Ram8349 Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 Back in the days I know some people host their own web sites on their own servers at home, as well as some game servers. Some of them had SDSL at home, and the server hardware can be upgraded at will. These days it seems most people use host service. Those dedicated servers are quite expensive, always cost anywhere between $100~200 per month. If you build a server of your own, it wouldn't cost more than a year's monthly fee, and it is easier with the server sit at home. Which one is the better option today? Dedicated server hosted by host companies? Or have your own server sitting at home? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
__Darknite Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 It is all about "Economy Of Scale". At the small end, from an economic point of view it makes no sense. Do not forget that the hardware cost are not the full "Total Cost Of Ownership": * Secure Premise * Air conditioned data room * Cable Management * UPS backup system * Secondary redundancy for all hardware * Fail-over * 24/7 monitoring costs * Electricity bills * ISP bandwidth cost If you do the maths, managed hosting always wins. However if you are running hundreds or thousands of web sites that are making thousands of dollars a month, then self hosting (or co-hosting) make work out cheaper. LiquiLayer - Brent and Nathan 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Nathan Posted June 7, 2012 Administrators Share Posted June 7, 2012 Yup, the biggest one I see is "ISP Bandwidth Cost", the cost of that to compete with a data center up speed would be crazy. I want to say last I checked pricing 10/10 symmetrical connection was about $900/month. 10/10 connection wouldn't even be enough, but just as an example. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ram8349 Posted June 7, 2012 Author Share Posted June 7, 2012 Are you guys saying it is actually cheaper to let a host company to host your web site on a dedicated server? Do you have the actual price comparison for the similar hardware and bandwidth for both options? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ridwan sameer Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 Exactly. Leavinga server on is bound to pile on your electricity bill, and you will have to monitor it all by yourself. And if you live in an asian country like mine, electricity cuts are quite frequent. Then it's easier for hackers/thieves to gain access without security... It's better just to pay someone and not worry about it Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victor Leigh Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 Yes, you can run your own server from your own home if (a) your server only serves a small number of people and ( your server is not expected to be on 24/7. However if you are planning to use your server for serving people globally, it's a dead duck before it can even get off the ground. For one thing, you have to think about the cost of a static ip. That alone should be enough to make it not cost-efficient to run your own server from your own home. btw you don't always have to use a dedicated server to host your web sites. In most cases, a vps is more than sufficient. Just curious. What are you planning to run on the server? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marc Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 have never looked into it if Im honest, however on a home connection I cant see it even being feasable, therefore you would need a business line. For that I could just hire the server I use currently and not worry about it burning my house down. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LiquiLayer - Brent Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 It is all about "Economy Of Scale". At the small end, from an economic point of view it makes no sense. Do not forget that the hardware cost are not the full "Total Cost Of Ownership": * Secure Premise * Air conditioned data room * Cable Management * UPS backup system * Secondary redundancy for all hardware * Fail-over * 24/7 monitoring costs * Electricity bills * ISP bandwidth cost If you do the maths, managed hosting always wins. However if you are running hundreds or thousands of web sites that are making thousands of dollars a month, then self hosting (or co-hosting) make work out cheaper. X100 on this. For personal things, then sure. If you're hosting customer data, then no. Keep in mind though that ISP's don't like people running web servers from their home. Nathan 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
merlyn73 Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 I would think the risk and the expense would in no way be proportional to the rewards unless you already had an established income flow that could cover your costs on ANY given month. Otherwise, I believe you are setting yourself for a failure that you will have only one person to blame on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tetutato Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 For game servers, running one at home is pretty good resolution if you have decent computer specs. It's not like you have to keep it up 24/7 (if it's just for your friends), etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ridwan sameer Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 For game servers, running one at home is pretty good resolution if you have decent computer specs. It's not like you have to keep it up 24/7 (if it's just for your friends), etc. I Think he's talking about Website servers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CHiLL Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 If you're in the UK, you can't run your own business website from home from a standard home broadband connection. Well, technically you can, but if your ISP find out, they will charge you and put you on a much more expensive business connection. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ram8349 Posted June 8, 2012 Author Share Posted June 8, 2012 (edited) In the U.S. it's pretty much the same. You are not allowed to host servers on home DSL or cable. I totally do not understand the logic behind why the business connection cost more for the same speed. Home users can use a lot more bandwidth. They can be streaming from Youtube or netflix, transfer video files over the internet, downloading large files etc. which would cost a lot more bandwidth than a web server. Edited June 8, 2012 by Ram8349 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Nathan Posted June 8, 2012 Administrators Share Posted June 8, 2012 In the U.S. it's pretty much the same. You are not allowed to host servers on home DSL or cable. I totally do not understand the log behind why the business connection cost more for the same speed. Home users can use a lot more bandwidth. They can be streaming from Youtube or netflix, transfer video files over the internet, downloading large files etc. which would cost a lot more bandwidth than a web server. That's the point right there. Yes you can use more sitting on your home computer, but it's mostly all down data and nothing go up. With a server you will be using more upload so it will cost more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 I know a game which a few members have created a legal grey area application that allows you to host at home or on a server. Lots of people do host it on there own computer and I've not heard of anything bad happening to them yet. That being said there is always going to be the big reasons why not to host at home: Needs to keep computer on 24/7 365 days a year. Needs a very good computer spec. Needs a very good internet connection. You are going to run into issues with allowing other people into your computer unless you are very knowledgeable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Nathan Posted June 8, 2012 Administrators Share Posted June 8, 2012 I know a game which a few members have created a legal grey area application that allows you to host at home or on a server. Lots of people do host it on there own computer and I've not heard of anything bad happening to them yet. That being said there is always going to be the big reasons why not to host at home: Needs to keep computer on 24/7 365 days a year. Needs a very good computer spec. Needs a very good internet connection. You are going to run into issues with allowing other people into your computer unless you are very knowledgeable. What about upgrading to a static IP? