Server in my house? How to make it?

M

ModestMoo

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 26, 2011
Messages
135
I guys,
I hope I write in the right place.

I want to have a server for website hosting, and I want to have it in my house. I create some websites for people and then host them and they pay me for it, so I want to have it on my own.
I just want ask you, what I need?

Is it possible to build it?

Thank you
 
Of course it's possible to build....what do you have to start with? A business class or FIOS connection with static IP, router/switch on a UPS w/ the dedicated server incase of outage. You'd spend less money getting a VPS for a few people in the long run.
 
Just building the server yourself, sure. Most importantly, what is your budget? I'm sure you want a lot of bells ans whistles like backups, redundency, speed, space, etc..., but if don't have the money, you'll have to pick and choose what is important based on what you can spend. This should include what networking equipment you would need too.

Also, if you are trying to do this from your residental line (e.g., not business class, non static IP, etc...), you will probably run into problems there.
 
It might work out better for you and your customers if you host online. GoDaddy or some other web hosting. A lot less to worry about. I'm sure others will be glad to point you to their favorite hosts.
If you have your heart set on doing it from home it's going to cost a bit (to do it right anyway).
 
Depending on what kind of sites and the bandwidth required you would be better off hosting with a company depending on what kind of internet access you have.
 
Bad idea, do not do it. Unless of course your time is worth less than $0.
 
402blownstroker said:
Inexperience talking..... if you know what your are doing it is pretty easy and simple.
Click to expand...

It's easy to set something up for a home type situation (i.e. gateway to my house, host a personal web page, etc.)

But selling the service as part of a web design package is a different matter - it's more that it's complicated to do *correctly* - what's the uptime going to be like? Are you on a business or personal connect? Hardware failure? Data backup? Bandwidth issues?

The fact is that generic "hosting" is commoditized to the point that there isn't much money to be made unless you can provide volume (to amortize the overhead), or really cut corners.
 
For a dev site, that is one thing (and realistically one you could use a shared host for if you wanted), but for production, let someone else maintain the servers and just resell to clients.

Let me give you a thought: I have tons of server hardware and infrastructure components (like battery back ups) and I still won't host my own site.
 
Buy a dell poweredge 840 and a raid controller to raid 1 the drives. then backup to somewhere external.
 
402blownstroker said:
Inexperience talking..... if you know what your are doing it is pretty easy and simple.
Click to expand...

Sorry but you are either ignorant or not a business owner (or a bad one). Lets first start with the fact that running a legit hosting service is hardly easy, it takes time to have a high uptime that is redundant and is secure.

Unless your time is worth less than $0, it is 100% not worth the time and effort to have a live production machine running client websites within your home. Let me be clear that I am specifically talking about production machines that host client websites, not dev machines.

Looking at it purely from a business evaluation it makes no sense at all. You are either going to be ripping of clients or charging competitive rates that provide little to no return. Of course I assume that people are valuing their time correctly. As previously stated, hosting is highly commoditized and unless you are creating some unique value add its pointless to try and compete. I can take a shot in the dark and make a good guess that no home base hosting solution is going to beat most legit hosting companies.

For a couple bucks a month a home base hosting solution cannot beat the uptime, redundancy and security of the most idiotic hosting companies. And then you are competing for what, a couple bucks a month? Its 100% an economy of scale and there is no money to be made unless you are overcharging.

Do you want to start a real hosting company? Go for it but dont expect to run it out of your house and offer any real service. What is the best way to spend your time, hosting client websites for a few bucks a month each or doing design work. IMO the value add as a web developer is to then resale managed solutions. So do the dev work then resale hosting from another site and throw a couple bucks a month on top of it or something of that nature. My only point is its about the division of labor, its not worth the time to manage it and much easier to pay someone else.


FYI I have run through the circuit of hosting setups in my time. Back in the early 00s I ran a couple successful traffic networks. I started with cheap shared solutions, jumped to VPS then made a leap to unmanaged dedis. I currently run a small cluster of linux machines on AWS to do data crunching and analysis and no longer mess with site hosting.
 
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