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https://lowendtalk.com/discussion/188740/new-uae-location-opened-17-countries-24-locations-15-days-full-moneyback
You'll never guess who upstreams them
Who? CIA or KGB?
Interpol
Let me clarify that there was already a recent discussion in another topic and you can see it there – https://lowendtalk.com/discussion/comment/3724648#Comment_3724648
First level - large, reliable, well-known, but not cheap -
The second level is average in quality and stability, among Russian, Lithuanian and Estonian companies, which usually resell from the data centers of first-level providers, like Melbicom
For example -
1. https://gcore.com/hosting/vds
2. https://bluevps.com/
3. https://ultahost.com/uae-dubai-vps
4. https://oneprovider.com/
The stability of these providers in this region is much lower than the first tier providers.
The third level is providers with large overselling, who outsource the lease from level 2 vps providers and do not particularly care about network speed, as well as not provide supporting their users with the provision of normal quality of services. There are exceptions, of course, but not frequent.
For example -
1. https://ishosting.com/
2. https://www.melbicom.net/
3. https://pq.hosting/
4. https://4vps.su/
The fourth level is small companies that may have less overselling, but stability still needs to be tested; it may vary from server to server.
For example -
1. https://vpslot.com/
2. https://hostemirates.com/vps-servers/
3. https://www.vpsserveruae.com/uae-vps.html
@mcs
Thank you very much for the comprehensive breakdown of VPS providers across various levels of reliability and quality. Your insights are invaluable. Unfortunately, it appears that OneProvider currently has no VPS availability in the UAE, but I will certainly explore the other options you've presented.
I have two questions that I hope you can assist me with:
Could you elaborate on how you obtained the information that allowed you to categorize these providers into different levels? Is there a methodology that I could apply to evaluate providers in other countries as well?
What are your thoughts on Oracle Cloud? Speed of port is a critical factor for my business, and Oracle Cloud doesn't seem to get much attention in discussions. Is this due to a lack of popularity or perhaps the quality of their data centres?
Thank you in advance for your time and expertise.
Oracle cloud is fine, but their pricing is basically the same as AWS I'm pretty sure so I wouldn't imagine it to be much better?
According to my activities, I have many clients in this region, and also have my own servers with many of the providers I listed above - therefore, the assessment I gave above was developed in practice tests in different production environments of both my own and my clients.
We conduct testing with various basic tools for performance, port speed, hardware characteristics, global connectivity assessment, and network infrastructure testing.
Also, at the time of use, we check and compare in real time at the level of various applications in the working environment for reliability, performance, and security, using our personal tools and specialized services.
According to Oracle's question, I will say the following - this provider appeared earlier than Amazon in this region. At the moment, the two providers have approximately equal numbers of data centers in the region, the network infrastructure and performance are approximately equal, but there is still a difference in the relationship of the network infrastructure with other data centers in the Eastern region.
Oracle in the Middle East and Africa is represented by data centers - Jerusalem, Israel; Jeddah, Saudi Arabia; Johannesburg, South Africa; Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates; Tel Aviv, Israel; and Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
AWS in the Middle East is represented by data centers in Bahrain, Dubai, and Fujairah. Also, AWS Dyrect Connect allows you to connect servers with other data centers in this area and also with other partners - Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, India, Oman.
You can compare points of presence on the map
Additionally, I will say that since data centers appeared at different times, their equipment is different. The first Oracle data center appeared in Dubai in 2019, the second in Abu Dhabi in 2021. The last Amazon data center appeared in Dubai in 2022. Also, in fact, the bandwidth and connections to them are still carried out through the monopolists in the UAE, the company Etisalat, but everyone has their own network organization of communication with the outside world.
According reliability, performance, stability will be approximately the same, but it all depends on the specific resources that you will use.
According to communications with the outside world, although Amazon has fewer points of presence in a given region, setting up a network configuration is much simpler and more economical than doing it with Oracle, and you can also use the built-in cdn cloudfront, which will ensure even better network stability.
