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Posts Tagged ‘Colocation’

The popularity of colocating a company’s servers into a data center is a growing trend today. With the need for increased power, cooling and reliability – organizations are realizing that housing their server infrastructure internally is no longer adequate.

The following are some simple Q

Colocation is a type of dedicated web hosting. Dedicated Hosting means a website is hosted on its own server, and not shared with any other sites. With colocation clients have their own dedicated server which they control, but hire rackspace at a data centre. They use the data centre’s infrastructure and pay a free for it.

Here we take a look at who can benefit from using Colocation hosting.

WEBSITES THAT HAVE A LOT OF TRAFFIC

Share hosting is not sufficient for sites that have a high amount of traffic. It is therefore necessary for these sites to be hosted on a dedicated server. This is simply because if a website is sharing everything, including bandwidth, with other sites there is unlikely to be sufficient bandwidth available to host a site that receives an extreme amount of traffic.

THOSE WITHOUT THE FACILITIES TO HOST THEIR OWN SERVER

Many website owners would like to have their own server but simply don’t have, and are unable to have, the necessary facilities. This could be due to infrastructure or the lack of enough physical space. Colocation for these people, is the perfect solution. They have their own server as they wish but are able to use a data centre’s facilities, so overcome the problem of not having this infrastructure themselves.

THOSE WHO WANT CONTROL BUT DON’T HAVE THE BUDET TO HOST THEIR OWN SERVER

Colocation is cheaper than some other forms of dedicated hosting as the clients are performing the hosting and maintenance tasks themselves. Hosting your own server is an expensive business though. There needs to be investment in the facilities for them only to be used by themselves. If the server is hosted at a data centre, then many of the facilities can be shared with their other clients and this reduces the costs.

ANYONE WHO NEEDS THEIR HOSTING TO CONSTANTLY RUN SMOOTHLY

A dedicated server is a lot less likely to encounter problems than a shared server, as websites are not affected by other sites. So if a website owner can simply not afford to have problems then colocation is one of the options available to them.

BUSINESSES THAT ARE EXPECTED TO GROW

It is not advisable just to think about the present; you also need to think about the future. If a small business, or start-up business, is expecting to grow in the future it is best to take this into consideration when choosing their hosting. Hosting requirements may be minimal to begin with – the website might be small with little traffic – but if there is a dramatic rise in the business’s success then they could encounter problems if they have only chosen basic hosting. With Colocation clients sometimes only have to pay for the bandwidth, electricity, and other factor, they are using. With other types of dedicated hosting they need to choose a particular package and therefore if they are using less than predicted they will still be paying for it. The advantage of colocation for growing businesses is that they will only have to pay a small amount when they are using a limited amount of these variables, but can then use more if they unexpectedly need to.

Andrew Marshall (c)

Web Hosting is crucial to the success of any website. There are a large number of options available to you when you are picking a host for your website and the best option depends on many factors. Factor around the individual site are important as different sites need different things from their hosting. Your own experience and expertise are also important; if you are a novice you will need assistance but this may not be necessary if you are knowledgably around the subject. Other factors, like budget, may also come into the decision making process.

There really is no definitive answer as to what the best type of hosting is; it does all depend on your situation. Here though, we’ll look at two of these types – Colocation and Managed Hosting. Colocation is where customers rent rack space from at a data centre and host their server there. The customer provides the server and all the equipment and runs the hosting themselves. Managed Hosting is, as the name suggests, where the hosting company manages the hosting for the customer, allowing them to concentrate on their core business.

The amount of control and amount of help you want is important to your decision. With Colocation you get complete control as you are only renting rack space. You are in charge of your hosting, which can be a negative when things go wrong, but it does allow you to have more of a say. If you don’t want this control and want everything taken care of by somebody else then Managed Hosting may be preferable. It means you don’t have to be too concerned with the hosting as experts are looking after you website. If you have no hosting knowledge but need complex hosting this could be the best option. There are many different types of managed hosting though, from partly managed to fully managed (although different providers have different definitions of fully managed).

