign ups in the first month to about 3 million by next year. Maybe more :D.

I suspect most people would use the app about once a week.

The data stored would be mostly text like email addresses, descriptions and links but maybe a small image here or there would be added later so space would be less important than traffic.

Which hosts would you recommend I look at which would be able to handle that amount of growth in international traffic?
Two obvious ones that come to mind are Rackspace and Amazon but I'd like to hear some other recommendations.
 
I think cloud based servers such as Amazon is the way to go. Use it when you are small and can very big, very quickly when you need it to.
 
Amazon from experience. Easy to scale up or down based on your needs. One of the guys at work slapped together a small application thats communicates with other social networks and it runs on Amazon with great success. We have nearly 2 dozen Amazon instances running already.

But with Facebook, just remember they are changing their API and its making it more of pain to use some of the authentication services.
 
Meh.

Translate what you just said into MB/second.
That will give you the size of the backbone that you will require the server to be on.

Then calculate what kind of machine will be required to run your application on at the maximum load.
That will give you the processing power and memory load that you will require.

Now, double that.

Now you can start looking for a hosting provider.

What you're asking is the same as saying: How fast is a pair of tackies in a sandstorm coming from behind at maximum speed. It's big and scarey, but lacking in essential details like the running prowess of the person wearing the shoes and the wind-power of the storm.

All that aside, I would look at getting a virtual private server (VPS) at a hosting provider that is capable of moving the VPS onto faster hardware as required.
 
cbrunsdonza said:
Amazon from experience. Easy to scale up or down based on your needs. One of the guys at work slapped together a small application thats communicates with other social networks and it runs on Amazon with great success. We have nearly 2 dozen Amazon instances running already.

But with Facebook, just remember they are changing their API and its making it more of pain to use some of the authentication services.
Click to expand...
Cool,2 votes for Amazon so far. They seem to struggle with Reddit but then again that's like 30% of the internet. :D

Regarding FB, yeah I know they're a pain but they would be absolutely essential to getting the critical mass required to get this app from interesting hobby to holy **** I can buy a yacht.

To make matters worse I'm not really technically gifted and I've only started learning to code in the last year or so and the learning curves been pretty steep. I also don't know any developers personally that would be a good personality match for a co-founder so it's a solo mission on the rough seas ahead for me at the moment.

Any other suggestions?
 
davemc said:
What you're asking is the same as saying: How fast is a pair of tackies in a sandstorm coming from behind at maximum speed. It's big and scarey, but lacking in essential details like the running prowess of the person wearing the shoes and the wind-power of the storm.

All that aside, I would look at getting a virtual private server (VPS) at a hosting provider that is capable of moving the VPS onto faster hardware as required.
Click to expand...
I know its pretty vague right. That's why I'm asking for general suggestions. Which VPS provider would you recommend?
 
Your best bet would be to either cluster dedicated servers or scale virtual machines. I second the recommendation of scaling a virtual machine because it presents a lower barrier of entry.

You could also start out with a server which has a config optimised for database operations but that route will cost a lot of capital.
 
Another option would be to consider something like Google's App Engine or Microsoft's Azure. These services are meant to scale by default.

Just throwing it out there....
 
Thanks for the replies. :)

RSkeens said:
Your best bet would be to either cluster dedicated servers or scale virtual machines. I second the recommendation of scaling a virtual machine because it presents a lower barrier of entry.

You could also start out with a server which has a config optimised for database operations but that route will cost a lot of capital.
Click to expand...
Any specific recommendations?

dequadin said:
Another option would be to consider something like Google's App Engine or Microsoft's Azure. These services are meant to scale by default.

Just throwing it out there....
Click to expand...
Yeah I looked at G App Engine. Seems to require Python though and I've got enough on my plate already without diving into yet another scripting language.
Hmm, Microsoft. Wonder if they'll allow me to run Apache... :D
 
A bigger question would be is, how much would you want to spend a month on this?

You can get quite a high-end dedicated server for $200 that could take the punch. I have one and yesterday got hammered with 5-8 requests per second and it stood up fairly well without much load (had to tweak apache since it was queuing a bit)
 
The best thing to do is test it on your own dedicated server as AcidRaZor suggested.

Best place to ask such a question would be www.webhostingtalk.com

But for a recommended server I'd try LeaseWeb, Hivelocity & FDCServers

I have multiple machines from all of them and they are all top class(fdc is improving lol) and great prices. I have web sites that get an average of 4,000-5,000 sign ups per month, doing just fine on the dedicated machines!
 
Geriatrix said:
Thanks for the replies. :)


Any specific recommendations?


Yeah I looked at G App Engine. Seems to require Python though and I've got enough on my plate already without diving into yet another scripting language.
Hmm, Microsoft. Wonder if they'll allow me to run Apache... :D
Click to expand...

Not necessarily? Java, perhaps? I guess "it depends"...

sn3rd's version of Farlig's UPFRONT DISCLAIMER (©FarligOpptreden 2009) :
It depends... Copyright © 2010 sn3rd
Click to expand...
 
@Geriatrix: Check out Amazon's free tier. You can probably use that for prototyping.
 
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