According to the use of these services, Oracle is used more by large companies (banks, insurance companies, oil and gas, transport, and so on). Amazon also has large companies, but so far their account is not as large in this region as Oracle, but you need to understand that previously many private medium-sized companies, startups, banks, as well as just individuals - constantly used Amazon, but in the American region , and this practice remains to this day. Therefore, today many medium-sized local companies are transferring their resources to data centers in Dubai, especially if they conduct local and not international business, it is easier and more convenient for them.
According to the pricing policy, it is more optimal for small clients and individuals to still use Aws, by setting up its services you can save more. Large companies are still able to save more on Oracle, and they stay because they have special conditions.
Examples of companies that use Oracle - Leading businesses such as DP World, Abu Dhabi Customs, Qatar Airways, Kuwait Gulf Oil Company, Miral, Saudi Railways, Mashreq Bank, Damac, Saudi Arabia Tourism Development Fund, Saudi Railway Company, Saudi Arabia Mining Company ( Ma'aden)
Examples of companies that use Amazon - GEMS Education is one of the largest private K–12 operators in the world, The Ministry of Health and Prevention (MoHAP), YAP is a fast-growing regional financial super app, Al Tayer Group - one of the largest privately held family-run conglomerates in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), Emirates NBD - is a leading banking Group in the Middle East, Careem.
According to the usual user interface and settings, AWS is simpler than Oracle and more convenient.
In conclusion, specifically in the UAE, the cost of certain services and resources depends on the Emirate in which these resources are located, if we take local companies. Although global players are striving to make the price common for all data centers, there are still differences in price and in this regard Amazon will again stand out - since it has a data center in Fujairah, which is considered cheaper to maintain. And that is why many reseller players resell these locations to you.
The pricing policy, all things being equal, if we do not take Amazon and Oracle, will depend on the Emirate in which the data center and servers are located.
And lastly, there is the concept of certification and audit - at the moment, one Oracle data center in Dubai has been completely audited and certified, the second data center has been certified, but no audit was performed. Amazon has only one data center in Dubai that has passed certification and audit, the second one is not fully certified.
@houmie - Oracle Cloud UAE Ampere A1 - YABS
## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ##
Yet-Another-Bench-Script
v2023-09-06
https://github.com/masonr/yet-another-bench-script
## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ##
Wed Oct 4 19:48:44 IST 2023
ARM compatibility is considered experimental
Basic System Information:
Uptime : 0 days, 8 hours, 38 minutes
Processor : Neoverse-N1
CPU cores : 4 @ ??? MHz
AES-NI : ✔ Enabled
VM-x/AMD-V : ❌ Disabled
RAM : 24.4 GiB
Swap : 1024.0 MiB
Disk : 193.7 GiB
Distro : Ubuntu 20.04.6 LTS
Kernel : 5.4.0-148-generic
VM Type : KVM
IPv4/IPv6 : ✔ Online / ❌ Offline
IPv4 Network Information:
ISP : Oracle Corporation
ASN : AS31898 Oracle Corporation
Host : Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (me-dubai-1)
Location : Dubai, Dubai (DU)
Country : United Arab Emirates
fio Disk Speed Tests (Mixed R/W 50/50):
iperf3 Network Speed Tests (IPv4):
Geekbench 6 Benchmark Test:
Test | Value
|
Single Core | 1109
Multi Core | 3743
Full Test | https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/2901845
YABS completed in 11 min 40 sec
I don't want to hijack this thread but since the location is United Arab Emirates and UAE being in middle-east, how restricted are those servers (in terms of access to all parts of internet)?
I saw that you shared the server parameters from the free Oracle plan, so I decided to help person who asked yesterday about the methodology (I didn’t want to describe basic things in detail yesterday), but today I decided to clarify some possible methods on how to approach choosing a server from these providers according to your tasks , as well as practical tests that you yourself must conduct in order to definitely see and understand what will be better for your specific task, and of course, to minimize your costs for this without suffering in terms of setup time and the final user experience.
