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We are using cloud environment for our web-apps, i need an expert opinion on hosting our applications.

our application built on php & mysql, i want to know which is the most efficient and/or cost effective way to get instances.

case 1: get 1 large instance and configure both php & mysql on same server. case 2: get two small instance and configure php & mysql separately.

OR

case 1: get 1 xtra-large instance and configure both php & mysql on same server. case 2: get two large instance and configure php & mysql separately.

HopelessN00b
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Rizwan Yahya
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  • on a light-to-modest community site, I didn't see much improvement moving MySQL to a different instance. Beauty of Amazon is that you can fire up a couple of instances, test it out, and tear it down for a dollar or two, if that. – gravyface Aug 23 '12 at 14:32
  • What cloud environment? You also have 4 cases listed, Are you just asking the question about seperating the php+mysql instances? – Matt Aug 23 '12 at 14:36
  • @mindthemonkey Amazon, Yes, i need to know in which case its most efficient and costeffective. – Rizwan Yahya Aug 23 '12 at 14:43
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    @RizwanYahya too many variables for say either way without testing: if there's a performance gain, is it worth the additional costs? – gravyface Aug 23 '12 at 14:47
  • this mostly depends on how big a pipe you have between the two servers and if you are charged for this pipe based on traffic etc.. – tony roth Aug 23 '12 at 14:48

1 Answers1

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In terms of immediate performance gains, like gravyface mentioned, I wouldn't expect a huge gain, however separating the your database and application onto two servers gives you a large amount of flexibility when it comes to scaling your environment in the future, since you have the ability to grow resources for either the application or the database as needed.

Again, though, depending on how your application runs, there is a possibility that you'll take a hit by moving the database away from the application, and forcing the application to go out to the network.

All things being equal (and assuming the hit you take from latency isn't too large), my recommendation would be to separate them now rather than having to deal with doing so later, but again, depending on your requirements and expected growth, you might be fine with either setup.

If all your worried about is cost though - it just comes down to doing the math on Amazon's rates for whatever you mean by "xtra-large" and "small instances"

gravyface
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Univ426
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  • +1 and I know you're going with assumptions here... flip side is that if there isn't contention for resources with both on the same server, he could actually experience a _reduction_ in performance if there's latency between hosts. – gravyface Aug 23 '12 at 15:02
  • Very very true, I actually meant to write that this assumes your application won't take too large a hit from having to go out to the other box. I'll add that in. – Univ426 Aug 23 '12 at 15:09