What is Colocation?
secure space with reliable network connectivity
Hosting Internet servers in-house is expensive and time consuming. It requires expensive equipment like routers, switches and an uninterruptible power supply (UPS), reliable high speed Internet connections, including charges from an Internet access provider and telco charges. Once everything is set up, you also must have sufficient staff and resources to maintain the network around the clock.
Some considerations to hosting Internet servers in-house:
- Will your Internet connection have the capacity to provide your customers fast uninterrupted access to your servers, including peak usage times?
- Will you have a back-up connection in case your main link goes down?
- Will your servers and all associated network equipment be supported by a UPS?
- Will the UPS provide power for more than a few minutes in the event of an extended power outage?
- Do you have technicians to maintain the network and keep your servers operational 24 hours a day, 7 days a week?
- How will you monitor your network and servers and notify someone if something stops working?
- Who will attend to problems in the middle of the night or over the weekend?
- Will your servers be secure from theft or physical interference?
BusinessOne Colocation is the Logical Alternative.
The Netspace state-of-the-art Internet hosting facility provides customers an affordable, robust and reliable alternative. Netspace maintains the hosting infrastructure, high capacity Internet connectivity and support services to keep your servers online 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Often referred to as colocation or telehousing, your servers are housed within our data centre, fully redundant connections to multiple Internet backbones, backup power, extensive security and on-site technicians and more. IP addresses, server monitoring and notification, a secondary DNS service and a range of support services are all included.
Whilst located in our data centre, you maintain complete control over the functionality of your servers and have physical access to your equipment if required.
Supply your own servers or use a Netspace supplied dedicated server. Sun Cobalt and other platforms including Linux, FreeBSD and Windows are also available.
Key Benefits of Colocation
- Eliminate up-front and ongoing expense associated with building and maintaining your own hosting environment and suitable Internet connectivity
- Connection to multiple high capacity Internet links
- Your servers are monitored and supported around the clock
- Servers can be installed and online immediately
- Additional servers can be easily added as your needs grow
How is a Dedicated Server different from a Virtual Server?
A virtual server is where an Internet server is used to host many Virtual Servers. Typically used by ISP's to provide virtual web servers (VWS) to their customers. The main benefits of using a virtual server is that the server is managed by the provider, so you don't have responsibility for the hardware, its connection to the Internet, installing and maintaining the operating system, applications, etc. The cost of using a virtual server is a fraction of a dedicated server because the operating costs are shared across many customers.
With a virtual server, the server provider determines the functionality of the server, guidelines for its use and usually does not allow for any sort of customisation of that standard environment. You may wish to run custom scripts in a web server, host a database or other applications, and so on. Processor or memory intensive tasks are usually prohibited as they impact on everyone else sharing the server and there are likely to be other restrictions such as the amount of storage space available to you.
With a dedicated server, whilst you may be responsible for the maintenance of the server hardware or operating system and applications, you have complete control and can configure and use the server to meet your specific requirements.
Colocating your servers at Netspace or a Netspace supplied dedicated server provides an affordable high speed Internet connectivity from within a secure environment, with a range of associated services to keep your servers operating around the clock.
Please contact us today to discuss your colocation requirements.