Consider this option if you host dozens or even hundreds of Drupal sites, but only a few generate most of the traffic and system load. How can you pay only for what you use in this scenario?

Meet Ægir Monster! It introduces the RAM SQL Working Set feature, allowing you to focus only on the size of databases loaded into server memory, not the disk size. Only visited sites load their databases from disk to memory to generate web pages.

Ægir Monster offers flexible database limits, allowing up to 300 GB of databases on disk, with up to 20 GB of memory used by the most active databases at any moment. Extra memory and disk space are available for scaling system resources for load and traffic spikes on the fly. That’s Ægir Monster!

The cluster core holds all your files and runs your web server with a super-fast web cache, called MicroCache. By default, it stores pages cached for anonymous visitors and logged-in users for just a few seconds—enough to speed things up considerably while keeping everything fresh in the browser.

The core also runs a ProxySQL server, transparently managing load-balanced connections between your web server and all connected database nodes.

The default cluster configuration includes three database nodes, depicted as the head and two hands. These nodes communicate directly and sync data automatically as members of their private Galera Cluster DB Ring. The cluster can be significantly enhanced by adding more DB heads and hands.

With the ProxySQL server running on the cluster core, your Drupal sites don’t need to figure out how to connect to all these database nodes in a Galera Cluster DB Ring. Regardless of the number of database nodes, Drupal will see them as a single database server, while ProxySQL transparently handles and optimizes all connections, managing data transfer between your sites and their databases.

In this configuration, all database nodes are equal—there is no single 'master' or 'primary' node. The system can operate as long as at least one database node is online, reducing or eliminating downtime typically associated with database server upgrades. Your visitors and clients will appreciate the consistent online presence!

Now, let’s discuss Cluster Legs. While database servers are faster and more reliable in a cluster configuration, they are still not fast enough for temporary data. Therefore, all your Drupal sites' cache tables are handled by the incredibly fast Valkey/Redis Memory Cache Server leg. This significantly speeds up everything, especially for logged-in users.

The second leg runs a Solr Search Server, offering advanced search-based content presentation methods, beyond just a flexible search box. It is a free add-on for all hosted sites, and you can easily add Solr instances to any site.

For the peace of mind during summer vacation we recommend the Ægir Hot-Copy, so you can relax, knowing we can easily restart or recreate your system on different machines, even in different tropical location if needed, without the high costs of a traditional High Availability system with duplicate load balancers, web nodes, and slow network filesystems. Meet Ægir Hot-Copy!

Ægir Hot-Copy maintains a fresh and constantly updated hot-copy of all your files and the entire system running Cluster Core and its Legs. It's ready to start and connect again to the Hands and Head, running together as your perfect database cluster on separate machines.

Ægir Hot-Copy can be added as an optional 'hosting insurance policy' to your live Ægir Monster or Ægir Ultra but cannot be used independently.