On Thu, Aug 26, 2004 at 09:30:55AM +0100, Mike McKay wrote:
> Christopher Baus wrote:
>
> >I'll always
> >choose more bandwidth and reliability over RAW CPU speed. I honestly
> >don't expect to pay more that $500 for a workstation ever again.
>
> There is definitely some wisdom in that statement. But I have to ask the
> question - what do all of you (not just Chris) need that expensive
> bandwidth for?
>
> I have two old laptops - one catches email for me and about 5 others and
> then serves it up IMAP style, the other is my web server. I run quite a
> few things on the web server including about 10 dynamic web sites for
> various people and companies as well as an instance of bugzilla for
> three different projects.
>
> All of this is done with my ADSL connection - which only has 256kbit
> upstream, and 512kbit downstream.
Depends on your needs. A lot of people have small businesses or websites
which need 24/7 accessibility. Most home providers are not even close to
that kind of reliability. (Few things piss me off more than not being able
to get work done at 2AM because the cable modem is down... because that's
when AT&T thinks it's most appropriate to do maintenance or some crap). :-)
Reasons to go with a colocation service... (these may be obvious to many)
1) So when you move houses, your connection doesn't go away, change,
or become unavailable...
2) Guarranteed power facility (most colo's have backup generators)
3) Bandwidth guarranteed by a service level agreement
4) Contracts for home bandwidth often prohibit serving
5) Colo environment (air conditioning, clean power.. things that keep yer
server healthy)
6) Bandwidth can be increased quickly upon demand, as opposed to ordering
higher level DSL or T* connection
7) Server traffic won't impede yer home connection (haven't seen this
as a big factor personally yet..)
8) Organized rack layout... no tripping over cables leading into the closet
I've done both....
So the community colo people want to get a chunk of that goodness
on the cheap... it's just a balance of what you want versus what you
are willing to pay... you don't get everything by hosting on your
home line, but often times it's enough for what you want...
>
> I am never going to survive a slashdotting or anything, but as much as I
> want to justify $30/month for a machine with more bandwidth, I just
> can't do it. I am getting by far too well running servers off of my home
> connection. Perhaps I should start advertising for co-location, or
> virtual servers!!
>
> If I could increase my outgoing bandwidth for a reasonable cost I would
> go for it, but the ISPs (at least here in the UK) don't even offer it.
> Perhaps dual DSL connections would do it, or figuring out how to create
> a wireless mesh network with my neighbors.
These are great ideas for increasing your bandwidth and reliability,
some of them may violate your ISP's service agreements though.
>
> So please justify it to me - why should I shell out way too much money
> in order to host my stuff elsewhere (if you say reliability, tell me why
> you need it to be reliable!)
Any time you income is reliant on your server being accessible, I'd say.
Other than that, it's still nice, but depends on your financial situation.
I have a friend who hosts a bunch of OS-related websites from a colo
facility which he used to pay $1K/mo for... (now it's down to $200/mo).
He doesn't have to do it... it takes up a fair bit of his discretionary
funds, but it's a reliable site with a lot of bandwidth and a whole lot
of people are using it for various services. (Yeah, he could handle a
slashdot)...
I also have another friend who makes a point of having people use his
home server at the end of a DSL connection. He's moved a couple of times
and his DSL line is occasionally flakey, but as far as a few people and
their friends are.. it's fine...
Man this post was way longer than I expected! :-)
-Brian
>
> Curious,
> Mike
>
> _______________________________________________
> RLUG mailing list
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> http://lists.rlug.org/mailman/listinfo/rlug
_______________________________________________
RLUG mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://lists.rlug.org/mailman/listinfo/rlug
