Maximum PC

Hello,
In the past it seemed that all I considered for hosting as shared hosting and the biggest consideration was price and limits. Now there is Dedicated, VPS, and Cloud Hosting. The first question is whether or not Cloud Hosting is a better performer than dedicated hosting. Then the next decision is comparing the different prices offered by various companies. On the high end there is Rackspace but recently someoen suggested vps.net for cloud hosting. The pricing plans for cloud hosting make it hard to compare apples to apples.
Can I get some advice on this, please? VPS.net that was recommended to me is stating that their cloud hosting plan is still in beta when I last checked. Should I worry about that? What kind of support is reasonable to expect in a non-managed hosting account? I can work with a Linux hosting account using ssh but I'm not sure if I'd be able to install any and all software upgrades without the company's assistance. I suppose that $10 per ticket is reasonable for any one service where I might need assistance. What about backups, though? Should I expect that with a non-managed plan?
Thanks,
Bruce