Ladies and gentlemen: the moment has come! The votes have been counted, the results have been checked, and the winners have sent in the offers. The results for the Top Provider Poll 2013-Q4 are finally here! First of all, let me all thank you very much for voting! The quarterly provider poll is a fun event in which we can all show some appreciation to the hosts we like the most. It’s been an on-going tradition and it always brings me great joy that so many of you vote. So, thank you again! This poll was different than the last ones. Previously, you got to pick a number 1, number 2, and number 3 provider. These providers were awarded points accordingly: each number 1 vote earned the provider 3 points, each number 2 vote earned the provider 2 points, and each number 3 vote earned the provider 1 point. Unfair, thought I. You should be able to divide those points yourself! Because of that, each member got 5 votes to distribute amongst providers as they wished. Basically like dot-voting without the stickies and the whiteboard. Some gave a provider 5 points, others distributed them amongst providers. All in all, a nice, flexible, and honest system. I’m going to continue with this in the future! So, on to the results. By popular demand, I have listed the top 10 right here! Most of the hosts have sent in a special offers to share their love with the LowEndCommunity. Enjoy these offers while you can, because some are limited either by quantity…

  Salvatore, from Prometeus, sent in an e-mail regarding the launch of his new brand: XenPower! XenPower offers high-resource servers for a very reasonable price! XenPower was started because Salvatore once purchased the domain (xenpower.com) and still hadn’t done anything with it. What better to do with it than offer some great Xen servers! These servers are hosted on a host node with dual Intel E5-2620v2 CPUs, 128GB of RAM and 12x 3TB SATA hard drives in RAID10! This happens to be Prometeus’ first deployment of servers with SATA disks (all others are SAS, SSD, or SAN) and I have to say, the speed is very good! We all know Prometeus: most reviews are very positive, support is fast, and the customer always comes first! Please share your own experiences with XenPower in the comments! The offer 2 vCPUs 1GB RAM 120GB Disk space 2TB Bandwidth 1Gbps uplink 1x IPv4 address 2x IPv6 address (/64 on request) XenPV/SolusVM Coupon: XENPOWER25 Price: €4.42/month or +/- $6/month Order in Milan Order in Dallas Prometeus accepts payments via Paypal. VAT, at 22%, is added if you’re an EU citizen/company without a valid VAT ID. Prometeus is a registered LIR (RIPE NCC member), which means they own their IP addresses. Like noted above, an IPv6 /64 is available for free on request. No refunds are offered. For more information, have a read of their Terms of Service. Network information Looking glass Milan: http://lg-milano.prometeus.net/ Looking glass Dallas: http://lg-dallas.prometeus.net/

I have some great news! 1) BandwagonHOST's new Florida location is online. All nodes at this location come with RAID-10 SSD storage by default. If you have a VPS with BandwagonHOST, you can migrate it over to this new location ("Migrate to another DC" in the KiwiVM panel). If you do not have a VPS with BandwagonHOST, then you should get one. 2) New Micro plans (yes, those are YEARLY prices): MICRO-64 $3.99/year 64MB RAM 1.5GB SSD 100GB Bandwidth on GigE MICRO-96 $4.99/year 96MB RAM 2.0GB SSD 200GB Bandwidth on GigE MICRO-128 $5.99/year 128MB RAM 3.0GB SSD 300GB Bandwidth on GigE Locations: Jacksonville, Florida Phoenix, Arizona Amsterdam, Netherlands Platform: OpenVZ, control panel: KiwiVM 3) KiwiVM kicks ass, as always! Ticketless migrations between datacenters, automatic migrations from other providers, snapshots (create/restore), automatic OpenVPN installer, 2 factor authentication, all this good stuff is in the KiwiVM for you to play with. A friend of mine once said he likes KiwiVM more than his girlfriend.

CPU: 2 Core RAM: 1.5GB Hard Disk: 120GB RAID 10 disks IP addresses: 1 IPv4, Dedicated internet bandwidth: 3000 GB OS: Linux Control Panel: SolusVM Virtualization: XEN Type: Unmanaged Order here Limited stock!

