Media Temple or Dreamhost

Rails
1

I have a feeling this question has been asked (if not many times) but I
was
wondering what people’s opinion are that have dealt with both.

Which has been a better RoR application host?
Which has had the best uptime?

Which is more customizable, as far as adding gems, etc goes?

-Mark

2

Mark T. wrote:

Which has been a better RoR application host?
Which has had the best uptime?
Which is more customizable, as far as adding gems, etc goes?

Not sure about Dreamhost because I’ve never hosted with them, just know
that Dreamhost has had many reliablility problems lately due to a recent
power outage - then a spiraling problem with a mystery network problem.

MediaTemple and Dreamhost I believe are both housed in the same
facility.

As far as rails hosting, I’ve played around with MT’s new GS product and
it’s pretty cool if you’re not looking for a VPS solution.

Gives you a 64mb rails container (sandbox so you don’t take down the
server, is like a mini VPS) that you can run your apps in. They use
apache (not 2.2, 2.0 something) and proxie rails requests to 1 mongrel
instance. So all images, css, etc is served by apache.

My experience is that one rails app on there eats up about 25 to 30mb or
ram, so you probably shouldn’t host more than 1 app per container
safely. You can upgrade your containers ram (256mb for $25, 1B for $75).
Gem install is done via their local servers (for C compiled gems) or can
via others. Can run subversion.

Is $20 a month.

Speed is ok, but have only had it for a week and haven’t really played
with it too much. So, my vote would be for MediaTemple just because I
have experience with them.

Hope that helps.

DC

3

David C. wrote:

Mark T. wrote:
As far as rails hosting, I’ve played around with MT’s new GS product and
it’s pretty cool if you’re not looking for a VPS solution.

Gives you a 64mb rails container (sandbox so you don’t take down the
server, is like a mini VPS) that you can run your apps in. They use
apache (not 2.2, 2.0 something) and proxie rails requests to 1 mongrel
instance. So all images, css, etc is served by apache.

My experience is that one rails app on there eats up about 25 to 30mb or
ram, so you probably shouldn’t host more than 1 app per container
safely. You can upgrade your containers ram (256mb for $25, 1B for $75).
Gem install is done via their local servers (for C compiled gems) or can
via others. Can run subversion.

Do you know if the server has ImageMagick or GraphicsMagick. I need to
use the RMagick gem which requires either package. Thanks.

4

I am also trying out MT but I’m on my way out it seems. It has a lot
of potential but for some reason my app (which I host now on three
other servers just fine) seems to keep growing on size and it ends up
being killed. I also run into problems with their Urchin stats. My
rails app don’t seem to taken into consideration into the stats. Their
support is good for small things (you can call 24/7) but if the
problem is mildly complex they tell you to write a ticket and it takes
24-48 to get a response. So far I’m not very impressed with their
support at all. BTW, I have hosted with Dreamhost and I would not go
back. They are just not good with performance and stability.

Hope it helps,

AEM

On 10/27/06, David C. [email protected] wrote:

MediaTemple and Dreamhost I believe are both housed in the same
My experience is that one rails app on there eats up about 25 to 30mb or

–
Adrian Esteban Madrid

5

They have their own RMagick gem and although I have installed it I
haven’t tested it yet.

AEM

On 10/27/06, Donut D. [email protected] wrote:

Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.

–
Adrian Esteban Madrid

6

Adrian M. wrote:

I also run into problems with their Urchin stats. My

rails app don’t seem to taken into consideration into the stats.

Yeah, urchin is run against your apache stats only, and it doesn’t seem
to log transactions from the containers. Plus their implementation of
Urchin counts all domains you host with them as the same, so I don’t
really think you could ever count on them to be reliable (e.g.; 5
domains, 1 access log - lame). Google Analytics is free and is pretty
good (just Urhin 6 vs MT’s Urchin 5 install).

I agree, in concept it sounds like a good thing, and probably will once
they start fixing issues (said they are looking into allowing you to run
mongrel_cluster, svn via webdav, more than 1 mysql user, etc.).

Also, you only get one MySQL user, kinda lame. They’re “looking into”
allowing more in the future.

I’m playing, then probably gonna cancel end of the month. Hope
TextDrive’s cheaper Open Solaris containers come out soon. I’m sure
they’ll be way better.

7

I’ve been with DreamHost for about a year and my experience has been a
mixed bag of potatoes. On the one hand I think they offer a well-priced
product with (in my opinion, good support) nice features. On the other
hand, they’re not for five-nines hosting…in fact they’re not for the
faint of heart hosting :slight_smile: So if it is a mission-critical, biz-oriented
site, DH would be off my list! Now, if it’s for your personal use or
perhaps a small biz site I think they are a good value. I’m pretty
happy with RoR on FCGI on my shared boxen there (when it’s up). Runs
fine and have yet to get the much feare Error 500 (with the fix they
published in their Wiki).

So…to semi-answer your question…if you need the server and the
rails app to be up at all times, and ultra-fast, responsive support and
redundant data-centers…DreamHost is NOT what you’e looking for. If
you just want get your toes wet and hack away Rails apps and if you’re
looking for lame, pseudo-intellectually-unfunny newsletters then DH is
the place for you :slight_smile: Poor Josh…he’s just trying too hard (read his
blog LOL).

8

I have only seen complaints about Dreamhost. I host with
Railsplayground (don’t let the name fool you, they are very
professional) and love their service. I recommend them to all of my
clients. I have heard good things about Planet Argon. There is also
Engine Y. and Rails Machine.

Sorry to make your decision more difficult, but you should really
check out these other sites as well.

Carl