Frequently Asked Questions
Archived answers; some product and software details may be out of date. Please contact support for current advice.
Do you offer 24-month contract terms?
Yes, we do. Please contact us with your requirements and we'll see if we can work out a deal for you.
What kernels can I use?
We are happy to accommodate your choice of kernel, as long as it has Xen domU support. The default kernel we offer us 2.6.18 (Debian Etch), but we can easily switch you over to 2.6.26 (Debian Lenny). All you need to do is to either ensure you can install the appropriate modules for 2.6.26, or allow us access to your VPS so we can copy modules across. Switching over takes a matter of minutes. If you would like a customised choice of kernel, please contact us and we will manually set up your VPS to use your kernel. These services are provided free of charge.
What can I do with my VPS?
You can do whatever you want, as long as it complies with our Acceptable Use Policy. In general this restricts you from performing illegal activities, harming our network or other networks, and sending spam. With Linux VPS hosting, you can perform any tasks you would do with a standard Linux system, including: Performing web hosting, mail server, DNS hosting etc. Providing a VPN or proxy service Cheap online storage facility Experimenting with a variety of Linux installations, including Debian, CentOS, Turnkey Linux and Gentoo
Can I run an IRC server on my VPS?
Yes, this is fine. The only restrictions for IRC are that you may not connect to EFnet or Undernet, and it should not be used for illegal purposes, e.g. as part of a botnet.
Do you host DNS?
Yes, we do. We have two DNS servers with all records from the primary server replicated automatically to the second. Let us know your requirements and we will allow you to configure your DNS settings from the standard front end.
Do you offer a backup service?
Yes we do, with prices available on our VPS pages. These are incremental backups on a totally separate server in a separate location. Although all VPSs are on either a RAID 1 or RAID 10 setup, which protects you from at least one hard drive failure, this will not protect your data from situations such as accidentally deleted files or formatting.
Can I upgrade my VPS?
Yes, you can! Usually, this will involve a configuration change on our end, and a reboot on yours. However, there are rare circumstances where resources on the physical server that your VPS is hosted on are exhausted. In these cases, we will migrate your VPS to a different server and allocate you different IP addresses.
How many IP addresses can I have?
We are happy to set up your VPS with up to two IP addresses with a simple justification. If you require more, you need to provide a justification (e.g. "running multiple https/SSL sites"). The amount of IP addresses you can be allocated for free is determined by your package size as follows: Uno and Duo - 2 IP addresses Trio and Quad - 3 IP addresses Pro and above - 4 IP addresses If you require more than the above allocation, we reserve the right to charge £1.50 per month per IP address.
Do you offer Windows VPS?
Gigatux now offers a range of Windows virtual private server solutions with data centres in the USA, Germany and London. Please ask for more information about our superb Windows VPS hosting.
I'm just starting off with Linux. Is this suitable for me?
Yes, we believe so! If you're hoping to see what Linux is all about, or hoping to learn more about Linux, our VPSs are suitable for the following reasons: We offer a variety of Linux distributions to experiment with. Our control panel allows for automatic, fresh reinstalls of the above distributions, so you will always have a standard starting point whatever you manage to do to your VPS. We offer contracts from only 1 month in duration We're happy to help out with the occasional setup query, with many years of Linux experience behind us.
Do you offer a SLA?
For VPS services, we will ensure that they are available with a 99.9% uptime. If we fall below this level of service, we will refund, or provide credit, for the time lost upon application. For website hosting services, there is no specific SLA, but we still aim for as close to 100% as we can. You will find that our services are incredibly reliable, with most users only experiencing downtime due to the occasional scheduled maintenance issue or for upgrades. Very rarely are our systems unavailable without notice, and in reality, our VPS service uptime is well above 99.9%. We aim to resolve any issues that arise in the quickest fashion possible and have employed complex monitoring systems to notify us of any problems. Please note that no credits will be provided in connection with our SLA promise in the following situations: Circumstances beyond GigaTux's reasonable control, including, but not limited to, acts of any governmental body, sabotage, fire, flood, strike, unavailability of or interruption or delay in telecommunications or third party services, virus attacks or hackers. Failure of network availability to the GigaTux network and equipment, unless such failure is caused solely by GigaTux. Scheduled and emergency maintenance and upgrades. Issues elsewhere on the Internet that hinder access to your account.
Do you provide console access to the VPS?
Yes, we do. This is accessible over SSH. The password or SSH key to your console can be configured from the control panel. This is especially helpful if you have misconfigured your network settings.