Prometeus' new Italy KVM offer 60% OFF with code LEC60KSSD1G CPU: 2 Core RAM: 1024MB Hard Disk: 30GB on SSD disks IP addresses: 1 IPv4, /64 IPv6 Dedicated internet bandwidth: 3000 GB OS: Linux Control Panel: SolusVM Virtualization: KVM Type: Unmanaged Order here

WeLoveServers' VPSes have been tested by VPSMATE a few times. It turned out they are solid and good. Check the previous posts HERE & Tests. Winter 512 30 GB Disk Space Storage 500 GB Bandwidth (1Gbps Port) 512 MB DDR3 RAM 1 IPv4 Address SolusVM Access $25/Yearly Los Angeles, California Buffalo, New York Dallas, Texas Order Here Winter 768 30 GB Disk Space Storage 400 GB Bandwidth (100Mbps) 768 MB DDR3 RAM 1 IPv4 Address SolusVM Access $2.99/Monthly Los Angeles, California Buffalo, New York Dallas, Texas Order Here Winter 1536 60 GB Disk Space Storage 1500 GB Bandwidth (100Mbps) 1536 MB DDR3 RAM 1 IPv4 Address SolusVM Access $5.77/Monthly Los Angeles, California Buffalo, New York Dallas, Texas Order Here Winter 2048 80 GB Disk Space Storage 1500 GB Bandwidth (100Mbps) 2048 MB DDR3 RAM 1 IPv4 Address SolusVM Access $15/Quarterly Los Angeles, California Buffalo, New York Dallas, Texas Order Here Spring 512 30 GB Disk Space Storage 500 GB Bandwidth (1Gbps Port) 512 MB DDR3 RAM 1 IPv4 Address SolusVM Access $25/Yearly London, United Kingdom (NEW) Orlando, Florida (NEW) Buffalo, New York Los Angeles, California Dallas, Texas Order Here Spring 840 35 GB Disk Space Storage 500 GB Bandwidth (1Gbps Port) 840 MB DDR3 RAM 1 IPv4 Address SolusVM Access $9/Quarterly London, United Kingdom (NEW) Orlando, Florida (NEW) Buffalo, New York Los Angeles, California Dallas, Texas Order Here Spring 2048 100 GB Disk Space Storage 1500 GB Bandwidth (100Mbps) 2048 MB DDR3 RAM 1 IPv4 Address SolusVM Access $7/Monthly London, United Kingdom (NEW) Orlando, Florida (NEW) Buffalo, New York Los…

If you thought he had enough brands already, you were wrong! Oktay, from — well, you know who he is — recently launched Winity! Winity offers the unique combination of a Hyper-V server with very decent specifications, a custom-coded panel, an included Windows license, and a LowEndPrice! These servers are hosted on a monster of a host node: dual 10-core E5 2660v2 CPUs (40 threads total), 384GB of RAM, 8x 4TB enterprise-grade hard drives in RAID10, 4x 128GB SSDs in RAID10 for caching, backed up by an LSI RAID card, redundant power, and redundant network! The windows license is a 100% genuine Windows 2012 Datacenter R2 license. No evalutation, no tricks. Winity launched in December 2013, but Oktay’s other brands have been around longer. His other brands get very positive reviews, so I expect this to be as good as the others (or even better)! Like always, please leave a review if you try! The offer 1 vCPU 1GB RAM 50GB SSD-cached disk space 1TB Bandwidth 1Gbps uplink Hyper-V virtualization with a custom panel 1x IPv4 address Location: Orlando, Florida, USA Coupon: LAUNCH (41.67% off for life) Price: $7/month Order link The coupon works on every plan they have, so if you need a bigger machine, check their website. But wait, there is more… …because Oktay was nice enough to also included a bunch of Backupsy offers. So no more excuses for having no backups ;-) Backupsy US 250GB Backupsy US 500GB Backupsy UK 250GB Backupsy NL 250GB 512MB RAM 250GB Disk space 1 vCPU cores 1TB Bandwidth 1x IPv4 address 1Gbps uplink KVM/Custom Panel $5/Month Order…

