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0 pointsEwanToo14y ago0 comments

The Netflix approach (which definitely isn't for everyone), is to use no persistent storage.

They cluster their databases across multiple instances, availability zones and regions, and back them up constantly to S3. Their ultimate recovery plan is to restore from backup if necessary, which is pretty much the same as assuming EBS will corrupt your data.

While it's far from trivial to do it that way, they seem to be the most successful user of the AWS systems.

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semanticist14y ago· 1 in thread

I'm more and more of the opinion that EC2 only makes sense for very small (2-3 node, no significant load) or very large (Netflix) deployments, and almost everyone else would be better off with either Linode-style VM rental or actual dedicated servers, depending on their needs.

The only exception I've seen are people with very spiky traffic patterns, who can save a bit of money by only running instances when they need them - but even then I suspect that the money saved might be less than you'd think.

bluestix14y ago

For any constant load applications dedicated servers are definitely much cheaper then ec2.

Amazon wins for APIs and convenience but not for price.

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