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SGP "crap to gold" VPS?
Recently an idea struck me while looking at my (detailed) list of VPS. I have three Contabo VPSs, one in DE (which was upgraded and is actually nice), one in Murrica (St. Louis) (which I consider crap), and one in SGP which I also considered crap - until now. Or more precisley, I still consider it crap but potentially really useful crap.
Why? As my short benchmark below shows processor & mem. are crap (in 2026), the disk is ugly crap, and a major part of its connectivity is crap as well - but some regions are halfway decent and a few even are nice.
The other relevant factor: traffic volume, which as we all know is tight and expensive in many parts of Asia. But this box came (and supposedly still does) with 32 TB, albeit limited to 200 Mb/s (which doesn't seem to be so bad within Asia)! And even better its best connectivity region is Asia! Its price highly likely buys you single digit TB traffic volume only with all other providers I looked at.
So, my take is that this crap-box actually can well be a box of "gold" within certain limits, the two major ones being
- only very mild disk load (that thing is really crappy)
- mainly serving Asia only.
But as long as your use case fits within those, that VPS might be really great for e.g. a distro mirror or some such or a webserver with "hot content" fitting in RAM, etc.
Let's have a look, based as usual on >=30 runs.
Sysinfo, processor & mem.
Version 2.5.0a, (c) 2018+ jsg (->lowendtalk.com)
Machine: amd64, Arch.: amd64, Model: AMD EPYC Processor (with IBPB)
OS, version: FreeBSD 14.2, Mem.: 7.983 GB
CPU - Cores: 4, Family/Model/Stepping: 23/1/2
Cache: 32K/64K L1d/L1i, 512K L2, 8M L3
Std. Flags: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat
pse36 cflsh mmx fxsr sse sse2 htt sse3 pclmulqdq ssse3 fma cx16
sse4_1 sse4_2 popcnt aes xsave osxsave avx f16c rdrnd hypervisor
Ext. Flags: syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm lahf_lm cmp_legacy
cr8_legacy lzcnt sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw topoext
AES? Yes
Nested Virt.? No
HW RNG? Yes
ProcMem SC [MB/s]: avg 165.6 - min 51.9 (31.4 %), max 302.4 (182.6 %)
ProcMem MA [MB/s]: avg 728.6 - min 476.7 (65.4 %), max 850.9 (116.8 %)
ProcMem MB [MB/s]: avg 773.2 - min 517.2 (66.9 %), max 884.7 (114.4 %)
ProcMem AES [MB/s]: avg 938.9 - min 505.6 (53.8 %), max 1077.6 (114.8 %)
ProcMem RSA [kp/s]: avg 70.8 - min 51.9 (73.3 %), max 84.1 (118.8 %)
As I said, crappy in 2026. The multi-threading results are half-way OK though and AES as well. And hey, you get 4 vCores albeit ones that feel like an old Xeon E5v4.
Now the IMO worst part, the disk
--- Disk 4 KB - Buffered ---
Write seq. [MB/s]: avg 1.02 - min 0.33 (32.4%), max 1.85 (181.6%)
Write rnd. [MB/s]: avg 1.07 - min 0.44 (41.1%), max 2.27 (212.1%)
Read seq. [MB/s]: avg 2.74 - min 0.96 (35.1%), max 5.86 (214.2%)
Read rnd. [MB/s]: avg 2.56 - min 0.74 (28.9%), max 5.23 (204.6%)
--- Disk 4 KB - Sync/Direct ---
Write seq. [MB/s]: avg 0.99 - min 0.35 (35.4%), max 2.27 (229.4%)
Write rnd. [MB/s]: avg 1.04 - min 0.41 (39.5%), max 2.14 (206.2%)
Read seq. [MB/s]: avg 2.70 - min 0.78 (28.9%), max 5.88 (217.5%)
Read rnd. [MB/s]: avg 2.37 - min 0.58 (24.5%), max 4.90 (207.0%)
--- Disk 64 KB - Buffered ---
Write seq. [MB/s]: avg 7.88 - min 2.70 (34.3%), max 13.65 (173.3%)
Write rnd. [MB/s]: avg 10.89 - min 3.75 (34.5%), max 23.98 (220.3%)
Read seq. [MB/s]: avg 276.53 - min 55.55 (20.1%), max 677.15 (244.9%)
Read rnd. [MB/s]: avg 37.32 - min 13.68 (36.7%), max 85.25 (228.4%)
--- Disk 64 KB - Sync/Direct ---
Write seq. [MB/s]: avg 2.46 - min 1.09 (44.4%), max 3.92 (159.6%)
Write rnd. [MB/s]: avg 1.86 - min 0.94 (50.6%), max 3.03 (163.1%)
Read seq. [MB/s]: avg 246.45 - min 71.64 (29.1%), max 332.91 (135.1%)
Read rnd. [MB/s]: avg 32.27 - min 13.92 (43.1%), max 71.48 (221.5%)
--- Disk 1 MB - Buffered ---
Write seq. [MB/s]: avg 10.34 - min 3.64 (35.2%), max 17.47 (169.0%)
Write rnd. [MB/s]: avg 30.29 - min 10.92 (36.1%), max 69.87 (230.7%)
Read seq. [MB/s]: avg 399.98 - min 137.66 (34.4%), max 586.88 (146.7%)