Ken, from VPSNodes, has got two great deals for whom located in Dallas, Texas. You don’t need to use a coupon for either of the plans. OpenVZ 1024MB RAM 1024MB RAM 1024MB vSwap 3 CPU Cores (Equal Share) 75GB SSD-Cached Diskspace 2000GB Bandwidth 100Mbps Shared Port 1 IPv4 Address OpenVZ/SolusVM $3.75/ Month | Order Link OpenVZ 2048MB RAM 2048MB RAM 2048MB vSwap 4 CPU Cores (Equal Share) 100GB SSD-Cached Diskspace 3000GB Bandwidth 100Mbps Shared Port 1 IPv4 Address OpenVZ/SolusVM $5.00/ Month | Order Link This is the second time we have listed VPSNodes, the first time was a couple of months ago! They have renewed their website design since that time. The VPSNodes domain has been registered since 2009. Nodes are configured with the E3-1240v2 CPU, 32 GB memory, 4×1 TB WD RE4 SATA, LSI 9260-4i with BBU and a 120 GB SSD for SSD-cached enabled transfers. Ken tells us that they automatically backup their whole nodes. Currently there is no expiration date set for this offer. If you purchase one of these, do leave us a review below. VPSNodes accepts payment via PayPal. They offer a 48 hour money back guarantee. You will need to contact support if you wish to obtain a refund. Servers are provisioned instantly. Additional IPv4 addresses are charged at $0.50 each per month. For more information, take a look at their Terms of Service. Network Information: Servers are with ColoCrossing in Dallas, Texas. Test IPv4: 192.3.156.4 Test File: http://192.3.156.4/test100.zip

Posted on October 2, 2013 by Mark Achtemichuk There is a lot of outdated information regarding the use of a vSphere feature that changes the presentation of logical processors for a virtual machine, into a specific socket and core configuration. This advanced setting is commonly known as corespersocket. It was originally intended to address licensing issues where some operating systems had limitations on the number of sockets that could be used, but did not limit core count. KB Reference: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1010184 It’s often been said that this change of processor presentation does not affect performance, but it may impact performance by influencing the sizing and presentation of virtual NUMA to the guest operating system. Reference Performance Best Practices for VMware vSphere 5.5 (page 44):http://www.vmware.com/pdf/Perf_Best_Practices_vSphere5.5.pdf Recommended Practices #1 When creating a virtual machine, by default, vSphere will create as many virtual sockets as you’ve requested vCPUs and the cores per socket is equal to one. I think of this configuration as “wide” and “flat.” This will enable vNUMA to select and present the best virtual NUMA topology to the guest operating system, which will be optimal on the underlying physical topology. #2 When you must change the cores per socket though, commonly due to licensing constraints, ensure you mirror physical server’s NUMA topology. This is because when a virtual machine is no longer configured by default as “wide” and “flat,” vNUMA will not automatically pick the best NUMA configuration based on the physical server, but will instead honor your configuration – right or wrong – potentially leading to a topology mismatch that does affect performance. To…

