Ask HN: slicehost-like providers outside the US?

[abstractbill]

We're running into a bunch of issues at Justin.TV that would be much easier to test with IPs outside of the US. I've tried looking for free web proxies, but those seem to be hard to find, and not very reliable.

I'm thinking of getting us a few accounts with slicehost-like providers outside of the US, which we could use to run any kind of proxies we want. Can anyone recommend some good providers?

[jbyers]

http://www.gplhost.com / http://www.gplhost.co.uk

Singapore, Australia, Israel, Spain, France, UK

[joao]

http://gandi.net - totally recomended, located in France

[mjs → joao]

Seconded.

[astrec]

I've been using RimuHosting (http://rimuhosting.com/) for years - they're in a few data centres around the world and the service is A1.

[kragen → astrec]

I strongly recommend against RimuHosting for reasons that should be released in a few weeks.

[danw → kragen]

Care to elaborate on that now? The only reason I can think of that you wouldn't is if there was an unpatched flaw in their security

[aaronsw → danw]

Kragen was referring to my nasty experience with them, which I haven't published yet since I wanted to get all my data off before criticizing them.

[danw → astrec]

Seconded on Rimu. Brilliant customer service & support

[jwilliams]

Amazon EC2 is available in Europe now, so that might suit.

An EC2 pay-as-you-go model (opposed to a Slicehost one) might be a more economical option for testing as well.

[lux → jwilliams]

Not that this helps the original poster, but Slicehost is pretty much pay-as-you-go as well now that they don't charge the first 3 months up front. They still charge a full month at a time, but if for example you create a slice for just a couple minutes, they automatically pro-rate it and refund the unused time.

Coupled with their API that lets you instantiate new slices just like EC2 instances, they're definitely the closest thing to EC2 I've seen going.

[ntoshev → lux]

They pro-rate based on days of usage, it's not hourly billing like EC2.

[lux → lux]

Meant to add that I wonder if there will be any plans, now that they're a part of Rackspace, to expand to multiple geographic locations...

[ralph]

http://www.bytemark.co.uk/ Sterling's cheap at the moment! "Darling, why don't we sell up in the UK, move to France, and buy a croissant."

They've been doing virtual machines for years using User Mode Linux.

[dhess]

I'm also looking for a UK-based virtual host for occasional proxy testing. Does anyone here have experience with http://flexiscale.com/ ?

Alternatively, even a simple UK-based, non-root shell account with the ability to run Squid would probably suffice. I manage a few servers in a San Jose colo and would gladly provide an equivalent service if anyone wants to swap. Feel free to contact me (see my user page).

[danohuiginn → dhess]

I've used them. The reliability is terrible; at one point the entire system went down for several days. I've also had numerous other problems affecting my account there. The support staff are really nice, and pretty responsive, but that doesn't make up for their systems being broken.

For my needs (occasional access to a windows machine, cheaply) all this wasn't a big problem. Maybe if what you need is just a uk-based account for occasional testing, it'll be OK for you as well. But I wouldn't use them anywhere I needed even a little reliability.

[dhess → danohuiginn]

Two strikes. Thanks for the info.

[tonylucas → dhess]

I believe it was myself who posted on the other list. FlexiScale certainly has had it's issues this year, there is no doubt about that, however we are all extremely confident about the new release that will be coming out in Q1 of 2009, and would really like to get people to try it.

We will also be issuing a full detailed decscription at that point of the internal issues we faced, to explain how we've overcome them.

Anyone who wants to try it at that point is more than welcome to a no-catches free trial, so we can prove we are delivering on our promises.

Regards,

Tony Lucas CEO, FlexiScale

[pierrefar → dhess]

On a hacker mailing list I subscribe to, there is a long thread going on about how crappy Flexiscale is. Regular downtime seems to be the issue.

A rep from Flexiscale did come on the thread and state they've found the bugs and will be updating their virtual server software soon.

I can't comment beyond this, but hope this helps.

Pierre

[dhess → pierrefar]

Too bad, they looked great. Thanks for the data point!

[jonny_noog]

Australia:

http://www.netlogistics.com.au/

http://www.crucial.com.au/

[matthall28]

SuperBytes.net is in Canada and they are really good for VPS hosting

[nreece]

Have a look at: http://vpschoice.com/ They have a list (page bottom).

[liangzan]

http://frro.net/ from singapore

[mikeyur]

http://futurehosting.com/

They're a US company but you can get a VPS in London through them. A basic VPS can be had for like $10/month if they have a sale on.

[dbc]

I'm also interested in offshore VPS hosting, but I want the servers to be located in a country without police state laws surrounding Internet traffic and/or speech, so this excludes the US, UK, EU, Canada, and Australia. Switzerland, Norway, and Iceland would be acceptable, and I'm willing to consider other countries.

I've been using RimuHosting, and they've been pretty good, but their servers are located in jurisdictions that are problematic for true online liberty.

[mstevens]

I use http://clustered.net/ for a VPS. Pretty good, but not quite as automated as providers like slicehost.

They're in the UK.

[galactus]

I use myself dedibox.fr (France). I certainly recommend it.