Best Platform for Evo? VPS Cloud?

Background info for site architecture:
I need to create a new website, and I have decided to use MODX Evo. The main functionality of the site will be to house a forum and to provide a place for forum members to publish articles - related to their interests in the sub-forums. The 'articles' portion of the site will have its own mySQL DB, and the forum will use a separate mySQL DB. Whatever the server is will be some flavor of Linux running the latest php.

I will be using a bridge/integration tool ("MODx Extra") MODxBB 0.9.4 0.9.4-pl to facilitate a single login and session management functionality.

So, shared hosting, or VPS, or VPS Cloud?
If the site ends up to be sleepy (little activity), the hosting won't matter too much. On the other hand, if the site takes off, then I do not want it to be bogged down. I believe that I read that Revolution was written to take advantage of some aspect(s) of cloud computing, but how about Evolution?

Rather than pay $4/month for an inexpensive hosting service in a shared environment, and be faced with moving the site to a different host if it does take off, I'm thinking about trying a VPS Cloud server at its lowest level, knowing that more resources (RAM, CPUs, storage) can easily be added if and when needed. (I'm not necessarily going with VPS.Net, but for example:
http://vps.net/#deploy

I may be wrong, but I suspect that even the most basic service at $20/mo would be a lot faster than typical cheap ($4 to $6/mo) hosting on a shared server.

Dedicated CPU 1.2GHz
Dedicated RAM 376MB
Disk space10GB
Network transfer1TB
Monthly cost from$20.00


An interesting article that points out that most people don't need cloud computing:
http://www.cloudtweaks.com/2010/11/cloud-vs-vps-vs-shared-hosting-part-1/

Sorry my post was long, but I wanted to make sure that I explained what I want to do well enough to allow some web developers with cloud experience to offer an opinion.

Thanks in advance for any insights you can share.

Dennis [ed. note: last edited this post 13 years, 11 months ago.]

If you are planning for a lot of traffic then you may want to look into MODX Revolution as it has better caching to cope with higher traffic loads. That being said if most of the site is actually a forum then Evolution may work just as well for you, as the performance benefits show more so after 2-3k posts.

In regards to your hosting starting with a basic shared plan would be fine for your needs, and as the site increases in traffic a good host will work with you to upgrade your resources as needed. In regards to the performance, a well managed shared server should run well for your needs, granted if it's you and your closest 200+ neighbors that's another story.

There is a nice hosting offer here: https://forums.modx.com/thread/80440/2012-toast-the-host-free-skytoaster-modx-hosting#dis-post-443210 if you want a good place to start, or one of the hosts here: http://modx.com/partners/hosting-saas/

I hope that helps some.

Thanks AMDbuilder.

One of the site criteria was to have a single login for the forum and for forum members to use the features outside the forum (mainly, the ability to write and publish articles.) So, the "bridge"/MOD/Extra that allows this to happen with phpbb3 forum software is a must. That "Extra" author has Evo and phpbb3 working together right now, and has no immediate plans to try to tackle Revolution.

I suspect this new site will either will either flop (where I would be glad I just paid a monthly fee to a shared host, and not have lost many dollars), or it will take off and run terribly slowly and/or get throttled by the average shared hosting company. Of course, we know they don't really allow "unlimited" anything - it's just sales hype.

You are running a cool promo at SkyToaster. I think I jump on it. Thanks!

Dennis
p.s. I will send you a PM to get started.

The Vanilla forum has a very nice SSO module that works well with Revo. http://sottwell.com/article-vanilla/ [ed. note: sottwell last edited this post 13 years, 9 months ago.]

Quote from: sottwell at Nov 14, 2012, 09:50 PM

The Vanilla forum has a very nice SSO module that works well with Revo. http://free.sottwell.modxcloud.com/article-vanilla/

Thanks, Susan. I have set up phpbb half a dozen times and like it, its extensibility, and its community, so unless I run into a problem I cannot solve, I probably won't look at other forum software. But, I do appreciate your feedback!

Dennis