From the very beginning, in this case, you need to test servers with different characteristics, both on free tariffs of these providers, and on average tariffs that will use the same number of processors and ram, hdd and etc, which work on virtually the same technologies, but still have their differences. You suggested Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Ampere Altra A1, but you can also get a free plan for at least AWS Graviton Processors and compare both of them, although the hardware characteristics will still be different, and the performance evaluation parameters and approaches are different for everyone - so we can finally say that the same Can't be much better than the other. You can only choose the most optimal server for your tasks in terms of price, performance and scalability, as well as network parameters.
Oracle offers servers based on ARM technology –
AWS offers servers based on ARM technology -
We can see the general assessment of the processors that are used in these tariffs and how they differ from each other on the website of the manufacturer of the processors that Oracle uses in its servers -
https://amperecomputing.com/briefs/ai-altra-vs-graviton
A more detailed description of processors from Oracle - https://www.nextplatform.com/2020/03/18/stacking-up-arm-server-chips-against-x86/
Description of the processor from Amazon in more detail -
https://thenewstack.io/cpu-benchmarks-for-cloud-providers-intel-vs-amd-vs-amazons-arm-based-graviton2/
https://cribl.io/blog/comparing-intel-amd-and-graviton2/
A comprehensive updated (2023) assessment according to many parameters and some tariffs of these providers can be seen at the link -
https://www.vpsbenchmarks.com/compare/ec2_vs_oracle
Still, the best and optimal solution is to select servers that are relatively equal in characteristics and conduct at least basic simple tests yourself -
For an example at the application level, do the following basic test - https://medium.com/@meego/quick-benchmarking-of-the-aws-graviton2-for-node-js-applications-1ffb78992acc
Additionally, you can carry out tests according to the list (but everything takes time)
AI-Benchmark - Measures the speed, power consumption and memory requirements of several key artificial intelligence algorithms.
Geekbench 5, Geekbench 6 - a utility for testing CPU and GPU.
Gpu-burn is a stress test for video cards.
ffmpeg NVENC - checking GPU using video encoding/decoding speed indicators
CUDA Toolkit is a package of libraries, compilers and software for working with video cards.
Grafana and Prometheus - checking temperature and power consumption.
In addition to the basic yabs and benchmark tests and the list I mentioned above, you can additionally conduct such testing - https://github.com/phoronix-test-suite/phoronix-test-suite/
According to the general approximate and basic estimate of the price for using equivalent resources of the smallest plan from both providers, as well as according to traffic - Oracle with its plan looks a little cheaper (10 Tb of traffic for free) and the difference is approximately $18-19 versus $28 for Amazon. You also need to take into account that the hardware characteristics, as I indicated above, do not match and will differ both according to the processor model and according to the performance and mark performance ratings that each provider uses. But this is just a basic estimate. The correct standard is to do sample tests and compare different tariffs, see in which environment your specific applications and services will work better.
You can see how to conduct a general assessment of optimal costs here - https://cast.ai/blog/cloud-pricing-comparison-aws-vs-azure-vs-google-cloud-platform/
You can see how to improve and optimize your spending using artificial intelligence mechanisms - https://cast.ai/cloud-cost-optimization/
I also forgot to clarify that Huawei Cloud is also present in the Dubai market (although it is not very popular). It is also clear that many people do not look confidently towards Chinese companies, fearing for the safety of their data and the confidentiality of their data, due to the fact that there have been cases of surveillance by the company before. But in the region of the United Emirates, they do not pay much attention to this point and, for the most part, Chinese equipment and software are used in many places.
This time I think I have written a very good guide for any user to choose a specific provider for their needs.
@mcs Thank you for sharing all this, that was extremely useful.
I will certainly look into Phoronix Test Suite. One thing that I noticed was that most of those tests you suggested were concerned about the performance of CPU and storage, but not so much about the network itself. I will to look into this more, YABS for example is a good candidate to test the network speed, I believe.
I didn't know about Huawei Cloud. I agree with you about the hesitation around it, but certainly an option.
Thanks
https://www.exoticvm.com/?search=UAE
wasn't melbicom related to williams old "crew"?
if not i would guess russia or china related. they always use latvia or lithuania. russia also likes the netherlands for their operations out of saint petersburg.
cia is always germany or swiss (proton), sometimes south america and companies like neustar etc.