Technical support is one of the main features of managed hosting. So if you need plenty of expert assistance this is the way to go. 24/7 monitoring is usually included which will put your mind at ease. Colocation doesn’t normally include support but many are starting to offer this with some packages. You may consider this if you think you might need a little support from time to time. This support will not be at the same level as Managed Hosting but depending on your circumstances, could be sufficient.

Your specific requirements are obviously key to your decision. Both Colocation and Managed Hosting are good for large websites, but not usually necessary for small, simple ones. For small sites basic hosting may be more cost effective.

Price shouldn’t be the only reason why you choose your host, but it can be a determining factor. Everyone has a maximum budget that cannot be exceeded so this needs to be thought about. If you can’t afford a particular package then you will have to choose something else. This is an area where Colocation has an advantage over Managed Hosting, as it is significantly cheaper. Managed Hosting is quite expensive but if you need your web hosting managed for you it can be very cost effective.

Andrew Marshall ©

Colocation is a popular form of web hosting, where clients can hire rack space at a data centre to host their servers. This prevents them from having to host their own servers, saving on inconvenience and cost.

Colocation usage is increasing and is now one of the most popular types of web hosting. It is much in demand and more colocation centres are being opened all the time. It is becoming big business and many data centres are continually investing in their infrastructure to provide the best service possible.

The Internet is more integrated into business than ever before. You rarely find a business that does not have a website, meaning millions of new websites every year. On top of this there are many information and personal sites; although most data centre clients are businesses. With the Internet being used for a wide variety of business purposes, complex hosting solutions are often sought after. They often require individual servers, with basic hosting not enough for many. This is one of the reasons why colocation is more in demand than ever before.

Data centres infrastructure is shared between many clients and this spreads the costs, meaning a cheaper service for clients. Everything that is needed for high quality hosting is in place. Many clients who require their own server would not want to go through the costs and effort to build the infrastructure required just for a single server. Therefore they turn to colocation where all this is already in place. This makes colocation both cost affective and less work than hosting your own server.

Support is another reason for colocation’s increasing popularity. There was a time when co-locating your server meant performing all hosting and maintenance tasks yourself. This can still be the case with some packages but support is often available. This is becoming more and more common. Sometimes this is merely support while at other times hosting can be managed by the data centre’s staff. This is referred to as managed colocation (like managed hosting but within a colocation environment). Many who require hosting do not have the necessary expertise but with managed colocation they can get the assistance they require. This makes colocation accessible to all.

Colocation services are improving all the time. There are more choices of colocation packages meaning a large number of website owners are able to find a package that suits them. With more websites being built all the time hosting is more in demand than ever, and colocation is a good choice for many. The most common clients are businesses who require their own server but do not want the hassle of hosting it at their own premises. They can host the server at a data centre, often meaning they have support at hand should they need it.

Andrew Marshall ©

For a website to be visible to Internet users you need webhosting. There are many forms of webhosting from basic hosting to more complex solutions such as colocation or managed hosting. Managed hosting does what it says on the tin – you hosting is managed by the hosting provider. But who can benefit?

This option is mostly used by businesses, especially those whose staff have little or no experience of web hosting.

Basic hosting can be relatively easy to run after a little research, even for those with no prior knowledge. But more complex packages are different. Those who don’t believe they have the necessary skills and are not confident that they can manage their hosting, often prefer to pass it on to someone they think they can trust.

Many business owners are not confident in web hosting problem solving. They don’t want to risk having their server down for long periods, an eventuality that could happen if server problems are not rectified quickly. Managed Hosting is sometimes chosen for this reason alone, as having a team of experts can both prevent many problems and solve them when they do occur.

For those who have lots of website traffic or need a high-end hosting solution, a dedicated server is often what is required. A dedicated server means a website (or a group of websites) has its own server, which isn’t shared with others. Most cases of managed hosting is where a dedicated server is in use. Having a dedicated server is more complex than being on a shared server and many aren’t able to control this themselves. It is harder for novices as it isn’t just simply controlled with a control panel (although some areas are).

