Running GSA on home network vs VPS
I notice this question has been covered in official FAQ but I am looking for some further suggestions for my situation. I just got GSA and CS, running 4-5 campaigns at once in my home network - which offers unlimited bandwidth and up to 25 mbps per second.
I am aware that many users choose to run GSA on a VPS mainly due to bandwidth and a fast computer. In my situation, since my ISP offers unlimited bandwidth and I just bought myself a i7 computer, would you guys still suggest me running it on a VPS instead?
I was under the impression that with a fast computer + unlimited bandwidth + OK fast internet connection + private proxies, it should get the job done. However, something is telling me that this is not good enough and I am still missing some core reasons why many chose to go VPS instead.
Please give me some pointers on this. Thanks
Please give me some pointers on this. Thanks
Comments
Of course ISP companies mean unlimited with "reasonable use" even if they don't say that to you. Usually if you go over 300/400 G they will flag/ban you though. This is your only problem since you have a powerful pc and fast internet connection. ( although the VPS is even faster around 100/mb to 1000mb per second)
Unlimited plans in my country get flagged after 300/350 g per month. First month I get a warning and they reduce the speed to prevent you from going over that limit. Second month they ban you forever!. I don't know about your country though but my guess that it will be around the same limit and procedures. If you care you can give it a try and figure it out yourself.
I am in the same boat as @ninjaphp, I have a fast rig running a I7 2600K Sandy bridge over clocked to 4.2 Ghz and 32 GB RAM which is powered by a 1200w power supply and then i use liquid cooling - I have a 50 Mbps download and 5 Mbps upload - unlimited usage at home.
My pc is running 24/7 apart from the occasional restart and power cut. The problem is a fast pc running at full blast 24/7 use allot of electricity so one have to look also if moving to a VPS will save you how much in electrical bill charges.
The problem i have with VPS's is that the resources is much less than a desktop like mine and the high ends normally come with 4 GB RAM which is not much compared to my 32GB, but the main shortfall is cpu's most VPS the cpu is just not enough for me to blast away. The suppliers like Poweruphosting now are using the Interl E3 - 1240 or 1270 V2 CPU's which are awesome cpu's but consider that you will be sharing it with about 7 other people which all use a single pc with vitalization, then it is not much.
Since my pc is running 24/7, In my view the only thing that a VPS can offer me more is network speed, but then again, does one really need 1000mbps or even 100mbps - does this not create the possibility of building links to fast, maybe my home pc network speed force me to build links slightly slower which will look more naturally.
If i did not run my pc 24/7 and push it so hard then i can reduce electricity bills by about USD 30 \ pm - which in my view does not justify a vps.
But then again not everyone is so lucky to have fast public networks which offer unlimited usage like some of us, I know for instance in South Africa internet is about 10 years behind hat you will get in the USA or Europe or Thailand ( which is where i am) - in south Africa a fast connection at home is something link 3mbps \ 512 kbps and then it is capped and you will pay your backside off if you go over the cap. -- For those kind of situations a VPS is definitely the only option.
Conclusion:
So if you have a fast connection at home, unlimited bandwith and a fast pc then skip vps
If you have a slow connection ( like the South Africans) and have bandwith cap then get a VPS
If you have a fast connection at home, unlimited bandwith and a fast pc but too much money then get a dedicated server with a ssd and 16gb ram 1000mbps port speed @ about $300\pm and run windows on it.
After running SER on my home PC for a few days with the number of threads to use to 100 and also checked the
little box below thread settings : "monitor PC resources and
automatically lower threads". I think the last mentioned option to auto
adjust threads is crucial if running from either a VPS or home pc but
more so on a VPS as resources are limited.
I am running Ultimate
demon at the same time on 30 threads and it is working 24/7 same as GSA
SER - Sometimes UD only have a handful of task in the schedule so not
using much resources, in those cases in notices GSA SER auto adjusting
and using more threads.
GSA SER also auto adjust according to what
it is doing for instance submitting, searching or verifying links. GSA
SER is continuously adjusting threads and it varies between 30 and 100
with average being around 60
I have also kept an eye on my bandwidth usage and below is a screenshot of the hourly bandwidth usage since i started monitoring
Please
note this is all my bandwidth from Ultimate demon, GSA ser, GSA seo
indexer, checking mails and in the last 4 hours of the graph i uploaded
+/- 2,000 articles to different blogs of mine via xmlrpc
Conclusion:
There is no need for me yet, to move to a VPS as my home connection and PC is more than capable of handling everything
I've found SER runs faily ok at 15 threads, which seems to be the limit on this VPS package if I'm running indexer @ 5 threads and Indexer at the same time, provided that CS doesn't crash - then all hell breaks loose and I struggle to even restart it!
I've even gone so far as to move my other SEO tools like SE Nuke, Spyglass etc to a separate VPS, so it's literally just GSA and supporting tools running. Despite this extremely conservative setup, the CPU taps out at 100% for several seconds at a time, and the VPS hangs frequently to a point where I can't even end tasks.
So, although I'm South African (crap internet), I've wondered if performance would be better on a local dedicated PC so resources are less of an issue. @royalmice you're in a good position because your internet speed means you can run a machine from your house, and it seems you can run pretty high volumes without being flagged. Unfortunaltey I know the answer's "no" in my case because of "reasonable use" (we have that too despite crap internet speed!), and of course my dismal 4mb speed (that's the highest available in most areas in SA including mine, up to 10mb in certain areas in SA).