What happens if I go over by data transfer quota?
Our transfer quotas are soft limits. This means that your VPS will continue without any degredation in performance. Although we reserve the right to charge 4p/GB above your allocated data transfer quota, in reality we will only do this if we are charged excess usage fees by our upstream providers. GigaTux has a data transfer quota itself for each server, and only if this is breached will charges be passed on. This usually means that only if many other VPS users are using their quota will you be charged for excess usage above and beyond your own quota.
How much CPU usage will I be allocated?
We regularly and proactively monitor CPU usage on each server. If we find that the CPU is being used heavily, we will no longer add further VPSs to the server, or may move high usage clients to a different server in extreme cases. In reality, CPU usage is rarely maxed out and your VPS will usually have a large proportion of the CPU to itself. The worst case situation is that the remaining CPU will be shared evenly with other VPS users on the physical server. The only restriction we have on CPU usage is that we request that idle clients - clients that use all available 'spare' CPU cycles - are not run, These include distributed.net, SETI and BOINC.
What control panel do you use to administer VPSs?
We use the DTC control panel with its inbuilt ability to handle Xen instances, including reinstalling Operating Systems automatically. We contribute the occasional patch and operating system images back to the project.
Do you sell licenses for control panels like cPanel, DirectAdmin or Plesk?
Yes, we do. DirectAdmin licenses for your VPS are available at US $5 per month, whilst cPanel is available for US $15 per month. Please contact us for further information If you prefer another control panel, or free ones such as DTC or Webmin, it is worth remembering that as you have full control of your VPS, you can install control panel software of your choice.
Are your VPS systems 32-bit or 64-bit?
By default, all of our offered Linux distributions are 64-bit, with the exception of Turnkey Linux which is 32-bit. However, we are more than happy to initially set up your VPS with any 32-bit system. Just let us know and we will sort out the rest. The only downside is that automatic reinstallations of your VPS will not be possible for the 32-bit distribution, but once your VPS is set up, a reinstall rarely required.
How do your automated backups work?
Our automated backup solution enables backups to be taken every day, week or month with absolutely no user intervention. Behind the scenes, we mount a snapshot of your virtual disk and rsync the entire contents across to a different server. We then remove the snapshot. This process does not affect the contents on your disk in any way. If you do need a restore, or need specific files restored from the last backup, you will need to raise a support ticket and we will copy the data back to your VPS. This enables us to restore your VPS to its pre-backup stated if required. Note that only one backup is stored, so it is not possible to restore to a backup from, say, two weeks ago if you are on a weekly backup package. Pricing can be found on the Virtual Private Servers page.
How do I upgrade to the latest Gentoo?
The Gentoo version being installed is a reasonably old and you will not be able to update immediately. Follow the following steps to upgrade: Install Portage and Python from tinderbox (http://tinderbox.dev.gentoo.org/) Update Python to use version 2.6 Sync your portage tree Emerge 2.10.x version of glibc Update gcc Update glibc to latest version Emerge binutils Perform emerge -e world This should bring you up to the current tree.
What payment methods do you accept?
We accept PayPal, Google Checkout and 2Checkout. All of these facilities accept most credit and debit cards; please see the images below.
What is your refund policy?
We are very reasonable on this. If you cannot get your VPS working within two weeks, and you give us the opportunity to try and resolve your problems, we will happily refund your payment in full.
VPS is on two subnets but only one is reachable.
Routing might need to be manually set up depending on the Linux distribution chosen. If only the IP address on the first interface is accessible from the outside world, you will need to set up a new script that is run when each interface is started, although you might be able to run it upon start (for instance by placing details in /etc/rc.local). echo 252 newtable >> /etc/iproute2/rt_tables ip route add default via table newtable ip rule add from table newtable ip route flush cache rt_tables stores names of available route tables. 'flush cache' isn't absolutely necessary, but if you have other rules earlier on, it might be useful.
What are the passwords for Turnkey Linux installations?
The installation console will set the root password to the password you specified. However, for all services running on top of Turnkey Linux, the default password is "turnkey".
Do you have Windows VPS space in the UK?
We currently have very high stock (means lots of space!) in the UK for our Windows VPS hosting options. For speed, reliability and service you will find us hard to beat. Just visit our VPS hosting page for full details. Gigatux specialises in Windows VPS hosting, as well as Linux VPS; we have 3 main VPS data centres: UK, US (Chicago and California) and in Germany.