Businesses usually want to spend the majority of their time focusing on their core business. They do not want to spend half of their time trying to figure out how to run their website hosting. Some will want to outsource all of their IT, while others may only outsource certain areas, such as the hosting.

The day to day running and updating of a website is not usually included in a managed hosting package. Hosting is related to the servers that keep the website online, not the website itself. This is more likely to be taken care of by website maintenance companies or the company who built the website. Some managed hosting packages do include website maintenance though. This may be an add-on on top of the hosting services, and therefore may be cheaper than hiring a company just for this purpose. Customers with very limited knowledge, or those who just don’t want to worry about the website at all, are those who will pay for this.

Administration is something that many people dislike, and they would rather pass it on to someone else if at all possible. Managed hosting sometimes includes certain admin tasks. Although it is rare that someone would pay for managed hosting just for the admin, if it is included it may encourage businesses to use the service.

There are many reasons why managed hosting may be chosen. Businesses are the most common customers, but others may also use the service. For basic hosting managed hosting is rarely the best option as it can be expensive, but for complex solutions it can solve a lot of time and stress and therefore can give value for money.

Colocation is a type of Internet hosting, often used by small businesses. It is a type of hosting that is useful for a company who wants something more than basic web hosting from a web hosting company, but doesn’t have the requirements for hosting their own server.

Many web hosting companies offer rack space for colocation. Colocation works by hosting companies renting out this rack space within their data centres for other businesses to place their servers. These businesses will buy their own server, which they will configure and alter when necessary. This will then be placed in the rack space they have bought from the hosting company. The hosting company isn’t actually involved with the server in any way; they just own the rack space which they rent out to businesses to do with as they please. This means that the business owns the server just as they would if they had the server at their own site, but they use certain resources provided by the hosting company. The hosting company will provide the bandwidth, power and the right air and temperature conditions for the server to operate in. Responsibilities with regards to the server are completely in the hand of the business that owns it. Whenever maintenance needs to be done, the business that owns the server will have to go to the data centre and do this themselves.

Businesses that get the greatest benefit from colocation are those than need to run their own website, email and perhaps a database, while keeping complete control. They will not have to rely on a hosting company; if they need something doing they just do it themselves. Colocation is a type of hosting that has increased fairly rapidly over the last few years. As more businesses have the demand for extra needs on top of basic web hosting, colocation is a good alternative to hosting their own server. Colocation is more expensive than web hosting, but can be significantly cheaper than some of the other options.

With colocation a business runs its own server. This gives them much more control over their server, and has many of the same strengths of hosting the server themselves. There is a lot less work and expertise needed though. This saves them both time and money. A disadvantage is that if something goes wrong or needs changing, they will have to do it themselves.

Colocation has many benefits over other types of hosting. If a business needs more control over their hosting than they currently have but does not want to host their own server, then colocation is one of the alternatives.

Andrew Marshall ©

The world of data centers has grown dramatically in the ten years since the business was invented. Sure, there have always been computing centers where you could rent processing power. Going all the way back to the days of punch cards and huge data reading systems that milled through all the cards with holes in them, there were services you could pay for when you needed data crunched on a large scale.

Things are a little different today, but in some ways the same. Today the big need most people have is to host a website. There are still some who need massive processing power, but those are mostly companies who can build their own data centers. For the average consumer or small business person, the need is for a website, email, perhaps a database server or other application server. This is where the colocation hosting industry comes in.

Today there are many companies who are in the business of building and running data centers only to provide hosting services to individuals and businesses. Colocation hosting means that you have a server in someone else’s facility. There are several flavors. In the simplest version, you rent space in a server rack but you actually own the server. In this model, the owner of the hosting center doesn’t really touch your computer. They provide you bandwidth, power, and an appropriate environment (air conditioning, fire suppression, physical security).

Other versions include actually renting the server from the colocation company. And it gets even more complicated than that. With the introduction of virtualization several years ago, hosting companies are able to actually sell you a portion of a server. Using this method, they charge you based on the size and processing capabilities of the virtual machine. This allows them to sell parts of a server to several different customers. Each operating system installation has no idea that there are other virtual computers on the same hardware.