Read rnd. [MB/s]: avg 225.15 - min 55.11 (24.5%), max 476.49 (211.6%)
--- Disk 1 MB - Sync/Direct ---
Write seq. [MB/s]: avg 7.04 - min 3.42 (48.6%), max 11.80 (167.6%)
Write rnd. [MB/s]: avg 9.40 - min 5.03 (53.5%), max 14.93 (158.9%)
Read seq. [MB/s]: avg 384.89 - min 212.70 (55.3%), max 541.00 (140.6%)
Read rnd. [MB/s]: avg 235.22 - min 49.41 (21.0%), max 451.83 (192.1%)
--- Disk IOps (Sync/Direct) ---
Write seq. [MB/s]: avg 3.77 - min 1.05 (27.9%), max 8.07 (214.2%)
IOps : avg 964.39 - min 269.66 (28.0%), max 2066.99 (214.3%)
Not even 5 MB/s and barely 1000 IOps, yuck!
Finally the network
Europe
NO TRH mirror.archlinux.no [F: 17]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 11.4 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 40.8 (358.7%)
Ping [ms]: avg 259.4 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 274.8 (105.9%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 260.2 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 282.2 (108.5%)
UK KNT www.mirrorservice.org [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 53.9 - min 23.8 (44.1%), max 71.7 (132.9%)
Ping [ms]: avg 155.5 - min 152.8 (98.2%), max 170.1 (109.4%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 233.8 - min 174.0 (74.4%), max 411.7 (176.1%)
NL AMS mirrors.xtom.nl [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 47.5 - min 21.8 (45.8%), max 69.7 (146.7%)
Ping [ms]: avg 162.0 - min 157.1 (97.0%), max 224.2 (138.4%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 204.8 - min 158.1 (77.2%), max 275.6 (134.6%)
DE FRA mirror.plusline.net [F: 24]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 6.8 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 30.0 (443.5%)
Ping [ms]: avg 159.2 - min 149.7 (94.1%), max 221.1 (138.9%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 159.2 - min 149.7 (94.0%), max 221.1 (138.8%)
FR PAR ftp1.fr.freebsd.org [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 45.5 - min 37.5 (82.4%), max 48.2 (106.0%)
Ping [ms]: avg 150.9 - min 148.5 (98.4%), max 162.9 (107.9%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 176.8 - min 149.2 (84.4%), max 231.1 (130.7%)
CH ZUR mirror.init7.net [F: 6]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 20.8 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 30.9 (148.4%)
Ping [ms]: avg 151.1 - min 144.6 (95.7%), max 218.1 (144.3%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 153.0 - min 144.7 (94.6%), max 218.1 (142.5%)
IT ROM archlinux.mirror.garr.it [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 51.6 - min 38.5 (74.5%), max 68.7 (133.0%)
Ping [ms]: avg 213.9 - min 152.2 (71.2%), max 308.2 (144.1%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 256.9 - min 167.2 (65.1%), max 422.4 (164.4%)
ES MAD mirror.raiolanetworks.com [F: 1]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 40.4 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 71.0 (175.6%)
Ping [ms]: avg 157.5 - min 154.1 (97.8%), max 187.3 (118.9%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 161.2 - min 154.3 (95.7%), max 187.3 (116.2%)
RO GIU mirrors.pidginhost.com [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 42.9 - min 20.1 (46.8%), max 64.9 (151.2%)
Ping [ms]: avg 175.8 - min 173.5 (98.7%), max 182.2 (103.7%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 195.7 - min 174.9 (89.4%), max 221.0 (112.9%)
GR ATH ftp.otenet.gr [F: 32]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 1.8 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 58.4 (3300.0%)
Ping [ms]: avg 186.4 - min 182.4 (97.8%), max 208.6 (111.9%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 186.7 - min 182.4 (97.7%), max 208.6 (111.7%)
RU MOS mirror.yandex.ru [F: 2]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 52.1 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 58.0 (111.3%)
Ping [ms]: avg 197.2 - min 194.3 (98.5%), max 205.1 (104.0%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 229.8 - min 197.1 (85.8%), max 304.7 (132.6%)
Looks like a weird lottery but at least some half-way decent results here and there but all in all: crap!