I'm thinking of upgrading the VPS to 4 Core 4GB and see how that goes, but honestly all these VPS's are starting to get a bit costly. So the next question is, perhaps dedicated is the answer? Well, that opens a whole slew of other things you now also have to manage, and of course it's at least 4 times the price of a 2 Core VPS.
I may have missed something, but so far there's little feedback on "minimum requirements" or optimal setups for GSA. It would be nice to hear from other power users what works for them. I have a business built around SEO, so it's really important to me to know what works and what doesn't - so far, I only know what doesn't and am purely speculating on what does...
Even though the dedicated server is 4 times the cost of 2GB RAM and 2CPU plan, but dedicated servers are always much more powerful than a VPS (it's as good as running 8x of those VPS together)
If you have the budget and if you wanna do some serious link building then dedicated server is the way to go.
I have many customers running GSA on my dedicated server @300-400 threads with CS (Latest version which fixes the memory leak issue) along with 50-70 Projects and the CPU consumption is barely around 20-40% max on 100 Mbps port. With such a powerful server, you are left with a lot of extra unused resources which you can utilize to run tools like Ultimate Demon, Senuke Xcr, etc.
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This is what I would always suggest to each and every person
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1) If someone is just starting out then stick with a VPS. Make sure you don't spend anything more than your budget. It's very crucial to keep your expenses low initially when you are just starting out.
2) Once you start making money and see your profits going up, upgrade your VPS to a better version with more resources, this way you can handle multiple projects.
3) As you start making good profits (After 3-5 months), upgrade and get a dedicated server for yourself. You will instantly feel the difference and power.
4) As you keep growing in terms of profits, get multiple dedicated server for various purpose as overloading one server is never a good idea, but again, never spend anything more than what you can afford.
@ ninjaphp
I
have been running my set up with Ulyimate demon at 40 threads for
almost a year now and no problems at all with ISP. My ISP is very
generous and even throttle bandwith during non peak periods. So ( touch
wood ) the added bandwith from GSA SER should not be too much of a
problem.
@ Ruggero
It is pretty obvious that you cant run all those things ( senuke, gsa ser, gsa indexer etc) on a VPS with just 2GB RAM
I
would suggest just keep GSA SER + GSA SEO indexer on that VPS and then
set it to 100 threads but tick the box to monitor resources, if your
machine cant handle that then take it up 25% at a time untill your
machine reached its peak. --- Alternatively get a Dedicated Windows
server with at least 16GB RAM - Poweruphosting can set you one up for
about $300 - $400 \ pm
@ poweruphosting
My
concern with the high threads up to 300 - 400 is CS -- Mine bearely
keep up with 100 threads ( I have it set as main CS solver and retries
is set to 5 and then for the 2nd CS solver i use the new service Image
Decoders. Cant wait for the new GSA CB to come out
Can you tell me the average solve time of CS
Are you only running GSA SER or other tools as well.
IN GSA SER Capcha settings - how many times to you retry with CS
Thanks for the help
@poweruphosting - ok thanks that's good to know. It just started to seem hopeless frankly, so it's good to know that there is a point where GSA and supporting tools can't consume the entire PC's resources! Plus if there's still space for other tools I can drop my other VPS as well, to help compensate with the cost difference. Do you still have dedicated servers available? I couldn't find the page on your website. If you do, which package do you recommend? I'm ready to look into this seriously. Please feel free to PM me.
Happy new year everyone!
Also, with Sven's new upcoming Captcha Breaker, you should be able to push GSA at even 500 threads because Captcha Breaker is much better, stable and faster from what I have heard when it comes to handling high threads.
@Ruggero Sent you a PM
You are running GSA SER on a VPS with 1 GB RAM together with other SEO tools and 300 threads is not a problem ?? How many campaigns did u test with.
I previously ran a vps with Ultimate Demon ( 60 threads ) + No Hands SEO + Capcha Sniper + VAGEX + Proxy Goblin on a 4GB VPS and it kept failing due to lack of resources.
I think the E3 - 1240-70 V2 CPU's you have in your VPS's are excellent cpu's but unfortunately the 4GB ram is not sufficient to run all these powerfull seo tools at full blast - I would rather go for a dedicated windows server with the same cpu fast HD ( like a SSD) and at least 16GB of RAM ( 32GB would be ideal)
Totaly agree on the new GSA CB - It will be awesome.
My conclusions still stand as earlier mentioned:
Conclusion:
So if you have a fast connection at home, unlimited bandwith and a fast pc then skip vps
If you have a slow connection ( like the South Africans) and have bandwith cap then get a VPS
If you have a fast connection at home, unlimited bandwith and a fast pc but
too much money then get a dedicated server with a ssd and 16gb ram
1000mbps port speed @ about $300\pm and run windows on it.
My suggestion is (if you can afford it) get a dedicated server! You WON'T look back at VPS's that's for sure! Maybe some1's had better luck on a 4-core, 4gig VPS running GSA? I don't have personal experience with that setup, suffice to say that I think anything lower and trying to run GSA and supporting apps is a complete waste of time.