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How to Decide Between a Cloud vs. Dedicated Server

P

Peter Hall

n00b
Joined
Jul 22, 2015
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11
Hi guys,

I am a newbie seeking advice. I would really like some advice on whether I should go with a dedicated or cloud server for my website. I've read up on both and they both have their ups and downs, but I would like to hear some first-hand opinions. Can you give me any advice on which way to go?

All advice is appreciated. Thanks!
 
Peter Hall said:
Hi guys,

I am a newbie seeking advice. I would really like some advice on whether I should go with a dedicated or cloud server for my website. I've read up on both and they both have their ups and downs, but I would like to hear some first-hand opinions. Can you give me any advice on which way to go?

All advice is appreciated. Thanks!
Click to expand...

By dedicated do you mean one that you will physically own and host yourself? How many sites and back end machines do you need? SQL?
 
The only thing that really matters is cost. Over the expected lifetime of the server, is it worth it?
 
I agree with the other posts, it really depends on your use-case. That being said, what are your strengths? Do you have the time and or knowledge to setup and secure your own web server? Or would your time be better spent doing other tasks?
 
Yes, sorry. I definitely should have been more specific about that. It's an ecommerce website. So any server downtime means losing revenue. I'm currently on a dedicated server, but I'm just looking into my options for what is best for my business for the future.

TType85 said:
By dedicated do you mean one that you will physically own and host yourself? How many sites and back end machines do you need? SQL?
Click to expand...

By dedicated server, I mean that it's in a data center somewhere. That I am renting out a determined amount of space on a physical server that is housed within a reasonable vicinity to serve my web business optimally. I definitely don't have the time and know-how to run my own server.

Some benefits of the dedicated server is that IT help and customer service is usually pretty good, and the overall performance is usually good. I guess that all depends on who you're with though. But it means always paying for the whole package, say paying for certain disk space (and more is always expensive). It also needs to be managed and hardware needs to be updated and configured. This could all mean moments of downtime. Plus, you can really only scale to a certain amount, so when thinking within a 10 year plan and how much I want my business to grow, well it might be worth considering how much extra server space I may need.

Cloud hosting has the advantage of not needing the same maintenance and hardware updates, plus pretty much unlimiting scalling ability to grow my business. This is where your comment of price comes in Quix. Paying for only what you use definitely has a nice ring to it and the cloud server options that I have been looking into have been quite good, price wise. But there are definite cons too. Even though you are only paying for what you use, when you do need more space it tends to be expensive. Bandwidth is also expensive and limited, so is Disk space and SQL space. I'm also worried that if something does go down that I won't have someone on it right away to fix the problem. From what I have been hearing, cloud servers tend to have less reliable customer service and lower performance than dedicated servers. That being said, they are still developing and I can see this technoloy overtaking dedicated servers eventually...so considering that 10 year plan again.

Obviously the only way to succeed in anything is to think and plan ahead, so even though what I have is working for me right now, I need to prepare for when it may not meet all of my needs. So if anyone has some companies to recommend looking into or any other insight and advice, I'm all ears.
 
This should probably be in Webmastering & Programming since it's really a hosting question. Still, here are some thoughts:

Peter Hall said:
I am a newbie seeking advice.
Click to expand...

Peter Hall said:
It's an ecommerce website. So any server downtime means losing revenue.
Click to expand...

If the two quotes above are true, then stop monkeying around with everything you wrote, find a provider that will actually host your ecommerce solution and be done with it. As someone who doesn't know what he is doing it's the absolute worst thing to try and run this by yourself managing the server/os/ecommerce app/updates/upgrades/security/pci compliance/etc. etc.

Just pay someone to host your store for you and be done with it. It's cheap and easy.
 
There is also more overhead with setting up or paying for a dedicated server host compared to Cloud. Depending on the cloud service provider you go with, they may already have a lot of integrated tools and services for you to use at your disposal.
 
Thanks for the feedback. Thuleman, do you have a company suggestion for me? And this still doesn't answer dedicated vs. cloud. For the record I always meant to go with another company, not host myself, which I think I made clear in my post, since I mentioned that "I definitely don't have the time and know-how to run my own server". If I was not clear, I'm sorry, we aren't all clear, concise, gifted writers...or readers I guess. I merely need to know whether a cloud server is a better option for future growth.
 
Cloud Servers
These are a great option for businesses that need to optimise IT performance without the huge costs associated with purchasing and managing a fully dedicated infrastructure. For this reason they are a popular choice for small and mid-sized businesses, and those with variable demands and workloads.

Cloud servers can be configured to provide a similar level of performance, security and control of a dedicated server, but instead of being hosted on physical hardware that’s solely dedicated to you they reside on a shared “virtualised” environment managed by your cloud hosting provider, meaning that you benefit from the economies of scale of sharing hardware with other customers.

With Cloud servers you only ever pay for the exact amount of server space used, on an hourly basis, and have the benefit of infinite flexibility. You can scale up or down resources and server specification depending on demand, meaning that you can avoid paying for idle infrastructure costs when demand is low.

Dedicated servers
A dedicated server is a physical server that is purchased or rented entirely for your own business needs, making it a great solution for large businesses, those that for regulatory reasons require exceptionally high levels of data security, or organisations that have predictable demand necessitating all of their servers running 24/7/365.Businesses would typically need the IT capacity and expertise to manage the ongoing maintenance..

Whilst there is much debate as to the value of dedicated servers in the new world of Cloud, the reality is that there is still very much a need for bare metal dedicated hardware as businesses grapple with increased use of I/O-heavy applications such as databases and Big Data platforms.
** Courtesy of Rackspace. **

Start with a cloud server and if more power is needed move to a dedicated server.
 
The question of dedicated vs cloud is kind of a moot point these days. It literally doesn't matter because what you are paying for is CPU, RAM, IOPS, and latency. You decide what level of service you require, and they deliver it.

I can't recommend a company because I don't know what ecommerce solution you have in mind, what your expected volume is going to be, etc. etc., cloud vs. dedicated isn't even a question worth considering if you are going with a decent hosting company. Amazon AWS will provide all the performance you need and it will scale infinitely. I get what Rackspace is saying, but I (and reality) don't agree with it. Aggregated abstracted virtual hardware, including SDS, will outperform physical hardware any day.
 
Totally agree with you, Thuleman. I posted that to help give some definition to things.
 
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