Do you "co-locate" or get your own dedicated server?
Dedicated servers can only operate to their full potential if they're running from an environment that provides a high speed internet connection, together with performance and temperature monitoring.
But companies that offer a co-location service for pre-purchased hardware tend to be both expensive and restrictive.
By running a server from a "co-located" environment you may be increasing costs unnecessarily by paying for hardware, depreciation and on-site maintenance that could end up costing you and your business a lot more than anticipated.
No need to co-locate
At Fasthosts you can have full server control of a leading dedicated server that enjoys all the advantages of a managed environment, without purchasing the hardware outright, or paying anything extra for accommodation, maintenance and updates.
Housed in Fasthosts' dedicated UK data centre, you take full control of a dedicated server that can be used for any purpose, experiencing the very highest levels of performance, uptime and security.
Choose a Fasthosts dedicated server
Capital expenditure
By pursuing the co-location option, companies are required to buy all the necessary server equipment up front, which can impact on a company's budgeted capital expenditure.
- With Fasthosts you can take control of an up-to-date dedicated server from only £49/pm.
Hardware depreciation
The exponential rate of technological change in the server component market means that once systems are bought, they will quickly depreciate. By taking responsibility for the server equipment that depreciates, we alleviate the burden for customers by making sure that hardware is kept in perfect working order.
Microsoft's latest server OS.
- Choice of Windows 2008
operating systems
- Full server control with Plesk 9
- Pre-installed with Windows Platform Installer
Full details
Choice of Linux distribution.
- Choice of Ubuntu, Red Hat or CentOS distributions
- Full server control with Plesk 9
- Pre-installed with PHP, Perl, Ruby and Python
Full details
Overall maintenance
In a co-located environment, a company must take steps to ensure they have a disaster recovery solution in place in the event of equipment failure. For a truly robust solution, a company needs, at a minimum, a ready spare for every component in the configuration on hand, as well as level 3 technicians ready to diagnose and address the problem.
Specialising in dedicated server hosting, Fasthosts has all the necessary equipment, multiple spares of every component and level 3 technicians on hand 24/7/365 to ensure that our customers receive the best service.
Network
Companies who choose co-location will have to recreate network infrastructure which can also be very expensive. At Fasthosts though, we’ve tackled this problem:
- We offer a multi-homed network through several providers to ensure that we are not completely reliant on any one provider should they experience network problems.
- Customer data will always reach its destination in the shortest time possible and with minimal packet loss.
- Our network is powered by Cisco, with monitoring and redundant systems which allows us to deliver 100% infrastructure availability.
Risk
The upfront costs associated with co-location, plus the tying up of funds into hardware, re-creating the network, hardware depreciation and failure, as well as hiring staff to man it all, commits resources into just one area of the business. In doing so, this inherently means a lot of risk for a company. With Fasthosts though, you can reduce this risk:
- By taking over the management of our customers' hosting environment, Fasthosts alleviates the pressure on internal IT staff, freeing up resources to be re-deployed into more profitable areas.
