Hosting my own, or contract a host?
 

I am working on developing some adult WebPages, yet another webcams page. I have zero experience, but I will be teaming up with a company that currently develops and codes for the major banks in Mexico City.

We can?t decide weather we should invest in our own server and purchase all the licenses, or if we should find a good host instead. What are your ideas, what are most people doing? What are the advantages and disadvantages of running our own servers?

Since you have ?zero experience?, hopefully, your objective is to make money rather than spending sleepless nights maintaining servers. Hackers and spammers looking for open relays, FTP space, etc will kill you.

Get a host that offers managed services and let them worry about the servers while you focus on growing your business.

Personally I tend to think like you and agree with you, but my partner has a company of developers that specialize with the major banks in Mexico City. He seems to think if he can protect the mexican banks websites and databases, he should be able to do the same for adult content.

I sortha want to convince him for us to contract out the hosting but wanted to gather more facts as to which one would make more business sense.

What about bandwidth? What are you gonna use?

Most people that host also provide bandwidth, and I would imagine they get a better price because they deal in volume.

We haven't taken a real close look at bandwidth provider just yet.

This isn't quite the same as your situation, but recently I decided to build a box and use my existing business grade DSL link rather than commission a server half a world away. I am so glad I did because it's allowed me to easily fiddle with hardware reconfiguration, for example I just added a second hard drive and set up RAID1.

Going back to your question, there's also something in between: placing your own equipment into a data centre (rather than leasing a server from the host). You could develop it locally then move your stuff into the DC.

Good luck :)

The right managed host will be able to provide you with the full solution faster, better, cheaper and also be more flexible and have an easy time dealing with dramatic growth or problems when they arise. When you buy your own equipment and go unmanaged you are completely on your own. You yourself only have access to your own tech resources, you have no replacement equipment or spare parts and it's only a matter of time before you outgrow whatever equipment you purchased. SO, since you're not at a managed host that can just flip out your hardware to someone else and upgrade you, you are essentially stuck buying new all over again.

Brad

Heh, I think that's the first time I've even seen a host say that they reuse hardware. It's usually obvious anyway, eg the low end servers feature processors you can't buy any more or other unusual hardware configs. I hope you replace the HDs. :)

I sell of the used hardware ... on ebay.

All boxes that I provision are new ... so yes, it does take more then 24 hours... On the other hand, some offer instant setup but finally delivers 96 hours later ...

Well thanks. Seems I have a little more ammo to sell my case to the rest of the guys. From the beginning I have been a believer of "go to the shoe maker to have shoes made".

I can assume I could find hosts to run a live webcams page correct?

colocated is probably your best option

Colocated?

colocated means that you supply your own server ( mostly 1U ) and that you maintain/upgrade it.

You are charged a certain amount for space/power/bandwith ...

zero experience.

your going to get ripped off unless you do some serious homework.

That is what I am doing, my homework. I am under the impression that many small companies build up their rep in pages like these. Usually people that are very pleased with the service and price take the time to talk about them, give them that free publicity, so in return the company can grow and offer even better services.

I don't have any experience with setting up servers, securing them, etc etc. but the other team members do. These guys set up some of the banks in Mex City. Because of their experience they feel we should run our own. I am 100% confident they are aware what it means to run such setup, and the redundancies.

I am not sure how much work it is, the actual cost etc, but I still feel that going with a hosting company would be our best solution for the first year or two.

That brings me to GFY, to get some input.

You say I will get ripped off unless I do some serious homework, why not explain why? Or provide advice? Not that I disagree that I will get ripped off lol There is a very good chance I might if I do not do enough homework.

Hosting is the last thing you should worry about when running your business, concentrate on what is important... making money. If you choose a reputable host you should be able to rely on them completely for your hosting solution.

"I don't have any experience with setting up servers, securing them, etc etc. but the other team members do. These guys set up some of the banks in Mex City. Because of their experience they feel we should run our own. I am 100% confident they are aware what it means to run such setup, and the redundancies."

I would recommend going with a WEBAIR FULLY MANAGED DEDICATED SERVER. Whereas our support group will setup, manage, and maintain your servers from the ground up, or we could simply be a 'safety net', or 'resource center' for your guys if they need any advice along the way. If you are confident your team is savvy enough to manage and maintain your infrastructure then go with a WEBAIR COLOCATED PLAN.

Either way you decide make sure you choose a reputable company. Do your homework ask around and choose wisely :)

Feel free to contact me if you have any further questions. GOOD LUCK!

This might help:

http://www.dwhs.net/start-a-web-site.htm

The stats are from ynot and a little old but can still help.

Thanks to Brad and Webair for all there wisdom, I saved a bunch of typing..:)

ManyQuestionsGuy when you are ready talk to a few different host and see what they have to offer you. I would love to be one of those hosts as I already host a few official sites of mexico.


jim {AT} techiemedia {DOT} com

ICQ me if you want to run a micro server via the web or a wiki on a flash drive, or a full web space bound to your home computer. I can hook all that up and I mean that.