08 April 2006: CHOON.NET is now ready to launch its XEN-based Virtual Private Server (VPS) product line with the Xen Hypervisor Engine as the underlying technology. This allows CHOON.NET to partition the usual commodity server hardware into smaller virtual private servers. Detail information with regards to XEN and its underlying technologies can be obtained from XenSource.com and University of Cambridge.

The overhead of running a Xen Virtual Private Server is typically very low and often considered negligible. This makes it potentially more efficient than the excellent User Mode Linux (UML) in the very competitive virtual hosting environment. User Mode Linux uses emulated system calls and disk drivers which make it slower during context switches and disk I/O. Xen, on the other hand, is a "hypervisor" with the host operating system being a Virtual Machine (VM). This makes for extremely low single digit overheads.

The other common VPS software that one might encounter is Virtuozzo. Perhaps the most talk about facility of Virtuzzo to a hosting service provider would be the fact that the file system is entirely quota based which allows "overselling" of resources such as RAM or Disk Space, similar to typical "virtual hosting" environment. However, it has been noted that there are some hardware limitations within Virtuozzo. The Virtuozzo kernel does not support the wide range of hardware as the "standard" Linux kernel does, although its producers, SW-Soft have noted to be ready to produce special versions for large customers, to extend support for AMD processors and/or specific RAID devices.

CHOON.NET has considered and review a number of other VPS solutions but only XEN meets the specific needs for businesses of our nature. Linux VServer is probably as popular as the proprietory Virtuozzo but it too has its limitations. Perhaps for the interested, the following article provides some good reading in the comparison of various VPS softwares. Click Here.

Some basic fundamentals include:

How much RAM are you actually getting from your provider?
Unknown. Some VPS providers might resort to overselling RAM but in the CHOON.NET XEN VPS solution, RAM allocations are dedicated and guaranteed.

How much Disk Space is your provider overselling?
Unknown. Similar to RAM, some VPS providers might be inclined to oversell but in the CHOON.NET XEN VPS solution, Disk Space allocations are also dedicated and guaranteed.

No unlimited or unmetered Data Transfer.
You pay for what you use. Data Transfer and Bandwidth is one of our biggest cost and it is impossible for CHOON.NET to oversell bandwidth and overpromise.

No more kernel upgrade worries
CHOON.NET will handle all kernel related upgrades. You can run safely your own firewall rules and/or network related applications. Other VPS softwares have extreme limitations in this area.

Managed CPU usage
CHOON.NET will monitor all CPU usage agressively. Via Xen Scheduler, CHOON.NET is able to monitor the CPU usage for each VPS and carry out the required CPU Management tasks. Accounts using extensive CPU resources are typically not suitable for hosting on any VPS solution. Should these accounts exists, customers will be advised to upgrade to dedicated server accordingly.

Advantages of using CHOON.NET VPS Solution:

No more worries about having a spammer or abuser hosted on the same IP.
You get your own dedicated IP

Gain complete control of your hosting solution.
You have full root access to your VPS. You manage your own processes and are able install applications, tweak settings, add users etc.

Your applications are stored on their own virtual "disk" image on a seperate partition.
This results in a greater level of file system security and this can never be obtained on a typical shared hosting server (especially if the users have shell access). Additionally, your processes have greater protection against the crashed applications of other users resulting in greater security and stability.

If you have any questions or need a customized VPS package, do not hesitate to contact us.

There is only one base package available and if you need more just upgrade by getting additional addons/extras.

One base package available:

	10GB Disk Space
	512MB Swap
	256MB RAM
	1 Dedicated IP
	100% Fully Unmanaged
	50GB Monthly Total Data Transfer (Inbound + Outbound = Total)
	SGD$50 Setup
	SGD$125 Monthly

Additional/Add-ons/Extras:

	Additional IP: SGD$5/IP/Month (according to APNIC Justification)
	Additional 10GB Disk Space: SGD$30/month
	Additional 10GB Data Transfer: SGD$30/month
	Additional 100GB Data Transfer: SGD$200/month
	Additional 500GB Data Transfer: SGD$800/month
	Additional 256MB RAM: SGD$20/month
	Local Area Network (LAN) FTP Backup Space: SGD$10/10GB/month
	cPanel VPS License: SGD$30/month
	DirectAdmin VPS License: SGD$20/month
	Tech Support: SGD$30/hour charge in block of per hour

	Data Transfer Overage: S$5/GB/month in block of per GB

Choice of Operation System:

	CentOS 4.x
	CentOS 5.x
	Slackware 10.2
	Debian Sarge
	Debian Etch
	Ubuntu Breezy 5.10
	Ubuntu Hoary 5.04
	Gentoo
	Fedora 4/5/6/7/8/9/10/11