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 That to! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ram8349 Posted June 8, 2012 Author Share Posted June 8, 2012 I know a game which a few members have created a legal grey area application that allows you to host at home or on a server. Lots of people do host it on there own computer and I've not heard of anything bad happening to them yet. That being said there is always going to be the big reasons why not to host at home: Needs to keep computer on 24/7 365 days a year. Needs a very good computer spec. Needs a very good internet connection. You are going to run into issues with allowing other people into your computer unless you are very knowledgeable. It seems the host company is able to make money off the hosting plans while also have to pay for the hardware, electricity bill, as well as for the internet bandwidth. People's web sites hosted by those companies can still be hacked, right? That's the point right there. Yes you can use more sitting on your home computer, but it's mostly all down data and nothing go up. With a server you will be using more upload so it will cost more. Many people send a lot of photos, videos, and other files over the internet from their home. It uses a lot of upload bandwidth. Things like video chattiing also goes both ways. Why does upload cost ISP more than download anyway? Isn't our upload = download for the ISP? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 Yes it can still get hacked. There are multiple threats such as: Your email getting hacked like MyBB. Your host getting hacked. Your personal account getting hacked. But really if you are carful on the internet these shouldn't happen to you. There is a few reasons why you might want to host at home. One is for example, like someone posted, if someone wanted to host a server for your friends but didn't want to give then access directly to the MySQL database (assuming that the program has one). A set of web scripts could really streamline complex process. Another reason might be Development. On a LAN with all ports closed you could host things that might be potentially dangerous if hosted elsewhere. I personally use WampServer when I need to develop something for the web. That way I know I am safe. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tetutato Posted June 9, 2012 Share Posted June 9, 2012 I Think he's talking about Website servers Well: Back in the days I know some people host their own web sites on their own servers at home, as well as some game servers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LiquiLayer - Brent Posted June 9, 2012 Share Posted June 9, 2012 The main problem you're going to run into is your ISP throttling your connection. For running a home server, "upload" speed is more important than download speed. 9 times out of 10, port 25 is going to be blocked anyway. ISP's don't like people running web servers from the little $40 6meg soho connection. Like I mentioned above, if it's for personal stuff, then sure. If you plan on charging people, then no. If you're going to run web servers from home, at least colo it, but then it's not at your home. I also saw some replies regarding testing/development stuff - why not use something like VMware Workstation or Virtualbox on your home workstation? Another thing is, and I don't know how familiar you are with hardware, but power supplies in enterprise grade equipment are not that of a soho desktop pc. Be prepared for a power bill increase for both running it & cooling it. What kind of storage are you planning on having? Local storage? RAID? How about UPS's? There's a lot more to factor in than just plugging in a server and calling it a day. This of course, is if you plan on hosting "other peoples data". That's just my 2 cents. Marc 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victor Leigh Posted June 9, 2012 Share Posted June 9, 2012 The main problem you're going to run into is your ISP throttling your connection. For running a home server, "upload" speed is more important than download speed. 9 times out of 10, port 25 is going to be blocked anyway. ISP's don't like people running web servers from the little $40 6meg soho connection. Like I mentioned above, if it's for personal stuff, then sure. If you plan on charging people, then no. If you're going to run web servers from home, at least colo it, but then it's not at your home. I also saw some replies regarding testing/development stuff - why not use something like VMware Workstation or Virtualbox on your home workstation? Another thing is, and I don't know how familiar you are with hardware, but power supplies in enterprise grade equipment are not that of a soho desktop pc. Be prepared for a power bill increase for both running it & cooling it. What kind of storage are you planning on having? Local storage? RAID? How about UPS's? There's a lot more to factor in than just plugging in a server and calling it a day. This of course, is if you plan on hosting "other peoples data". That's just my 2 cents. I think the problem would not be so much an increase in the power bill as a very much shortened working life for the power supply. I have installed many different types of power supplies. On the outside, they all look more or less the same. They even have the same specs. However prices can differ by a factor of five to ten times. This is because power supplies designed for servers are built of a very different quality of material. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ram8349 Posted June 15, 2012 Author Share Posted June 15, 2012 I thought servers especially web servers shouldn't take more power than a gaming rig. You don't even need dedicated video card for a server. Just a Xeon processor, tons of ECC memory, good storage and backup. It's not going to be hotter nor take more electricity than a standard high end gaming PC. The internet connection might be a problem, but I see home DSL connection with over 1Mbits upload for only $40 per month. I remember the old days when I was playing on a counter-strike server hosted on a 1.1/1.1mbits SDSL, where a web site was also hosted on the same connection. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tetutato Posted June 15, 2012 Share Posted June 15, 2012 I thought servers especially web servers shouldn't take more power than a gaming rig. You don't even need dedicated video card for a server. Just a Xeon processor, tons of ECC memory, good storage and backup. It's not going to be hotter nor take more electricity than a standard high end gaming PC. The internet connection might be a problem, but I see home DSL connection with over 1Mbits upload for only $40 per month. I remember the old days when I was playing on a counter-strike server hosted on a 1.1/1.1mbits SDSL, where a web site was also hosted on the same connection. Well yea but you have to keep the computer online 24/7 and constantly manage it. Time = Money Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marc Posted June 20, 2012 Share Posted June 20, 2012 Well yea but you have to keep the computer online 24/7 and constantly manage it. Time = Money You mean people turn computers off? I cant remember the last time mine was switched off other than to switch OS lmao Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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