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If a provider offers you a 1 year free 1GB RAM, 50GB HD, 4vCPU XEN VPS no string attached...
vRozenSch00n
Member
in General
You know the performance is not very good in terms of machine and network blend, support just fair enough, pricing a little high, ToS very strict, what would you do? Would you:
- Recommend the provider eagerly to others with 5 shining stars.
- Recommend the provider while providing evidence of the real fact.
- Simply use it for 1 year without recommending or promoting them.
- Turn the offer down.
Comments
Four. I'd be putting the VPS to waste by having it idling.
@Damian Good point
@awson not even use it for testing?
I would do both #1 and #2, if its a pretty good preforming VPS that is :P. If its just a low resource VPS it would just be used for a bouncer and prob forgotten about.
I'm too lazy for that; and 1 year to test is overkill.
Maybe setup some little app like small sites or private proxy and give others freely.
^ Yes I do mean leave it idling and waste the IPv4.
I'd setup a gameserver.
What option will you choose #1, #2, or #3
I'd probably do number 1 or 2. It doesn't really hurt to say something nice about a product, especially if it's true. Plus it's free.
I would do option 2
Option 2. Honestly review it and make clear that you were given the server for free.
Option 2
Obviously not option 1 and 2, since the performance are not very good.
Provide feedback, and see what improvement they can do. If no improvement is happening, either tell honest experience/review or just stick with #3.
3 then ask for another year.
@Fritz lol
@Fritz
+1
You would do anything
2
2 and ask for another year
Option 3.
1 and 2 are out as I know the performance is not very good (OP) and I'm not going to recommend the provider (also OP) if the performance is poor.
4 is out as I think it's impolite to refuse gifts
2 but probably 4 and more context is needed
Take the offer, look at the performance for a week (if there is no improvement from the beginning) then option 4.
Turn it down. Like Damian says, you don't have any leverage.
I would take the offer. Depending on how bad it is, I might just forget about it after that.
1 and 2. Free is free. I'd use it as a backup file server where performance isn't exactly an issue
That would be disingenuous. If performance is "not very good", it's in no way a 5-star product. If support is adequate, that's fair enough. If pricing is high, that again detracts from the value for money of it, but it's up to people to judge that for themselves. Pricing and ToS are there for all to see. Caveat emptor. If they had particularly stupid clauses, I might point them out.
What is there to recommend about a product that's "not very good"? Unless everyone's getting them for free, people will be paying for them. If people are paying for them, could you really in good conscience recommend a "not very good" VPS?
I'd be honest. Even if it's free, if it's crap then say so. Maybe if they gave away less free VPSes, the performance would be better?
I'd probably do this, to be honest. If it's not very good, it's no use to me because I already have decent boxes. I might use it as a testbed, a devbox or something like that. I wouldn't have it in production though. Not just because it's not great performance-wise, but if you're paying nothing, they've no real incentive to give you good support, and you wouldn't have any comeback if they decided they didn't want to give away free VPSes any more.
2 - Recommending it to those who can benefit from this kind of service, such as students, VPS beginners, and those who need an extra server on the Internet where performance is not a specific issue (say, a secondary DNS server). The real question is what to do when the 1 year period expires.
Amazon offers a free year of EC2, although I don't know how the free tier specs compare with the offer above. I have avoided it so far, because I want to keep it in abeyance until I can really use it.
I have a free VPS from host1free.com, albeit with much lower specs than above. I plan to use it as a learning tool and as a secondary DNS server. Who knows, I might use it to host a small personal website someday, too.
Review of Host1Free.com VPS:
It was a pain to get enrolled, and they reject many who apply (I don't know why). Performance is low, and network performance is poor, but the VPS has been reliable. Support is through their forums, and is better than you might expect.
Obviously, their goal is to convert a certain percentage of their free users into paying customers for their premium services, but a side effect is that they are helping to train a cadre of experienced VPS users who may someday be your customers, too.
Four because I would never use a free VPS for production sites and I don't have any other reason to need a VPS.
This.
@Gary & @Abdussamad Thanks for the answer and the reasoning.