Q: should I increase my current VPS capacity or spin up a new one for the same price?
I have an already configured VPS server in Hetzner. I'm pretty happy with it. I have it configured with yunohost (a Debian "layer" that allows you to easily install services). Now I'm planning to run a NextCloud service, but my current server is not capable to handle it with it's current capabilities. For the same price I could scale my current server or spin up a new server with the same capabilities and dedicate it to next cloud.
The disadvantages of spining up a new server, is that I have to configure another server and secure it, but the advantage is exactly on the same side: I will have a second server in case something fails or I want to "scale down" to save costs it will be easier.
Even if I just scale up the current server, I will have to add an extra disk and configure the server to use it, so I'm not sure about the advantages of each one.
10 replies
I'm unsure how Hetzner does it, but confirm that you factor the cost of backups in. VPS providers might have you pay a flat rate for backups on an instance ignorant of size, but you'll have to pay for backups of each instance
That's interesting. Although I usually handle backups myself (to backblaze) and I never tested provider backup mechanism
Sounds like esxi storage provisioning. You can grow, but shrinking is a whole different story
Tbf, while it's possible to shrink disks, it's always a hassle and much more complex than growing one.
Yes. In any case I will attach an external volume,which is easier to manage and relatively cheap. Thanks for pointing it out
I always look for excuses to get more servers, so if you ask me, I'd say yes, get that new server. There's no such thing as having too much servers since there are so many things I want to self-host.
I also regularly tear down my servers and see how fast I can set it up again. Keep my deployment scripts up to date.
That's what I should do to and I keep telling myself that I'll do it next month 🙈
Yes, that's true. But if I start having many servers I will also start feeling the urge to cluster them, and that will be an absolute black hole of my time 😅
It feels like you answered your own question—a second server comes with advantages and sounds like it isn’t a significant increase in price.