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Netcup launches HOURLY BILLING + new VPS Generation (40TB traffic!)
Here we go 
The battle is on I guess :P
Servers with hourly billing: https://www.netcup.de/vserver/vps.php
CPU used: Intel E5-2680v4
Comments
The battle is on, from DO to Hetzner, now Netcup, who's next?
IMPORTANT:
If you don't know this yet I have just called them and you acctually NEED TO PREPAY the hourly vps for a certain time frame (which I didnt ask in detail yet but I think someone mentioned it's a month or so). This is a bit of a bummer even though the support agent said that once you cancel your hourly vps the rest of the prepaid credit will be added as balance to your account.
Can't wait to see more providers to join the battlefield.
Wow, they act fast.
Still hetzner the winner, since hetzner prices much lower and using NVMe ..
Also, don't forget Netcup charged VAT even you are living outside Europe
Im from Germany so VAT isnt an argument for me :P
i think that coincident. netcup english site not yet updated.
hetzner still win a little bit, by offering full english site
I expect Hetzner's API and integrations will outpace netcup.
I wonder if netcup still has that burst bandwidth cap that put me off.
--double post--
@vimalware You said that twice already though :P
According to the order page you have to pay 6 Months up front. Which is too much for me to cough up to compare it to Hetzner's deal.
Same
Otherwhise I would have run a bench too.
I would guess that for real power users, Hetzner is probably the better choice, but for me personally, netcup wins.
I'm waiting a little bit to see if the "Generation 8" comes to their root server series as well.
@Ympker did you find some hints about this in their German forum?
Yes I replied to you in the other thread
Yup I've seen it now, ty
So netcup just stated that you can't use the remaining prepaid balance to order a new hourly vps and use the balance first before being billed again. Instead you have to again prepay for 6 months and the balance will be discounted from that invoice. They told me it seems like I have misunderstood their idea of hourly cloud vps as they want to offer fair prices over a long time. At this point they may aswell f me Im going with Hetzner on this one. Told them that just perhaps the idea I have of an hourly billed cloud is different because, well, EVERY other hourly cloud service aside from Prometheus bills you exactly on the hour without the need to prepay for half a year. And Prometheus acctually allows you to use your prepaid balance/credit with any of their hourly vps to your hearts content without deducting it from a new 6 months prepaid invoice that has been issued for the vps you selected. That's not flexible for me, sorry.
Was that my first netcup rant? Perhaps it's not my day and Im just getting mad over nothing. Anyway they stepped up their game really fast to try compete but not my cup of tea this time around.
Thanks @Ympker for talking to them.
Sure thing
At this point I could never just return to netcup like "Oh I got some balance at netcup left. Let's spin up a vps for a couple days/hours."
More like "Here's your next bill. Thx"
It's not hourly billing if you need to prepay ~4200 hours in advance, all that they're doing is offering pro-rata refunds.
Their price/specs look similar, except that Hetzner use NVMe and Netcup is using SSD.
Which parts are better from Netcup?
I guess you could prepay, then use the vps for couple hours, cancel and request a payout of the rest of the amount but honestly that's just a pita to go through every single time you'd use them let alone you still just couldn't spin up a vps for a couple of hours quickly by using your balance/credit. Nope I'm out.
Hetzner is to big for netcup, so technicaly it's not even close to battle. Hetz is #1 in germany.
I'll shamelessly link to my side-by-side comparison between Hetzner and netcup:
https://www.lowendtalk.com/discussion/comment/2635819/#Comment_2635819
But, as @Ympker pointed out above, a significant practical difference in Hetzner's favor is how hourly billing is implemented. For those who need the flexibility of real hourly billing, Hetzner wins.
(I suspect that netcup, who didn't have hourly billing until now, haven't thought this through.)
Netcup always had nice specs and I'm sure you know that's what Ive always praised them for however their approach to hourly billing and their "You dont know what hourly billing is" attitude might have pissed me off. No it acctually did piss me off.
Yeah, I see that. :-)
My psychological reading is that netcup didn't really want to offer hourly billing but felt compelled because of Hetzner. They haven't thought this part through, clearly.
@Falzo Pretty sure you have received their newsletter/news article already but in case you haven't this is a friendly tag
Not my poison this time but perhaps you are gonna be happy with it :P
No one yet seems to have brought up this:
(From the press release on netcup-news.de)
A price-matching-10% discount.
Interesting for people that don’t care about the billing problems.
Applies only to comparable products. Netcup has 40 TB traffic Hetzner 20TB. They might just say it's not compareable.
Depends on ones point of view. I guess netcup is less ready for risks and more interested in people who are ready to make a commitment. And frankly, at those prices I don't care.
As I just saw it: Well, the price matching offer should clearly demonstrate that netcup is determined to stay in the top group.
As for "but Hetzner has 1+ TB capacity" I don't care; I consider anything beyond 50 Gb acceptable and beyond 100 Gb fucking plenty. And please, guys, let us not forget where we are: LET.
Welcome, netcup. Very well done and quick, too.