UK/Eurpoean Dedicated server: OVH vs Hetzner vs Online.net - your experiences ...

CTXMedia

Well-known member
I'm looking to move to a new dedicated server (self-managed) and have narrowed the choice down to three European providers:
Ideally I'm looking for Intel Xeon + 64GB RAM + 2x480GB SSD/NVMe in RAID1- with CentOS and CPanel/WHM.

I'm based in the UK and the majority of visitors are from the UK, however the French/German server warehouse pricing is much more competitive than what I can find in the UK (unless anyone has suggestions for warehouses I might not have come across?) which is why I'm looking at these three.

I wondered if any of you host with any of these providers and what your experiences have been? Any feedback appreciated on hardware support response, network speed, bandwidth limits (or not if you don't exceed them), website response after moving, etc. and any other pros or cons for a particular provider.

Cheers,
Shaun :D
 
Check out Vultr. They have datacenters in London, Amsterdam, Paris and Frankfurt. I've been using their VPS in Frankfurt for couple of months, no complaints so far.

They also have kind of 50% discount. During signup you can add funds to your account, they'll give same amount for free, effectively giving you 50% discount for few months.
 
Check out Vultr.

Think you must have missed the part where he was looking for a dedicated server. A 64G instance on Vultr (which is NOT a dedicated server) is something like $400/mo. Yikes!

Hetzner does not offer DDoS protection last time I checked, so if that is a concern, you will need to go with someone else. At the same time, they have hands down the best network out of the 3. To keep that network good, they don't have any form of oversold unmetered bandwidth, like you will find with the other two.

Online.net has setup fees, which is absolutely silly for non-custom servers that are set up 100% via automated means.

OVH is OVH. Some people love them, some people hate them. I hate them, personally.
 
Hetzner does not offer DDoS protection last time I checked
They introduced DDoS Protection last August:
https://forum.hetzner.de/thread/23562-ddos-mitigation/?postID=239250#post239250 (needs registration)
allo Zusammen,

Wir haben ueber die letzten Monate verschiedene Systeme zur Abwehr von DDOS-Angriffen getestet und inzwischen auch ein System implementiert. Dieses besteht im wesentlichen aus 3 Ebenen ueber welche wir in der Lage sind Angriffstraffic von validen Traffic zu trennen.

1. Automatische Erkennung von Angriffsmustern

Neben der bisherigen Erkennung basierend auf der Trafficmenge und Paketmenge sind wir nun in der Lage den eigentlichen Angriff genauer einzugrenzen. Dadurch koennen wir genauer auf den verwendeten Angriffstyp eingehen. Ein UDP-Flood mit 500k pps ist fuer Server kein Problem. 500k SYN Pakete koennen aber schon ein Problem darstellen. Genau diese Unterscheidung ist jetzt moeglich.

2. Filtern des Traffics nach bekannten Angriffsmustern.

Auf dieser Ebene werden die haeufig verwendeten Angriffe gefiltert. Somit koennen wir Angriffe sehr effizient herausfiltern. Dies betrifft besonders die haeufig auftretenden Angriffe wie DNS-Reflection oder UDP Floods auf Port80

3. Challenge-Response-Authentifizierung und Dynamische Trafficfilterung

Hierbei werden Angriffe wie SYN-Floods, DNS-Floods und Invalid Packets gefiltert. Auch koennen wir an dieser Stelle sehr flexibel auf einzelne Angriffe reagieren.

Insgesamt ist es natuerlich notwendig das wir Default-Werte definieren welche fuer alle Kunden funktionieren. Daher sind unsere aktuellen Filter sehr zurueckhaltend konfiguriert. Wir schauen uns aber alle Angriffe an und versuchen unsere Filter und Responses zu verbessern.

Sollte jemand Ziel eines Angriffes werden welchen wir nicht erkennen oder unzureichend filtern koennt ihr euch gern melden. Wir werden das dann untersuchen und schauen wie wir auf diesen Angriff reagieren koennen.

Ich hoffe das in Zukunft keine Server mehr wegen eingehender Angriffe gesperrt werden muessen.

Gruss
Martin

---
Martin Fritzsche
Netzwerksupport
Also: https://www.lowendtalk.com/discussion/100344/hetzner-ddos-protection
https://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/DDoS-Schutz/en
 
Thanks @TJA - I've already tried SyS but needed a bit more bandwidth and disk space than the ones in their list.

I had narrowed it down to OVH and Hetzner yesterday afternoon, but after trawling the web for reviews and comparisons of the two, I came across Clouvider - who have servers based in London with 1Gbps uplink and who are having a dedicate server sale, making the cost of a dedicated box with them comparable with the pricing from OVH.

I got in touch via the website with a query about customising the spec - to fit larger NVMe SSDs - not expecting a quick reply, or much chance of any customisation (after all, they had a sale on and it's usually "as is" for sale items) but within the hour I had a friendly and personal reply with an offer to customise the spec and give me 2 x Samsung 960 pro 512GB for a very reasonable upgrade price - one that I couldn't refuse!! :D Better hardware, more bandwidth, good support, UK location, and an excellent reputation for quality service provision - all good. (y)

I exchanged a few more emails into the late evening to clarify spec/pricing, and ordered the new server this morning. :):):)

Cheers,
Shaun :D
 
In response to this topic, I have added the OVH and Hetzner to the TAZ Hosting Companies reviews:

I'm sure some reviews will be added in time so that questions & comparison like this will be easier to answer. Feel free to add more hosts.

How is this helpful at all? There are no reviews there! Not a single one. All you did was copy and paste some promotional text off of these peoples' websites. spam/clickbait!


I came across Clouvider - who have servers based in London with 1Gbps uplink and who are having a dedicate server sale...

I can vouch for Cloudvider. Very good provider as well, and the owner is very active in his company.
 
How is this helpful at all? There are no reviews there!
Thats because I just added the listings. It will take a little time before forum admins add reviews and the overview of hosts will become useful to XenForo admins like us.
 
Thats because I just added the listings. It will take a little time before forum admins add reviews and the overview of hosts will become useful to XenForo admins like us.

So.....why refer someone to a page that has absolutely no useful information or value? Spammity spam spam!
 
I just answered that very very question. But you very well know that. I find it useful to get a full overview of hosting companies and this thread inspired me to do so. The same people in this thread have been discussing hosts years before and will be doing the same in the years to come. I find it valuable in that sense and some will feel the same.
Spammity spam spam!
lol. Is this an alias of Mike Edge?
 
Please add Clouvider too - they've been great so far and I'm impressed before they've even delivered my new server (which should be ready soon). :D
 
Please add Clouvider too - they've been great so far and I'm impressed before they've even delivered my new server (which should be ready soon). :D

Like I said, they're a really good provider. Know the owner personally and can vouch for them. :) You're going to be happy there.
 
I use OVH with no complaints, but haven't called their support line in roughly 18 months. The only issues were occasional network-related that were minor.

Would be interested in your experience with Clouvider.
 
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