Asia / Oceania
SA RIY mirror.maeen.sa [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 50.5 - min 35.7 (70.8%), max 54.8 (108.6%)
Ping [ms]: avg 215.3 - min 206.0 (95.7%), max 364.2 (169.2%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 248.2 - min 207.7 (83.7%), max 1096.7 (441.9%)
IN MUM mirrors.piconets.webwerks.in [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 154.4 - min 104.5 (67.7%), max 172.1 (111.5%)
Ping [ms]: avg 59.7 - min 54.4 (91.1%), max 78.5 (131.4%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 77.4 - min 54.6 (70.5%), max 120.2 (155.2%)
SG SGP mirror.sg.gs [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 185.5 - min 160.9 (86.8%), max 190.2 (102.5%)
Ping [ms]: avg 3.0 - min 1.1 (36.6%), max 22.7 (755.2%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 81.1 - min 51.2 (63.1%), max 129.8 (160.0%)
CN HKG mirrors.xtom.hk [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 175.4 - min 157.5 (89.8%), max 183.2 (104.4%)
Ping [ms]: avg 40.5 - min 37.7 (93.1%), max 51.5 (127.2%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 60.9 - min 37.9 (62.2%), max 158.4 (260.1%)
CN NIT_NAY mirror.nyist.edu.cn [F: 7]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 62.9 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 127.3 (202.5%)
Ping [ms]: avg 232.0 - min 84.9 (36.6%), max 372.9 (160.8%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 296.5 - min 92.8 (31.3%), max 771.8 (260.3%)
CN JLU_Changchun mirrors.jlu.edu.cn [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 119.7 - min 103.3 (86.3%), max 131.7 (110.0%)
Ping [ms]: avg 88.8 - min 83.2 (93.7%), max 111.9 (126.1%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 108.5 - min 85.0 (78.3%), max 399.1 (367.7%)
CN TUNA_Bejing mirrors.tuna.tsinghua.edu.cn [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 124.8 - min 53.9 (43.2%), max 147.2 (117.9%)
Ping [ms]: avg 102.0 - min 72.6 (71.2%), max 264.7 (259.5%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 106.1 - min 74.9 (70.6%), max 264.7 (249.6%)
TW Taichung mirror.ossplanet.net [F: 1]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 61.8 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 145.9 (236.1%)
Ping [ms]: avg 58.3 - min 56.0 (96.0%), max 65.7 (112.6%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 416.4 - min 57.7 (13.9%), max 1377.1 (330.7%)
MY Putrajaya mirrors.gbnetwork.com [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 186.1 - min 172.1 (92.5%), max 190.0 (102.1%)
Ping [ms]: avg 8.7 - min 6.8 (78.6%), max 13.7 (158.3%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 9.8 - min 7.0 (71.1%), max 18.1 (183.9%)
KH PNP mirror.sabay.com.kh [F: 3]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 48.0 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 82.2 (171.2%)
Ping [ms]: avg 39.3 - min 37.7 (96.0%), max 43.2 (110.0%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 68.7 - min 38.5 (56.1%), max 237.8 (346.2%)
ID YOK mirror.citrahost.com [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 170.0 - min 126.6 (74.5%), max 184.0 (108.2%)
Ping [ms]: avg 24.8 - min 22.4 (90.3%), max 38.4 (154.8%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 42.7 - min 23.5 (55.0%), max 78.8 (184.5%)
JP TOK ftp.udx.icscoe.jp [F: 1]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 137.4 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 165.8 (120.7%)
Ping [ms]: avg 77.3 - min 67.5 (87.3%), max 132.8 (171.8%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 79.6 - min 67.5 (84.8%), max 132.8 (166.8%)
AU SYD mirrors.xtom.au [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 116.6 - min 110.0 (94.4%), max 119.6 (102.6%)
Ping [ms]: avg 94.3 - min 93.2 (98.8%), max 99.2 (105.2%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 168.1 - min 141.5 (84.2%), max 221.4 (131.7%)
NZ UNK mirror.fsmg.org.nz [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 86.7 - min 79.4 (91.5%), max 91.1 (105.0%)
Ping [ms]: avg 124.3 - min 122.9 (98.8%), max 128.2 (103.1%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 184.4 - min 125.3 (68.0%), max 780.1 (423.1%)
Front up: Almost all secondary and tertiary targets were reached an show similar results as the shown one. Nice!
IN, Mumbai about 150 Mb/s, quite decent. SGP (of course) near the BW limit of 200 Mb/s, good enough, HongKong 175 Mb/s, nice! Even nicer - and rarely seen so far - is multiple China mainland targets with really decent results plus a few with outstanding results of well over 100 Mb/s! And the joy continues with Malaysia also showing a very good result and the (usually difficult) Indonesia target as well. Really nice! Japan with well over 125 Mb/s isn't bad either, nor is Straya with over 100 Mb/s and even the Kiwiland result is quite decent.
