Storage VPS: ZFS or ext4?

svendeal · 2025-07-24T01:46:11+00:00

Got a 512MB "storage" special from InterServer (https://www.interserver.net/vps/), 500GB disk, $18/yr. [b]ARE YOU KIDDING[/b], SNAPPED IT UP instantly. Now wondering if ZFS is usable or if I should ju...

VPS Hosting by svendeal 1y ago 30 replies 2.5K views

itssage

Member

Joined:: Sep 2024
Posts:: 4

1y ago · edited

#21

Following. Same situation, VirMach not InterServer, same question. Going ext4 based on this thread.

LtdFlow

Member

Joined:: Jun 2024
Posts:: 7

1y ago · edited

#22

This. The thread answered in 4 replies and we kept going for 20 more. Love forums.

coder_ruan

Member

Joined:: Jul 2024
Posts:: 7

1y ago · edited

#23

Has anyone tested bcachefs on 512MB? I know, I know, "not production ready," but the memory footprint is supposed to be lower than ZFS. Just asking before I spin up a test.

WalnutLinux

Member

Joined:: May 2024
Posts:: 23
From:: Frankfurt, Germany

1y ago · edited

#24

coder_ruan said:

Bcachefs on 512MB

Tried last month on a Hetzner CX11. Would not compile on 1GB without zram, OOM during fsck equivalent. Maybe in 2025. Maybe not. Don't.

plattan3

Member

Joined:: Aug 2024
Posts:: 5

1y ago

1 #25

What about btrfs? I know, I know, "btrfs is ZFS's little brother who didn't go to college," but send/receive is nice and the memory footprint is... I actually don't know. Anyone measured?

shellmarch

Member

Joined:: Apr 2024
Posts:: 4

1y ago

#26

plattan3 said:

I know, I know, "btrfs is ZFS's little brother who didn't go to college," but send/receive is nice and the memory footprint is...

Measured on my 2GB VPS: 60-80MB idle with no compression, 100MB with zstd. Better than ZFS, worse than ext4. The "free space cache v2" eats RAM proportional to filesystem size though, so 500GB might hurt.

Still wouldn't on 512MB. The tooling is also half-baked for automated snapshots.

uma

Member

99.99% or bust

Joined:: Jun 2024
Posts:: 324
From:: Dublin, IE

1y ago

#27

99.99% or bust and I have 14 status pages. None of them care about the filesystem. They care if the service answers. ext4 answers. ZFS on 512MB does not answer, it swaps, and then my status page is red and I am sad.

Dublin to anywhere is 20ms. The protocol is TCP, the filesystem is irrelevant.

436 days. reboot is surrender.

klaus

Member

yaml victim

Joined:: Jul 2024
Posts:: 71
From:: Vienna, Austria

1y ago · edited

#28

Yaml victim I understood kubernetes once in 2019 and I understood zfs arc parameters once in 2021. Both times I forgot and both times I regretted the yak shave. ext4. no yaml for fstab. Bless.

jam1978

Member

Joined:: May 2024
Posts:: 6

1y ago

7 #29

Late to this but:

svendeal said:

InterServer, 500GB disk, $18/yr

Is this still available? Link? I checked their site and see $2.50/mo minimum for VPS.

svendeal

Member OP

Deal Sniper

Joined:: Jul 2024
Posts:: 301
From:: Miami, US

1y ago

7 #30

jam1978 said:

Is this still available?

It was a Black Friday 2023 flash deal. Gone now. They do storage specials a few times a year, follow LowEndBox/LowEndTalk. The regular $2.50/mo is 1GB RAM + 30GB SSD, different product.

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