Comment by cpinto | Hacker News Reader

Comment by cpinto | Hacker News Reader

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agreed but for different reasons. in terms of bang for the buck EC2 is awful if you want it up 24/7. And then you get other problems with EC2 too, the biggest one being it's non-persistent storage (but that's something everyone already knows and is happy to ignore).

Yes, it's possible to design an application to either not use a database at all, by storing _all_ your data on S3, or to implement some workarounds that deal with DB master-slave replication, store commit logs on S3, etc etc etc. Question is: is it worth it? In my opinion, no.

S3 is great if you want to store images, movies, etc and aren't very popular worldwide. EC2 is great if you need extra processing power to deal with extra traffic coming from those Digg/Slashdot stories, or doing batch processing like converting movie formats, but going 24/7 on simple EC2 or EC2+S3 (using S3 as a database and not just for storing media files) is more of a hassle than a "good enough" solution. VPS is definitely the way to go if you cannot afford to lease a couple of servers or some rackspace for the cheap 1u boxes you can buy at ebay.

Even if used 24/7 is EC2 that bad value wise? Assuming it costs about $70/month for one instance it is a lot cheaper than most dedicated servers. EC2 is a lot more powerful than the average VPS, that is not really a fair comparison. I would say it is pretty good value if you need (almost) 2gb ram and a fast processor.

If Amazon sorts out the other issues EC2 could be really great.

No, not really. Possibly this depends on where you are at but here in Portugal (where I am), I can get a better physical server for about 80Eur/month, which is only a bit more for what I would pay for an EC2 instance (including network traffic). Is it worth the extra dollars? I think so.

Also, even though S3 doubles as a backup medium (and you _must_ backup your database), if you want a database running on EC2 you _must_ go for S3 to store your information. That too will increase your costs.

And on top of all that, you have to spend some time tweaking and testing your configuration (and testing again). If you're short on working hands, the time you spend on this activity may not be worth it.

I think that, unless you're doing it just for fun, you should let someone else help Amazon sort out the kinks of their system.

In the end, having your entire system on EC2 will not give you an edge over your competition, but the time you save by not doing it probably will.

I was just making a comparison of pricing. Not everyone needs a database, and not everyone will be too bothered by the other EC2s drawbacks. For my app the persistent storage issue doesn't matter, and EC2 is good value for a number of other reasons. I agree that for the OP's needs EC2 probably isn't worth bothering with.

Would you mind pointing me in the direction of some cheap hardware, or something to Google for? I'm totally clueless in that respect, and am doing research, but any help would be greatly appreciated.

I don't really need a monstrosity, just something small and reliable.

Before answering this let me tell you that I cannot endorse any of the services because I've never used them so I don't know how good or bad a service they provide. You'll have to check this for yourself (google for opinions, etc.).

Slicehost and other similar services (VPS') are about as cheap as it can get but bear in mind that you're sharing hardware with other people so don't assume you'll be the only one using the server.

If you want real hardware, google for "managed hosting". Alternatively, if you already have a 1u server lying around or can get hold to one (or more) it may be cheaper to search for "colocation services" which should show you some companies that will provide rackspace for your servers.

Renting hardware may be cheaper but if you buy a couple of servers on ebay and go for colocation, in the event of your business going belly up you can sell the hardware and maybe get enough money to last you for a couple of months while you search for a job or make new plans for world domination.

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