Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!


gaming VPS - need further help in understanding my requirements
New on LowEndTalk? Please Register and read our Community Rules.

All new Registrations are manually reviewed and approved, so a short delay after registration may occur before your account becomes active.

gaming VPS - need further help in understanding my requirements

wladymeerwladymeer Member
edited January 2016 in Help

Hello,

Before I start, I must quote that I'm not tech-savvy guy concerning servers, but I do apply trial/error method with some logic and at the end of the road I do accomplish what I need. However I apologize if my questions sound dumb :)


I need a Europe-based (as close to Serbia as possible) VPS for running a game server. I was using evovps.com package #1 before and it has:

  • 256MB guarranteed RAM
  • 256MB vSwap
  • 20GB RAID10 Space
  • 500GB Monthly Bandwidth
  • 1 x 2.0 GHz Core, 1 gbps / Node, 1 IP address with full root ssh access, OpenVZ Virtualization, Reverse DNS and SolusVM VPS Panel

I have chosen Debian 7.0 as an OS, not sure if it was 32 or 64-bit to be honest and it did work with no struggle after setting it up. Any Linux will do. But, meanwhile, by reading your website, I've got a feeling that I may get cheaper than 5€/month or at least get some more resources for same price.

As my server is actually used mostly for connecting players and transfering textual (chat, session logging and etc) I must say that I was nearly scratching my resources. I don't have more than 20 players on server on peak and I can't recall using any significant bandwith or RAM. To be honest I'm not completely sure how or if server quality affects gameplay. From what I've been told, it's all P2P once match starts and the only trouble server can cause is downtime.

But, here's the next step - I would like to add this code to track server info and do some ranking calculations: https://github.com/IkeC/evo-league - It looks like this when implemented: http://www.pesgate.com

So, dumb question #1: beside buying domain, do I need anything else than VPS in order to get this set up?

And another question: Do you have any idea how this is gonna affect my RAM usage and what amount do I actually need? I would have 40-50 users in total at this moment and I doubt it will ever reach 100+.

So bottom line: What resources do you assume I need and can you recommend me some optimal solution for me?

Many thanks and I'm here to answer you if something is not clear.

Comments

  • edited January 2016

    Some info to start with.

    PHP 5.5 and a MySQL database are required. PHP must be configured to allow short tags (short_open_tag = On in php.ini).

    You'll need at least a virtual server to run this. I recommend a Linux-based server (eg. Debian).

    To run Sixserver properly, I recommend a server with at least 1GB RAM.

    So...

    PHP5+ NGINX + MySQL:

    By turning performance_schema off in mysql, even the most heaviest websites I have run have stayed around ~512MB

    So you require around 1.5GB ram for the entire package (not sure if the 1G RAM takes into account the webserver).

    I am quite sure you can fit it in 2G RAM, while being under 5eur. Take a look at https://www.ovh.co.uk/vps/vps-ssd.xml . Converting gbp -> eur = 3.27 EUR. Includes DDOS protection.

    To get the actual ram usage, you can probably test it out on your own computer using virtualbox to see how much memory usage it requires.

    Thanked by 1wladymeer
  • wladymeerwladymeer Member
    edited January 2016

    First, thanks for a very fast reply:

    Some additional info:

    • Sixserver was a gaming server that had more than 200 players online in prime time.
    • Server I'm running is not going to have more than 20 players online in prime time.
    • I was running Sixserver (just game server, without webserver) with 256MB RAM and had no significant trouble and no downtime at any point during 6-7 months.
    • Lets presume that this specific website code is nowhere close to the heaviest ones, especially as my server won't be crowded anywhere like the one mentioned in tutorial (which had probably more than 300-400 active players all surfing the forum, website, playing matches online etc...)

    Is it safe to presume that 1GB of RAM would be enough?

    If it is same, then I've found this https://www.arubacloud.com website - it's based in Italy and there is no record about bad experience so far (https://www.lowendtalk.com/discussion/70703/arubacloud-is-it-really-that-cheap) and I haven't found any hidden costs as well.

    Do you think it's a worth a shot?

    I would first try out just gaming server, as it's the most important, and if it works like it should for a month I would then go further and try webserver.

  • pbgbenpbgben Member, Host Rep

    OVH SSD should be good, add on their load balancer ad you'll have a reliable site. imo.

    Thanked by 1wladymeer
  • edited January 2016

    In this case, should actually be able to fit on a 1G VM.

    These stats (below) are from a server that I installed mysql + php5-fpm on. There is no load, no caching enabled, and no sites running.

    root@lax-01:/etc/mysql# free -m
                 total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
    Mem:          4096        553       3542         67          0        538
    -/+ buffers/cache:         15       4080
    Swap:         4096          0       4096
    

    This is an openvz server, which means it has no kernel. ArubaCloud is VMWare, which has a kernel as well. Doesn't make much of a difference though.

    Kernel takes up around 100000, maybe 150000 kB.

    1G (1048576 kB) - (100000kB ) = 948576 kB = 948.576 Megabytes usable.

    Take around 256M for max webserver usage, 948.576-256 = 692.576 MB remaining.

    Disclaimer:

    Calculations are a rough estimate, and are not indicative of real world performance.

    Thanked by 1wladymeer
  • Very well, I'll try ArubaCloud to check how gameserver behaves in a week and then proceed further.

  • williamworthwilliamworth Member
    edited April 2016

    Informative stuff for me because i am new in VPS servers. Before it i have used simple hosting plan but now i am using VPS servers and i hardly know about it basics, i have found some good material by reading your article. Anyways, games are the best entertaining sources as well as we can learn our children many new things by games. I mostly used online sources for playing games or watching movies at snipped, snipped and snipped . Online watching has lots of advantages like time and money saving as well as another privilege is that when you watch movies online, not clutter your computer's memory, as do not need to download the film. Anyways, thanks for making this effort.

  • JunklessJunkless Member
    edited April 2016

    @williamworth said:
    Informative stuff for me because i am new in VPS servers. Before it i have used simple hosting plan but now i am using VPS servers and i hardly know about it basics, i have found some good material by reading your article. Anyways, games are the best entertaining sources as well as we can learn our children many new things by games. I mostly used online sources for playing games or watching movies at snipped, snipped and snipped . Online watching has lots of advantages like time and money saving as well as another privilege is that when you watch movies online, not clutter your computer's memory, as do not need to download the film. Anyways, thanks for making this effort.

    Someone please flag this post.

Sign In or Register to comment.