Best/Fast VPS Hosting Companies?

[CoffeeLovesYou]

Hello!
Firstly, let me just say that I have read numerous threads about what host to pick on vB.com and vB.org. However, some are outdated and I know that statistics change from when they were years ago, so I would like some updated information on the best hosts out there.

Background Info and Specs;
Currently, our forum is ran by a Linux centOS MyHosting VPS. The specs are

40GB disk space
6GB RAM
10 Virtual Processors
300GB Bandwidth
1 IP address

Our forum is about to hit 1,500 members, and our daily count of members at the end of each day is over 250 (not including guests). With guests, we have over 500 people view our forum each day. At a given time frame of 2 hours, we have 300 members/guests viewing the forum actively.

We couldn't complain about the speed and uptime before we got as active as we are today. About 2 weeks ago, we had so much activity going on that our CPU hit 100% and our database and site crashed! When that happened, we updated our Virtual Processors and RAM, but now our uptime is beginning to become sluggish. During the day randomly, the site can freeze and take over 1 minute to load, or you get those 'A connection can not be established' messages. Especially at night time, around this time as I am posting this message, it is very frequent.

Now, some companies have AMAZING web hosting. However, their VPS hosting can be totally different. I always used HostGator for my shared web hosting before I had to go with MyHosting for VPS.
Is HostGator's VPS service good? They are very costly.
I see their cheapest Linux VPS is;
CPU
0.57 GHZ
RAM
384 MB
Disk Space
10 GB
Bandwidth
250 GB
However, I would need the Level 3 VPS which comes with cPanel because I have used cPanel since I first started out with websites and it would be weird to switch to anything but it... :rolleyes:
CPU
1.13 GHZ
RAM
768 MB
Disk Space
30 GB
Bandwidth
500 GB
which is $50 recurring monthly.

Is there a better host out there than MyHosting? We pay about $40 monthly for what we currently have, which is good considering our 6GB of RAM.
Please help on this subject! Need good host advice, thanks! :D

[snakes1100]

Is the current live server setup & optimized correctly?

[CoffeeLovesYou]

Heh, I can't really be the judge of that. I think it is?
I know the CPU does get really high though because of vBSEO.

[snakes1100]

If your unsure, then i would be suggestible that server been gone thru to see whats going on, before the server is blamed for lack of hardware resources & you move your site to a new one.

You cna post a request at vbulletin.com for a free server optimization, but that requires work on your part as well, it can also take a few days for an answer.

[final kaoss]

Also, have a look in my signature for my written guide. Proper caching can save on alot of resources: Ram, CPU, Bandwidth.

I suspect that in your case you haven't combined js/css files, don't worry though, I've linked to a mod in the guide that can handle that.

[CoffeeLovesYou]

My forum is vB3.8.7. So that guide is no help for me, but thanks Kaoss. :(
Is there a guide anywhere to set up caching (like XCache) for vBulletin? I can't find one.

[final kaoss]

other than apache (which is covered in my guide), you can make a request here.
https://www.vbulletin.com/forum/forumdisplay.php/14-Server-Configuration

[betterthanyours]

Don't go with Hostgator. Chances are with the number of users visiting your site, you will need much more than a puny 700MB RAM. Is your current VPS managed?

Do you require cPanel and managed services? If you can drop both, you would save a tidy sum and can pick up a VPS with the same if not more resources for half the price you are paying...double that to the price you are paying and you'd get a pretty beefy one.

My suggestion to most people is: paying a provider to manage your VPS when you only maybe raise one or two tickets a month which takes 10 minutes to solve is not really economical. It is cheaper to just hire a freelancer to solve issues as and when...