  2 days ago, I bought a storage VPS from GreenValueHost. Although the VPS was glitched, their owner Jonathan was actively willing to solve the problem. Finally the 8T ram glitch was fixed. Here I'm going to show you the simple I/O, Network & Over selling test of the storage VPS I bought. the VPS Specification: OpenVZ Virtualization 290GB SSD Accelerated RAID-10 Disk Space 30TB Premium Bandwidth @ 1Gbps Port 4048MB Guaranteed RAM 6144MB Burstable RAM 2 IPv4 $5.00/month OR $40.00/year - NO CONTRACTS and NO BS - Fetching System Informaion ./+o+- root@VMCAT-GVH yyyyy- -yyyyyy+ OS: Ubuntu 12.04 precise ://+//////-yyyyyyo Kernel: x86_64 Linux 2.6.32-042stab084.12 .++ .:/++++++/-.+sss/` Uptime: 1d 2h 20m .:++o: /++++++++/:--:/- Packages: 827 o:+o+:++.`..```.-/oo+++++/ Shell: bash 4.2.25 .:+o:+o/. `+sssoo+/ Disk: 1.7G / 308G (1%) .++/+:+oo+o:` /sssooo. CPU: Intel Xeon CPU E3-1240 v3 @ 3.392GHz /+++//+:`oo+o /::--:. RAM: 298MB / 6144MB \+/+o+++`o++o ++////. .++.o+++oo+:` /dddhhh. .+.o+oo:. `oddhhhh+ \+.++o+o``-````.:ohdhhhhh+ `:o+++ `ohhhhhhhhyo++os: .o:`.syhhhhhhh/.oo++o` /osyyyyyyo++ooo+++/ ````` +oo+++o\: `oo++. Starting I/O Tests bs=64k count=4k 4096+0 records in 4096+0 records out 268435456 bytes (268 MB) copied, 2.06775 s, 130 MB/s 64k count=16k 16384+0 records in 16384+0 records out 1073741824 bytes (1.1 GB) copied, 6.15116 s, 175 MB/s 512k count=4k 4096+0 records in 4096+0 records out 2147483648 bytes (2.1 GB) copied, 375.501 s, 5.7 MB/s bs=1M count=1k 1024+0 records in 1024+0 records out 1073741824 bytes (1.1 GB) copied, 13.6133 s, 78.9 MB/s bs=64k count=16k 16384+0 records in 16384+0 records out 1073741824 bytes (1.1 GB) copied, 0.53662 s, 2.0 GB/s real 0m0.681s user 0m0.003s sys 0m0.506s CPU model : Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E3-1240 v3 @ 3.40GHz Number of cores…

SPECIAL OFFER - DEDICATED SERVER Quad Core i5-2400 - 8GB RAM - 500GB HD - ONLY $49.95/Month! FREE DIRECTADMIN CONTROL PANEL! - Available in Scranton and Los Angeles CHECK IT OUT DEDICATED SERVER BLOWOUT PROMO CYBER MONDAY SALE! HUGE BLOWOUT - Dedicated Servers starting at ONLY $34.95/Month! CHECK IT OUT VPS CLEARANCE SALE Use promo code "WINTER20"...Expires 12/31/2013 Valid at all BurstNET® US locations Valid on all BurstNET® virtual private server (VPS) services 20% OFF CHECK IT OUT DEDICATED SERVERS - FIRST MONTH FREE Select Packages Only Limited Time Offer Quantities Limited CHECK IT OUT SPECIAL OFFER - DEDICATED SERVER Xeon Quad Core X3220 8GB RAM (2)500GB SATA Hardware RAID 100TB or 1Gbps unmetered bandwidth $179.95 MONTH CHECK IT OUT ULTRA LINUX SSD VPS FASTEST DISK SPEED VPS AVAILABLE! Available at all BurstNET® global locations CHECK IT OUT COLO SPECIAL OFFER #1 - FULL RACK 100M NEW SCRANTON PA DC2 FACILITY ONLY 42U Full Rack 20A 110V Power 100Mbps Bandwidth 1-Year Contract USE COUPON CODE: PADC2MB $499.95 MONTH CHECK IT OUT COLO SPECIAL OFFER #2 - FULL RACK 1G NEW SCRANTON PA DC2 FACILITY ONLY 42U Full Rack 40A 110V Power 1Gbps Bandwidth 1-Year Contract USE COUPON CODE: PADC2GB $999.95 MONTH CHECK IT OUT COLO SPECIAL OFFER #1 - FULL RACK 100M MIAMI FL DC1 FACILITY ONLY 42U Full Rack 20A 110V Power 100Mbps Bandwidth 1-Year Contract USE COUPON CODE: FLDC1MB $599.95 MONTH CHECK IT OUT COLO SPECIAL OFFER #2 - FULL RACK 1G MIAMI FL DC1 FACILITY ONLY 42U Full Rack 40A 110V Power 1Gbps Bandwidth 1-Year Contract USE COUPON CODE: FLDC1GB $1099.95 MONTH CHECK…