So in some ways, the world of colocation hosting and virtual servers brings us full circle to the days of the punch card. You are, again, paying for processing power. However, this time it is measured in terms of ram, ghz and gb of disk space rather than CPU time or cards read. But if you still want to keep it simple, you can simply rent a space and slide your server into a rack and call it a day.

Colocation is a technical term referring to the location of a web server or other telecommunications equipment within a data centre built for the purpose of housing high tech electronic equipment. The equipment is co-located with other servers hence the name colocation or co-location.

Usually the equipment a web server that is housed in a collocation centre is located in a secured cage or rack, with a regulated power supply, it’s own dedicated internet connection, security software and managed support. The advantage of a collocation centre is that the equipment is housed in a purpose built facility with the correct atmospheric controls, electrical supplies and solid high speed internet connections. A good co-location centre will have high level security measure and be much better protected against theft, fire and vandalism then a server hosted within a companies normal office. From a top level provider of collocation you would expect there to be security cameras, fire alarm and detection equipment coupled with extinguishing and sprinkler systems. They should also have back up power supplies, power surge protection and a variety of internet connections. The idea being that during a power failure or the loss of an internet connection a server housed in a collocation centre would carry on working with little or no down time. They offer a level of security and the ability to stay connected and keeps your server working that a server housed with an office of work space would not offer.

Colocation centres are also sometime called carrier hotel or “colo’s”. Colocation is increasing in popularity due to the time and money a company can save buy sharing the large scale costs of providing the best environment for servers and other telecommunications equipment. Economies of scale come into play it cheaper to have your equipment, core IT and communications facilities in safe, secure hands in purpose built location then build run and staff a colocation facility yourself.

Another reason that companies are switching to collocation is the ability of a collocation provider to supply much improved bandwidth whilst the relocation of the equipment frees up space on a companies internal network resulting in it working much more efficiently.

Data back up is another reason to use colocation facilities as a good colocation service provides expert back up resources for your critical data and web pages. Losing your data can be critical to the survival of a business. The lose of data can result in your business closing down, sixty percent of companies that lose their data will shut down within 6 months of the disaster. So the back up data services offered by a co-location provider are vitally important and well worth the investment.

Colocation also provides a solution if the software you run cannot be placed on shared or managed servers, if you are using a collocation centre then you have control of the server and the software that is placed on it. It gives you more options then using managed servers as the equipment is yours to customise to your own requirements.

The colocation market seems to be set for growth although there has been a dip in the demand but the requirements still outstrip the current level of supply. The knock on effect of this is that collocation prices are set to rise during 2009.

Tony Heywood ?/p>

Equipment colocation (aka co-location) is when an organization pays to rent space in another organization’s networked facility. It is a common practice for web hosting, as it allows a company to put their equipment into a controlled, reliable, networked environment without having to build or buy their own data center. If your company or other organization needs to be on the Web, colocation may be a good option – especially if you have special requirements such as non-standard equipment.

There are many reasons why colocation may make sense for you. One may be cost – by renting space in another company’s data center, you can simply move your equipment into that location and “plug it in” – the other company takes care of keeping it cooled and supplying it with power and internet access. One scenario in which this really makes sense is if your organization has a server already running on the premises, but is having problems keeping it online, and keeping it secure. By colocating that server to another company’s data center, all you need to do is unplug the server, drive it over to the new location and plug it in!

Another common reason for equipment co-location is to allow an organization to spread its online resources around geographically. This may be useful in terms of performance – by allowing equipment to help deal with traffic coming from that geographical area. It also can offer some redundancy in case of natural disaster. For example, you can be sure that large online companies like google do not have “all their eggs in one basket” but instead have data centers scattered all over the globe. Of course building facilities all over the place is not feasible for a lot of organizations – but by renting colocation space in a few data centers scattered around, your company could possible gain some benefit over concentrating everything in one location.