DigitalOcean Versus Rackspace Cloud Server

DigitalOcean Versus Rackspace Cloud Server is a difficult comparison which, can not be answered simply whether First is better than the later. DigitalOcean is practically unmanaged and at the time of publication of this article, has only one service – Cloud Server. Whereas Rackspace Hosting includes lot of services related to Cloud Computing and Big Data. Not to forget the analysis by Gartner Magic Quadrant 2014 for IaaS Solutions. But, it is a practical fact that – DigitalOcean costs so less, after the virtual death of MediaTemplate; comparison automatically arrives.

DigitalOcean Versus Rackspace Cloud Server : Cost Factor

Everyone knows that Rackspace Cloud Server run on OpenStack Cloud Computing Software. Not to forget, Rackspace Cloud DNS, Cloud Queue, Mail Gun are fully free services provided by Rackspace. Right now, minimum charge for a new account for running any number of instances of Rackspace Cloud Server will cost 150 USD (Infrastructure Level Support). If we only compare the total incurring cost – DigitalOcean definitely beat Rackspace at this point and not really the performance in real life of DigitalOcean is bad. As none of the providers will ever care to endorse us ( rather simply sponsor to run the website ), we have no reason to deny the very practical fact – at the same cost, one will get better virtual instance on DigitalOcean. From SSH, both frankly appears faster and easy to SSH. For less serious website like personal blog, when $10/month can serve the purpose on DigitalOcean, there is no meaning of wasting money on Rackspace Cloud Server. Whitelisted IP or Service Continuity not basic need of a non-serious website, like just another personal blog.

DigitalOcean Versus Rackspace Cloud Server : Performance Factor

An excellent real life simulation testing is done by Jason :

http://blog.cloudharmony.com/2014/07/comparing-cloud-compute-services.html

His analysis frankly is so detailed, not a single word can be said about the point of neutrality. Performance is almost same is money spending is kept constant and number of cores increased to adjust any flaw of underlying infrastructure or extra running daemons. PVHVM makes the Rackspace Cloud Server 2GB+ instance to run faster. For just a simple personal blog, Rackspace Cloud Server simply can not offer anything extra. There is no software level support at 150 USD (Infrastructure Level Support). More need of good hardware arises, Rackspace has more to offer than simple Rackspace Cloud Server – there is managed virtualization, onMetal, Dedicated, colocation etc. For 512 MB instance, Rackspace honestly is not any good choice.

DigitalOcean Versus Rackspace Cloud Server : Support

The big plus of Rackspace is the support of managed services and service level agreement. If there is payment failure due to changed policies by a Country – for example in case of us (India), Rackspace will not stop providing the service. None within business wants to delay payments, if there can be assumed problem at present or in future, here Rackspace is the winner. That never means deliberate non-payment, this way saves the online business. This is practically “Business Performance Factor”. Rackspace will take the money out in legal way for disturbing customers, but this minimum assurance of running the instance is warranted.

Rackspace’s specialty is quality of personalized support. Cloud Server is not great for dedicated performance. In other words, Rackspace Cloud Server possibly can not be directly compared with DigitalOcean but yes, we have no reason to agree with the fact – DigitalOcean is really good for the advanced users. Not everyone can code, at Infrastructure Level Support, they’ll help to run a Heat Template. Practically the cost of free services like Cloud Monitoring, Cloud Intelligence, Cloud DNS, Cloud Files aka Akamai CDN at almost subsidized cost – all are calculated and average cost is added on the paid products. Quite normal, no business will pay from own wallet.

There are definite reasons behind why we are using Rackspace Cloud Server since 2010-11. Rackspace has discontinued their 100% unmanaged servers, possibly to avoid comparison.