In many situations, HTTP services are public and intended to be accessed by anyone with the ability to connect to the server. However, there are a number of cases where site administrators need to have some additional control over which users can access the server. In these contexts, it is useful to require users to submit authentication credentials (e.g. usernames and passwords) to a site before gaining access to a resource. This guide provides an overview of both credential-based and rule-based access control tools for the Apache HTTP server. We assume that you have a working installation of Apache and have access to modify configuration files. Contents Configuring HTTP Authentication Generating HTTP AUTH Passwords Access Control Lists with Groups The Caveats of HTTP Authentication More Information Configuring HTTP Authentication To enable passwords for a directory, insert the following lines into the appropriate <Directory> section of an Apache configuration file. You may also insert authentication information in an .htaccess file or in a virtual host configuration section. The required directives are: File excerpt:Apache Configuration File AuthType Basic AuthUserFile /srv/auth/.htpasswd AuthName "Sign In Here To Gain Access To the Site" Require valid-user The AuthType directive specifies which authentication method Apache should use when connecting with clients. Basic requires that passwords be sent as clear text over the network. As a result we don't recommend using this to protect sensitive resources. The AuthUserFile specifies the path (in full) to the password file where the passwords are stored. The AuthName directive contains the message which the browser uses to inform the user of what resource they're authenticating to. The value is arbitrary. The "Require valid-user" setting simply tells Apache…

  New Year’s Resolution: From Jan 6th to Jan 11th, save 25% on all your Linux and Windows Cloud Hosting needs. That’s right. One month, Three months, Six Months or a Full Year of Cloud Servers at 25% off. Resolve to Save Money in 2014 . Use Case Sensitive Coupon Code: NYRSaver2014 Please Note: Promo only applies to the three, six, nine or full year package purchased. The promo does not extend any further. Linux Cloud 512M Ram 20G Disk Space 1 Core CPU 2T Bandwidth $4/mo BUY LINK

  BuyVM just restocked their VPS 15mins ago. Don't miss the offers this time. Check it out

  Prometeus launched their Xen Plans in Milan, Italy and Dallas, Unite states.  I bought 2, 1 in Milan, 1 in Dallas. I can tell you they are good. Coupon: XENPOWER25 Node in Milan, Italy Dual Intel E5 v2 CPU LSI raid controller with BBU SATA enterprise disks in RAID 10 2, 4 or 6 vCPU (fair share) 1, 2 or 4 GB of RAM 120, 250 or 500 GB of Disk 1 IPv4, 2 IPv6 (one /64 on request) Xen PV Virtualization Gigabit shared link Solusvm Control Panel Self Managed service Location: Milan, Italy XP1G - €5.9/month or €59/year 2 vCPU 1GB RAM 120GB Disk space 2000GB Traffic included Milan, Italy XP2G - €9.9/month or €99/year 4 vCPU 2GB RAM 250GB Disk space 4000GB Traffic included Milan, Italy XP4G - €16.9/month or €169/year 6 vCPU 4GB RAM 500GB Disk space 6000GB Traffic included Milan, Italy 22% VAT will be added to listed prices to all EU customers without a valid VAT ID and all Italian sales.   Plans in Dallas, Unite states XPsu1G (15 Available) XenPower.com CPU: 4 Core RAM: 1024MB Hard Disk: 40GB SSD IP addresses: 1 IPv4, 2 IPv6 Dedicated internet bandwidth: 4000 GB OS: Linux Distribution: debian, ubuntu or centos Control Panel: SolusVM Virtualization: XEN PV Type: Self Managed Location: Dallas, USA COUPON:1GSPECIAL40 $6.96/mo BUY LINK XPsu2G (4 Available) XenPower.com CPU: 4 Core, RAM: 2024MB, Hard Disk: 80GB SSD IP addresses: 1 IPv4 and 2 IPv6 Dedicated internet bandwidth: 6000 GB OS: Linux, Distribution: debian ubuntu or centos Control Panel: SolusVM Virtualization: XEN PV, Type: Self Managed Location: Dallas, USA COUPON:25K0TLZMZN $6.96/mo BUY LINK  