Africa - left out because only a single target reached and not with a nice result ...
Americas
CA MTL speedtest.mtl2.ca.leaseweb.net [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 45.8 - min 42.0 (91.7%), max 48.7 (106.4%)
Ping [ms]: avg 237.4 - min 235.2 (99.1%), max 244.8 (103.1%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 239.5 - min 235.2 (98.2%), max 247.9 (103.5%)
CA ONT mirror.csclub.uwaterloo.ca [F: 3]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 34.0 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 52.0 (152.8%)
Ping [ms]: avg 181.0 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 220.5 (121.9%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 222.4 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 484.4 (217.8%)
US NYC nyc.hawkhost.com [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 47.2 - min 35.1 (74.5%), max 50.1 (106.2%)
Ping [ms]: avg 225.1 - min 223.4 (99.2%), max 231.3 (102.8%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 234.4 - min 226.2 (96.5%), max 248.4 (106.0%)
US PIB mirror.pit.teraswitch.com [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 55.9 - min 53.8 (96.2%), max 57.7 (103.3%)
Ping [ms]: avg 198.8 - min 197.1 (99.2%), max 203.0 (102.1%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 203.2 - min 198.5 (97.7%), max 213.5 (105.1%)
US MIA speedtest.mia11.us.leaseweb.net [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 47.9 - min 43.3 (90.3%), max 50.8 (106.0%)
Ping [ms]: avg 223.8 - min 221.5 (99.0%), max 226.1 (101.0%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 232.5 - min 222.4 (95.7%), max 244.8 (105.3%)
US CHI ord.mirror.rackspace.com [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 53.9 - min 39.7 (73.6%), max 57.5 (106.7%)
Ping [ms]: avg 198.8 - min 196.5 (98.8%), max 208.7 (105.0%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 263.0 - min 198.8 (75.6%), max 365.3 (138.9%)
US PHO speedtest.phx1.us.leaseweb.net [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 61.4 - min 58.0 (94.5%), max 64.4 (104.9%)
Ping [ms]: avg 176.6 - min 174.7 (98.9%), max 179.8 (101.8%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 182.5 - min 179.3 (98.2%), max 185.6 (101.7%)
US PTL mirrors.cat.pdx.edu [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 68.1 - min 46.7 (68.5%), max 73.0 (107.1%)
Ping [ms]: avg 154.9 - min 153.6 (99.2%), max 157.2 (101.5%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 159.2 - min 154.4 (97.0%), max 166.8 (104.8%)
US LAX speedtest.lax12.us.leaseweb.net [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 63.4 - min 60.3 (95.0%), max 67.1 (105.8%)
Ping [ms]: avg 192.0 - min 190.4 (99.2%), max 197.9 (103.1%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 192.0 - min 190.4 (99.2%), max 197.9 (103.1%)
US SEA speedtest.sea11.us.leaseweb.net [F: 0]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 50.9 - min 30.6 (60.2%), max 61.9 (121.6%)
Ping [ms]: avg 186.1 - min 184.1 (98.9%), max 190.6 (102.4%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 199.0 - min 184.3 (92.6%), max 222.0 (111.6%)
BR SPA mirrors.ic.unicamp.br [F: 5]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 19.1 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 35.5 (186.3%)
Ping [ms]: avg 297.8 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 377.2 (126.6%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 298.6 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 377.2 (126.3%)
CL SAN mirror.anquan.cl [F: 8]
DL [Mb/s]: avg 6.8 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 36.9 (544.3%)
Ping [ms]: avg 286.8 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 405.1 (141.3%)
Web ping [ms]: avg 288.0 - min 0.0 (0.0%), max 405.1 (140.7%)
Hmm, better than Europe and at least Murrica shows quite a few decent results.
TL;DR As I said when I explained my idea, this VPS is certainly what I'd call crappy in 2026, BUT looking at its within-Asia (even incl. Oceania) and considering the 32 TB monthly traffic volume it has, it suddenly looks attractive - well, for certain use cases. But still, lots of traffic volume and at decent albeit limited speed at that price may well be an ideal choice for quite a few.
I only wish Contabo would update/upgrade that location as they did in Germany.
P.S. In case you are interested in their routing to China I can get and provide that as well.
Comments
I figure you'll probably clear this up but: A processor that does AES but no AVX2 and it's an Epyc of all things? If this comes down to Contabos config it's a pretty huge WTF in my opinion.
Thanks but nope, I won't clear it up because I often see Epyc based VPSs with AES but no AVX2. That's by no means related (only) to this provider (Contabo).