eBlush_Hector — Fri, 04 Feb 2005 15:37:38 +0000

I didn't mean that your recommendation of a T1 is wrong. It's right! All I wanted to emphasize was the co-lo. So we're in complete agreement!

mairving — Fri, 04 Feb 2005 15:30:34 +0000

eBlush_Hector wrote:
Anyway, I agree entirely with mairving, except I'd skip the T1 and go with a type of co-lo. CptAwesome makes a good point about the possibility of renting and you could always have a hosting company set you up on a dedicated box that they manage for you. Of course, the more they do for you, the more you pay.

I am not sure where you disagree with me about the T1 line. All I said was that it was a minimum requirement for hosting your own in my opinion. CoLo's are affordable and certainly your connection is going to be better. I tried to go that route last year but my work wanted to bring the webserver in house. We have a full T hooked up to a backup generator so no problem. Still I would have rather gone the dedicated or CoLo route.

eBlush_Hector — Fri, 04 Feb 2005 00:10:39 +0000

Yes, CptAwesome! I refered to it that way because it's a habit. I should have clarified that...

NOC= Network Operations Center
It's where ISPs have their BIG pipes come in, and all the servers/switches are in. We always purchase our own boxes and physically move them in, stroke their ego and tell them to behave as we walk out the door. You pay a flat monthly 'rent' for X rack units and bandwidth on top of that. It's _relatively_ (emphasis on 'relative') cheap because you are responsible for everything except a network connection and power.

Anyway, I agree entirely with mairving, except I'd skip the T1 and go with a type of co-lo. CptAwesome makes a good point about the possibility of renting and you could always have a hosting company set you up on a dedicated box that they manage for you. Of course, the more they do for you, the more you pay.

CptAwesome — Thu, 03 Feb 2005 22:25:58 +0000

Well, a lot of hosting companies will even rent you a server, or give you the option to buy it outright, and host it at a monthly rate at their location. I think the proper phrase is "co-location" you provide the server, they provide the pipe. I'm guessing thats the same thing that eBlush_Hector was referring to when he said the NOC.

andy206uk — Thu, 03 Feb 2005 21:28:13 +0000

It might be worth putting out a few feelers and seeing if you can find a few people out there willing to host mirror sites for free in exchange for ads or something... Then your basic hosting website just redirects people to different mirrors thus distributing the load.

That's how a lot of popular, non profit websites work.

eBlush_Hector — Thu, 03 Feb 2005 20:36:58 +0000

Its so cheap to host at a NOC, that if anyone is at all serious about running a site, hosting at your house doesn't make any sense!

Plus, having a NOC house your own servers is so sweet, it's doesn't make sense even to get a T1. The NOC is manned 365 days a year, has huge UPSs, power conditioning, air conditioning, physical security, as much bandwidth as you can afford, etc. etc. etc.

Then, if the NOC happens to be a few minutes from home... hmmm, hmmm, hmm, good!

mairving — Wed, 05 Jan 2005 14:25:04 +0000

ShunT wrote: I don't know why a good number of people say T1+ for servers. I'm on high speed cable which is faster than 80% of T1 connections.

Several reasons.
1.) Bandwidth - a T1 line gives you a bigger pipe allowing more connections at one time.
2.) While cable is faster on the download side, it is almost always slower on the upload side. say 3Gb down and 256K up wheras a full T1 line is 1536K up and down. No big deal if you are surfing but it is a big deal if someone is surfing your cable site since they are surfing at the slower connection.
3.) Reliability - when cable goes down it is sometimes days when it is repaired. When a T1 is down, it is usually hours or minutes before it is repaired.

ShunT — Thu, 23 Dec 2004 21:35:15 +0000

I don't know why a good number of people say T1+ for servers. I'm on high speed cable which is faster than 80% of T1 connections.

meatball — Wed, 08 Dec 2004 01:24:38 +0000

Seems like too much trouble for now, as well as too expensive. Thanks for the help guys.

mairving — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 22:29:27 +0000

A lot of thought should go into this. As has been mentioned, it is not an easy undertaking. A dedicated server is probably the next progression to go to from a reseller type account. You have a lot to consider if you want to run it out of your house. You will need:

Good reliable connection. Something like business class cable is fairly cheap but you really need a full T1. The reason is twofold. One is that you will have greater bandwidth. The other is the level of service that you get with T1 is much greater. You can be down for a couple of days on cable but rarely down for more than a couple of hours on a T1.
Good power source. A good battery backup system with a backup generator is needed. If your power is down, you need something to keep it powered up.
A server, perferably a 1 or 2U rack mount server in a rack. You don't necessarily need a dual Xeon system but I would go with SCSI over SATA or IDE. At least 1Gb of RAM.
Spare hard drives and various other spare parts.
Backup server. If your server dies, you can't afford to be down for a couple of days while you order parts for it.
A tape backup system.
Time for keeping your system patched and tested.

So there is a lot to consider. I would start with dedicated or a colo and as your business grows, maybe you will eventually decide to host your own. But it is a pretty capital intensive indeavor.