Does anyone have recommendations for what distro to use? I don’t know what really matters.
It doesn’t really matter. Only if you’re running critical applications on that server, and you rely on very specific things in the distro, you should worry about which you should install.
I’d advice debian (if you prefer rock-solid-out-dated packages) or CentOS (which is the free/unsupported version of RedHat). With Debian you have to do some extra work (adding a repo) to install the latest software like MySQL 5.2
I think it’s much more important whether you use yum or apt to install your packages. All distro’s have their own preinstalled package manager, but you can pull one package manage through the other 
Went with a 512mb Linode. I used woogley’s referral code I found on the forums. Here is my code if anyone would be so kind…
96b3cca89283fac6babee9b4de25cdc044a40e14
$17.60/month for 2 years. If I cancel early then I don’t get the savings, but still get the remainder of my money back (minuse $5). Used their script to install Debian 5 with LAMP:
http://www.linode.com/stackscripts/view/?StackScriptID=10
That sets up a virtual host, which made it easy to edit and copy for my domains. The Linode Library is very useful. With little more effort I now have everything set up: Java, SVN, etc. Super cool! I’ll post a new thread in a while and we’ll see what people’s ping is like. If my game takes off, I can have a US west coast, east coast, and a London server for ~$53/month, which is fantastic! Assuming 512mb RAM is sufficient of course.
The screen command came in handy, thanks Riven!
Thanks neoskunk for letting me hijack your thread.
I found this:
And I was thinking of getting the 2048mb option. I had a question, though - I’m not really good at judging bandwidth usage and connection speed requirements. Is “UNMETERED 7mbit Or 1000GB @ 100mbit” fast enough to serve most multiplayer games comfortably? How much bandwidth does a game typically use up? What usage amounts do you guys see in your games?
One warning: don’t have lengthy contracts with dirt cheap webhosters. Most are horribly slow, or becomes horribly slow. Pay for a month, see how it goes, and pay for the next.
Regarding bandwidth vs. datatraffic: for a n00b (hosting wise), I’d always advice traffic.
7mbit bandwidth is nothing: it’s 700kb/sec, which might sound like a lot, but keep in mind how much I/O you will do when loading a level. Or even worse, let’s say you have a few game files to download (jars, textures, audio)… and you don’t want to host them on yet another server… One or two players will lag the entire server.
Pick 100mbit, and a fixed amount of datatraffic.
I love my Linode. Haven’t gotten my game finished, :(, so I don’t know how well it will run under load yet.
That hazenet link seems waaaay cheap. There just has to be a downside.
You can get: cheap, fast, reliable
Pick two.
From the site:
[quote]NEW: Every single client is entered into a monthly prize draw, you could win a Remote Controlled Helicopter, or a flexible indestructible keyboard and loads more prizes, shipped for free worldwide! Click here for more details!
You may be wondering why our prices are so cheap, its because we cut out all the nonsense
[/quote]
:persecutioncomplex:
I use a GoDaddy VPS since a couple of weeks and it’s running fine. I have it hosted in Amsterdam (a few kilometers from my house) and I have a ping of under 20ms (a friend in Sweden has about 23ms with my server). Download rates according to speedtest.net is at 100mbit and upload is at 65mbit (shouldn’t it be the other way around with servers? Ah well…).
2 GB ram, windows 2008 R2 (What can I say, I’m much quicker in doing things in Windows :)) for something like 17 euro per month.
Mike
Yeah, I ended up going with 123systems.net and it seems good so far. The box was outdated and stuff when I got it, but I’ve just had to update some things, install others, etc. and now it’s fine.