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18 month review (updated) of Hetzner
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18 month review (updated) of Hetzner

18 months ago I decided that I would go away from cloud hosting for my main sites, and some of my backup sites, and got two servers @ Hetzner

WHAT?? are you thinking, but I wanted more control over my servers, and wanted to have more services on fewer hosts and servers.++

I found out about their server bidding, you can get decent servers there for cheap money, and there is no setup fee or contract. I'm using Windows Server 2012 R2 DC on my servers and use Hyper-V to run my VMs.

And this had now worked 100% for the last 18 months.

Product/hardware/price

At Hetzner you can get it all, from several thousand euro per month servers, to €26/mo servers. And since I'm on a low budget I did find their serverbidding site, and found me a couple of good servers.

The servers sold on their serverbidding is mostly 2-3 years old. Core i7 2600/3770/3930 and Xeon E3/E5 is mostly what you find there. The auction works like this, the price drop on different servers at different times, if somebody grab the server before you, the price goes up again, and it will take hours up to days before the price is so good again. I had two servers, a Core i7 2600 with 16 GB RAM and a Core i7 3770 32 GB RAM both with 2 x 3 TB HDDs and 20 TB bandwidth @ 1 Gbps, then 10mbps the rest of the time (if you use up 20 TB with BW) And I paid only €26/mo for each server.

I have changed one server, mostly because people recommended it, but I think I regret it, but still, my setup now is:

Server1:
XEON E3-1245v2, 32 GB EEC RAM, 2 x 3 TB Enterprise HDD, 20 TB BW, 9 extra IPs. 
Price: €50/mo

Server2:
Core i7 2600, 16 GB RAM, 4 x 4 TB HDD, 30 TB BW, 3 extra IPs: Price: €42.00/mo

One good thing since my last review is the Flexi Pack. Before you needed it if you wanted sub nets (IPs) on your server, and it was quite expensive at €12.5 + the price of the subnet. Now you can have sub nets without Flexi Pack.

Another change is that you can have 6 extra IPs (without subnet) with each server. Before you could only have three. The price is still the same €0,84 per IP/mo.

Some times you are lucky with the disks you get. On my i7 3770 server, the disks was brand new when I got the server. On my XEON server my disks is around two years old.

Still, you get allot for your money. If you are lucky to get a server at the right time, you can get a very good price, and lots of disk space etc.

Service/Support

Hetzner are a unmanaged host. They fix network and hardware issues, but that's it. All other support cost money. Still, I sent in some tickets in the start, just to see if they helped or not, and at the first I got fast and good help, but then they started to say that they only support Network and Hardware, and that you have to pay for all other support.

They also charge you for the most. Like the flexi pack, if you need to boot from a USB, you have ONE hard reset per month, then you have to pay (so don't turn the server off)

Still, what can you expect from a company that sells you a Core i7 3770 32 GB RAM, 6 TB HDD, and 20 TB BW on 1 Gbps port for €26/mo?

Have not had any hardware issues at all the last 6 months, so I have not tested their real network/hardware support.

Benchmark

I have taken benchmark from one Linux server on each server, both using 4 cores, and 3 GB of RAM and here is the result:

First the Xeon E3-1245v2:

I tested with 8 cores on the server, but since the 4 last core is just threads, the result was only 5.550 points, around 500 points higher.

Then the Core i7 3770, actually this one got a little better result then the XEON.

Network/uptime

100% uptime on the network on both Data centers (16 and 19) I have my servers the last 18 months.

Conclusion

I did go from a real cloud service @ Iwstack.com to a dedicated server. Was sure that was a bad idea, but since I have my own fail over service, servers in two different DC, backups on Vultr and a good host like Hetzner, my switch was not so bad. My servers is much faster then the Iwstack system, and I can start, stop, create etc server much faster on my servers then at Iwstack. I can use Hyper-V so I can Live export my servers how often I want, no snapshot that only works in this and that way. Full snapshot, that can be imported back on the same server, or on another server with Hyper-V. Just change the IP, and you are up and running again.

No abuse on the server, just me. The network can be from 200 mbps to 1 gbps. I think that will have something to do with other servers on the same rack using BW.

Still, after 18 months, I don't regret that I changed from Iwstack to my own dedicated servers. But of course, it cost more money. Before I paid less then I do today, but I have put several of my services in the two servers, saving money here and there. Still, it cost more then the cloud. Since I used so little RAM, HDD and CPU cores.

What do you think?

Thanked by 3Tom karjaj Cryck

Comments

  • FalzoFalzo Member

    you have ONE hard reset per month

    You are able to issue as much automatic hard resets as you like via control panel. Only manual hard reset may be charged ;-)

    I agree they deliver good performance and service for the money. Use them in production for years.

    Thanked by 2karjaj myhken
  • myhkenmyhken Member

    Yea, I talk about a hard HARD reset, aka that one person has to go to your server and turn it on. (or they do it via KVM)

  • sandrosandro Member

    I don't get why they have those strict BW policies...

  • myhkenmyhken Member

    You talking about the 20-30-40TB etc restriction? I think it cost €0.017 per TB over if you know that you will use more then you have as a limit. Charged by actual usage.

  • @sandro said:
    I don't get why they have those strict BW policies...

    Allows them to keep a quite good network mix, and with their new network hardware rollout low congestion. But at same time allow people who need as much bandwidth as they need pay.

    The per TB price for guaranteed port isn't bad.

  • MaouniqueMaounique Host Rep, Veteran

    myhken said: I think it cost €0.017 per TB

    Isnt that a typo? 1.7 cents a TB?

  • RodneyRodney Member

    @Maounique said:

    myhken said: I think it cost €0.017 per TB

    Isnt that a typo? 1.7 cents a TB?

    Yeah it is, it's 1.17€/TB

  • myhkenmyhken Member

    My bad...you are correct

  • sandrosandro Member

    AshleyUk said: Allows them to keep a quite good network mix, and with their new network hardware rollout low congestion. But at same time allow people who need as much bandwidth as they need pay.

    The per TB price for guaranteed port isn't bad.

    Why not just block the connection and/or revert full speed in the next month instead of permanent limit?

  • sandrosandro Member

    myhken said: You talking about the 20-30-40TB etc restriction? I think it cost €0.017 per TB over if you know that you will use more then you have as a limit. Charged by actual usage.

    >

    No i'm talking about this once you go over your Vserver limit

    *There are no charges for overage. We will permanently restrict the connection speed if more than 2 TB/month are used. (The basis for calculation is for outgoing traffic only. Incoming and internal traffic is not calculated). Optionally, the limit can be permanently cancelled by committing to pay € 1.39 per additional TB used.

  • edited July 2016

    sandro said: Why not just block the connection and/or revert full speed in the next month instead of permanent limit?

    If you max out the allotted traffic they probably don't want to encourage your stay as you would be presumably consuming much more traffic than their average client.

  • myhkenmyhken Member

    I only use 10-20% of my limits. Lot more internal bw between servers (backup files), but only external traffic goes to the limit.

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