Member OP
Been running a NAT VPS on Contabo for a small seedbox setup. Need to request specific ports forwarded through their panel. Wondering which range is safest to ask for—higher ports like 50000+ to avoid collisions, or does it not really matter? Take it with a grain of salt, but I heard some providers flag certain ranges. YMMV, IMO.
You are conflating two issues. Port numbering has no inherent security property—what matters is Contabo's CGNAT implementation and whether they employ layer-7 DPI or simple 5-tuple forwarding. Request ephemeral ports (49152–65535) to minimize conflict with their internal services, but verify their IRR entries first; some NAT VPS operators lack proper RPKI for their announced prefixes and will null-route you on abuse reports regardless of port. BGP communities for traffic engineering are irrelevant here since you lack your own ASN.
Did you test your restore? 😊 Sorry, force of habit. On topic—whatever you end up using it for, please keep backups. 3-2-1 rule, even for configs. I have seen too many "it is just a seedbox" turn into "my ratio and bookmarks are gone." If Contabo suspends, you want that data elsewhere.
Member
Electricity costs on these boxes are basically zero since you are not paying power directly. Optimization matters though. I run similar setups and the port range is whatever keeps the connection stable. Some ranges get shaped during peak hours, so test throughput at different times. Just my experience.
Contabo flag ranges? Never heard that. Which ones specifically
I did not say Contabo flags ranges. I said some NAT VPS operators do, and that you should verify their IRR entries. Please read before quoting.
Well someone said it. I just want to know if I should avoid 22 or 25 or what.
Member OP
Easy there. I asked the original question and I am still not clear on whether Contabo specifically cares. Has anyone actually had a forward denied?
Member
I have three Contabo NAT VPS instances in Nuremberg. Requested ports in 50000-55000 range, all approved within minutes. Never tried anything below 1024 for obvious reasons, and never had pushback on the upper range. Their panel (https://my.contabo.com) is pretty much automated for this.
Member
This is what I actually meant. Not flagging by number but QoS policies that hit certain buckets. Hard to prove without their switch configs though.