New promotions from Virpus. Free Cpanel & DirectAdmin for semi-annual & annual plans XVM512 VPS CPU: 1 Core 20G Disk Space 512M Ram/ 1024M Swap 1500G Bandwidth 100M Port 2 IP $3.4/mo BUY HERE XVM1024 CPU: 2 Cores 40G Disk Space 1024M Ram/ 2048M Swap 3000G Bandwidth 100M Port 2 IP $6.8/mo BUY HERE XVM1536 VPS CPU: 4 Cores 60G Disk Space 1536M RamGuaranteed / 3072 MB Burstable 6000G Bandwidth 100M Port 2 IP $10.2/mo BUY HERE XVM2048 VPS CPU: 6 Cores 80G Disk Space 2048M RamGuaranteed / 4096 MB Burstable 12000G Bandwidth 100M Port 2 IP $13.6/mo BUY HERE XVM4096 VPS CPU: 8 Cores 100G Disk Space 4096M RamGuaranteed / 8192 MB Burstable 15000G Bandwidth 100M Port 2 IP $27.2/mo BUY HERE

What should you do when dpkg-reconfigure tzdata is not working How will you change server time? On Linux Server:: ========== 1. Login as a Root. 2. The time zones are located on server in the directory /usr/share/zoneinfo, so change the directory to that one. Code: root@Server [~]# cd /usr/share/zoneinfo 3. Copy or move the current local time zone so that you will be able to set the time zone as per requirement. Code: root@Server [~]#cp -p /etc/localtime /etc/localtime-back Or root@Server [~]#mv /etc/localtime /etc/localtime-back 4. Now say for example, if you want to set the BST [British Summer Time] time zone for your server then, you will need to create a symbolic link for the same. The command is as follows. Code: root@Server [~]#ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Los_Angeles /etc/localtime Verify the changes done by “date” command.Code: root@Server [~]#date Mon Oct 20 04:51:57 BST 2008 If you get the below error while trying to change the time, you need to allow permission to the VPS to change time in the main node. Error:- # date 031612482009 date: cannot set date: Operation not permitted Fix:- To correct this problem, exit from the container (#exit) and issue the following commands. Login to the main node # vzctl stop # vzctl set –save –capability sys_time:on # vzctl start Where <veid> is your Virtual Environment ID. Next, log back into your virtual environment and issue the following commands to set the appropriate time-zone for the Virtual Environment (VE). # vzctl enter # mv /etc/localtime /etc/localtime.old # ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Los_Angeles /etc/localtime # date

This is the Benchmark Test for the new offer from WeLoveServers 8 Cores OpenVZ. I've been with WeLoveServers for 4 months. Their nodes are using "Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E3-1240 v3 @ 3.40GHz" and Raid 10 for storage. The benchmark shows the overall performance of their 8 cores OpenVZ VPS is good. However, I/O dropped to half of what it was when I bought them 4 months ago. It could be better if they could improve the I/O a bit. Check their offers, HERE Go to their website, HERE System Specs RAM 2048 MB HDD 62 GB CPU Model Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E3-1240 v3 @ 3.40GHz CPU Cores 8 CPU Speed 3399 MHz CPU Cache 8192 KB UnixBench UnixBench (w/ all processors) 5468.9 UnixBench (w/ one processor) 1923.1 Raw UnixBench Output # # # # # # # ##### ###### # # #### # # # # ## # # # # # # # ## # # # # # # # # # # # ## ##### ##### # # # # ###### # # # # # # ## # # # # # # # # # # # # ## # # # # # # # ## # # # # #### # # # # # ##### ###### # # #### # # Version 5.1.3 Based on the Byte Magazine Unix Benchmark Multi-CPU version Version 5 revisions by Ian Smith, Sunnyvale, CA, USA January 13, 2011 johantheghost at yahoo period com 1 x Dhrystone 2 using register variables 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8…