Suggestions on where to host a SMF. - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Ampera
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 27, 2017, 03:06:45 pm
content: Looking for a good place to host a Simple Machines Forum on the internet. I can't say what the forum is for exactly, but it's likely to be fairly active, maybe not as much as this one, but it's probably going to have maybe 100 users at a time.It needs to be in the US (East cost would be nice) as it's where the whole operation is located. Price is everything, as long as it can hold a simple Simple Machines Forum, it should be cool.I was thinking about GoDaddy's web hosting, but I'm not sure how well the performance will keep up with 100-200 users at a time.

author: kalel
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 27, 2017, 03:15:50 pm
content: I would suggest perhaps a VPS for usually better performance than shared hosting, but stability and price can differ.You could use those that aren't a VPS, but have some similarities (scalable container hosting systems).The problem with some shared hosting providers is that they simply don't give you all of the details. Especially those with "unlimited space and bandwidth".But definitely you can use a shared hosting too (others, all but a dedicated server, are also shared in some way, so I refer to the old fashioned "standard" shared hosting systems - sometimes you just don't know what's in the background), and the others are just potential alternatives.One thing you could do isask themif their hosting (whichever plan you intend to get, or ask them to recommend the right plan) can support a SMF with up to 100-200 users at a time.I suspect they will not just say "yes yes" and will likely provide you a proper response (they have an incentive, perhaps you will purchase the more expensive plan, or have a better experience with them and etc).Before purchasing, feel free to ask them, even if you don't get a useful reply, you will learn something about how their customer support/relations are (this is really important if you run into any issues later on).Once you set it up, you can experiment with something like Cloudflare (this forum is using it), because it can cache some content and serve it from their servers. This can reduce the amount of bandwidth that your server uses and there's usually a free plan that does that. But, whether it's faster or slower, you can/should test yourself.

author: Ampera
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 27, 2017, 03:34:33 pm
content: I'm more looking for exact names, what good deals are out there. I'm aware that a VPS is the best option, but they are incredibly expensive. I would definitely like to find something that's a good deal.

author: Zbig
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 27, 2017, 04:57:45 pm
content: LeaseWeb

author: rdl
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 27, 2017, 05:19:09 pm
content: I have a site hosted by Nearly Free Speech which is basically pay as you go. Since traffic on my site is tiny, it costs practically nothing. My biggest expense is the annual domain name renewal. I have no idea how competitive their pricing at high usage though.https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/

author: Ampera
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 27, 2017, 06:42:57 pm
content: Quote from: Zbig on July 27, 2017, 04:57:45 pmThat actually looks cool. I am a tad wary of the 10TB limit. I don't reasonably think it will be surpassed, but just saying, what would happen if it were?This is also a monthly limit? The cap resets every billing cycle, correct?

author: kalel
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 27, 2017, 06:51:30 pm
content: Quote from: TwoOfFive on July 27, 2017, 06:42:57 pmI would like to mention that it's probably reasonable to be more suspect of websites that say "unlimited" than those that specify a limit, whatever it may be.

author: Zbig
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 28, 2017, 03:24:29 pm
content: Quote from: TwoOfFive on July 27, 2017, 06:42:57 pmI don't remember but I'm pretty sure it's all thoroughly explained on their website. I guess they'd charge you overage for exceeding your quota.

author: rstofer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 28, 2017, 05:05:01 pm
content: Given the licensing of SMF, are you sure this is the best way to go?In response to the FAQ "Do I need to know how to program..."Quotehttp://www.whoishostingthis.com/compare/simple-machines-forum/#

author: Red Squirrel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 28, 2017, 06:30:23 pm
content: Quote from: rstofer on July 28, 2017, 05:05:01 pmWow, I was not aware of that. I have been working on converting some of my old down forums into a single large forum and went with SMF but had to modify the code extensively for it to work, as posts are sorted by ID and not by date.I wonder how enforced it really is though, like especially something like the change I did is not really easily visible without seeing the code.As for a place to host, for a large forum that may see 100's of users at once I'd go with a dedicated server. Check out OVH. I think they have servers in the US too. Downside is that they don't offer auto payment. I don't get why but it's annoying and kinda stressful knowing that I need to manually keep up with payments or I could lose my server. They do send reminders though so I tend to do several months in advance.

author: Ampera
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 28, 2017, 06:31:33 pm
content: Quote from: rstofer on July 28, 2017, 05:05:01 pmI don't plan to directly modify the forum. The simplicity and ease of use of the software is one of it's main appeals to me.