Sounds like you've been using VPSs for a while. Do you have an opinion on the virtualization tech used for various hosts (xen, virtuozzo, etc).
I haven't knowingly used virtuozzo for anything so I can't say. Most VPS I've had have been xen-based, but the hardware behind it seems to make more of a difference. I've got two virtualized xen projects right now, and same code on seemingly same virtualized hardware specs still yield pretty different results on some tests.