How difficult it is to manage a dedicated server?

Nunit said:

Well, if WordPress is cached properly, the total cache would take 250MB or so on RAM, and it will not consume 128MB or so per visitor. However, that depends on the type of website being created—WooCommerce is bound to use RAM one way or another, but things are entirely different if we're discussing blog-like websites.

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Caching is a whole different beast, and if done correctly, you would use Redis or Memcached, and it has its own memory requirements. Obviously, it lowers the per request memory requirement a bit, but still. A modern WordPress installation is quite heavy and needs a fair amount of resources. Caching objects will make things much faster because database calls can get expensive as well.. especially if you have hundreds at them per page load.

Shepseskare said:

Thanks for all these advises. The VPS I have now has 4Go RAM. My plan is to get at least 16Go.
I'm averaging 4000 visitors a day. I had 15,000 on my best day.
I wrote to 2 companies asking for info. I'm waiting for their replies.

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In that case, I'd recommend you stay with a VPS because upgrading a VPS is much easier than upgrading a dedicated server. It's reasonable always to have more RAM than you need because once you run out of it and don't have swap, it's bad news. If your server starts swapping, then it's kind of bad news as well because storage is A LOT slower than RAM, but at least your site stays up.

I shall go with a VPS. Best offers I've found so far are from Contabo and Ewallhost. A thing I like, is that they propose to install a GUI for you, so theoretically, you shall not use command lines. Theoretically.

I'd avoid Contabo, as their host nodes for VPS servers are often overloaded which results in high CPU steal and slow VPS servers. There's also frequent downtime.

Diplomat said:

You will pay with money or you will pay with your time. It's your choice.

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This sums up the main issue you face if you are not starting with much - time vs money.

Shepseskare said:

I shall go with a VPS. Best offers I've found so far are from Contabo and Ewallhost. A thing I like, is that they propose to install a GUI for you, so theoretically, you shall not use command lines. Theoretically.

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From what Region of the World are you?
You can use Cloudpanel which comes with a very nice Manage Panel and also the newest features like inbuild Redis and Varnish Cache.

Site Arrow said:

I'd avoid Contabo, as their host nodes for VPS servers are often overloaded which results in high CPU steal and slow VPS servers. There's also frequent downtime.

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Hey, if you want me to give any consideration to your saying, please remove the advertising link below your message. Otherwise, I can only think that wpbolt.com is a bunch of losers because their only way to find customers comes from spamming a forum, with badmouthing their competitors.

mavrick303 said:

Managing a dedicated server can vary in difficulty based on your technical expertise, the specific requirements of your applications, and the level of support provided by your hosting provider. Here are some key factors to consider:

Technical Expertise​

1. System Administration Skills: Basic to advanced knowledge of server administration, including familiarity with command-line interfaces, file systems, and network configuration, is crucial.
2. Security: Understanding and implementing security measures (firewalls, intrusion detection, regular updates) to protect the server from threats.

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This sounds so much like ChatGPT. Like other posts from you, @mavrick303 Are you real?

MuayThai said:

For me, to manage a dedicated server is a hobby. I really enjoy it. After ten years of experience it's very easy.

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But he does not have 10 years of experience. My personal take in this situation will be to value time more than money abd hire someone to handle this aspect. Otherwise , a lot of OP time will be wasted which could have veen spent on things he is good with.

seomaster5 said:

But he does not have 10 years of experience. My personal take in this situation will be to value time more than money abd hire someone to handle this aspect. Otherwise , a lot of OP time will be wasted which could have veen spent on things he is good with.

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If my budget would allow me to pay for an experienced developer to monitor my websites 24/7, you can be sure, I would do it.

Shepseskare said:

If my budget would allow me to pay for an experienced developer to monitor my websites 24/7, you can be sure, I would do it.

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You can have software do that

Be warned tho, dedi servers tend to break on holidays or just when you can't afford to be on the computer

Bare bone metal dedicated server + install Cyberpanel control panel on it (free). As far as I know, it is compatible with OpenLitespeed (the open source version of Litespeed): https://cyberpanel.net/

Thank me later.

If you can live without running Email and DNS on the same server I'd suggest Cloudpanel. With Cloudpanel the plan is to use something like Google Workspace, MS 365 or Protonmail to have truly professional mail (and in the case of Google and Microsoft, also tools for collaboratively editing sheets and docs etc..) and to use either the domain registrar's DNS service, or point it to Cloudflare and run the DNS service there. There is no need to use all the other Cloudflare services, you can just use the reliable, very fast DNS.

If you want to run it all on the server, incl. Email and DNS, Cyberpanel could be a choice if you plan to use Litespeed as the web server. I somewhat disliked Cyberpanel and found it a bit too cluttered, and there are upsells here and there inside the control panel. But a reasonable choice I think, especially if you want to use Litespeed Professional with Cyberpanel. I think then, if you take the few, reasonably priced add-ons, there will be no more upsells.

ISPconfig I used a couple times and their advantage is that there are many very detailed setup instructions online. I found the setup a bit too involved.

My favourite for a paid panel is not Plesk, CPanel or Directadmin but Liveconfig. It costs about 10 EUR / month which is somewhat expensive if you will for something that mostly just sits there but it is quite robust, fast and very minimal. It has Email, DNS and all the other stuff.

The above recommendations are for running your own sites or customer sites.

For mass hosting for customers I'd probably offer both CPanel (for US customers mostly) and Plesk (for EU customers mostly) as the two alternatives.

bartosimpsonio said:

You can have software do that

Be warned tho, dedi servers tend to break on holidays or just when you can't afford to be on the computer

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It's very important not to underestimate this. This is 100% true based on my experience.

Save yourself problems and go with semi-dedicated hosting
https://namecrane.com/crates-semi-dedicated-hosting

If you want dedicated - go with hetzner/ovh.
If you want vps - same companies + frantech.ca

Good luck

I would suggest rent a small VPS and try to manage it. In case of success you can easily migrate all your websites.

Diplomat said:

It's very important not to underestimate this. This is 100% true based on my experience.

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Yes, I made up my mind.
I will not get a dedicated server. A VPS is enough for my needs.
I have 2 already. I rented them for a month to make tests.

Managing a dedicated server is not different from managing a VPS, unless it is managed but the server can be managed as well.
If a VPS is enough for you then the question was pointless from the beginning.

With the same specs the server is typically cheaper. The only difference is that when someone trips over a cable and the server goes down. With a VPS you have other people complaining, too, whereas with a server it may go unnoticed.

Loree said:

If a VPS is enough for you then the question was pointless from the beginning.

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I said I was considering a dedicated server. Never said I absolutely needed one.

You can get dedicated server with windows server for OS if there budget for it. For cheaper you can take ubuntu server and install hestia control panel for easy manage. But hestia just for website setup, for technical like firewall and server security still need learn the command line for ubuntu server.

For me i take windows server more easy to manage. But sometime i take ubuntu server for simple project. Difficult or not to managed the server is depend on what project or what application we want run in the server.

not that difficult, use chatgpt and you'll become sysadmin in less than a week if you ain't slow and can understand and word correctly in english, it also takes a good amount of focus and determination but trust me it's not that difficult.