Web Hosting Questions?

[Jator]

Hello Fellow AnandTechers,

I am looking at starting a small web hosting service for physicians in the area I live in. TO give you a little background about myself, I contract with physicians for a HMO. I also am their service rep, which means I help them with problems they might have with the HMO, thus I have a pretty good relationship with these physicians.

What I am planning on doing is getting DSL sometime in December and using Telocity, which provides a static IP. I will be using a WinNT (maybe 2000) with IIS, and set up their web sites on this machine.

My first question would be, how much bandwith will I need to accomplish this, and will DSL provide me what I need to get started? I eventualy think I would need to move to a fractional T1 or T1 depending on how many accounts I sign up.

Thanks for any suggestions.

****Edit****

How can I find out about getting a pipe that will allow me to host commercial accounts that won't break the bank. Remember, my bank is pretty small too.

 

[Spiff]

What kind of bandwidth required depends onhow much traffic you expect to receive. The amount of traffic can be measured over time, and if you are seeing continually increasing numbers of visitors, then it would be good to look into getting a larger pipe.

However... you don't have to host the server at home. I'm not familiar with Telocity, but see if they offer co-location services, you can build your machine and let it be housed in their facility which typically means your system will have access to a large pipe. You could then maintain the system from your home or office. Outside of hardware issues there is usually very little reason to have physical access to a server if you have installed the right tools.

There are many options available for the remote administration of systems, from telnet to terminal services to pcanywhere to http, and more.

Once the machine is online and configured, the majority of your administration will be in maintaining the web space anyway.

 

[Jator]

Spiff,

Thanks for the reply. These are physicians offices, which has yet to really be integrated into the 'e' world. So I don't figure usage to be too high in the beggining. One of my selling points is that they need to be ahead of the game, and not wait til it's crunch time, that's when they get stuck in the wallet.

Offsite hosting would cost more in the beggining, but I would like the deliability someplace like that would have. How would I beging to look for a location here locally? I'd rather things be local so that if there is a hardware problem, I can have easy access to it.

As for remote control, yeah, I do that already via VNC. Makes life sooo much easier, and I don't have to buy multiple monitors. Wooohooo!!!

Jay

 

[Spiff]

Talk to your ISP

 

[Jator]

Hehe, I currently have Road Runner, and am looking to switch to Telocity. I doubt they will be to o helpful. I'll look into it though.

Jay

 

[Jator]

Well, I'm SOL so far. Telocity doesn't allow commercial accounts and BellSouth doesn't provide a Static IP, even for it's commercial accounts.

Jay

 

[Train]

Look around for ISPs that will give you a locker in thier building, ive seen tham as low at $10 a month, and you get a key to the locker that has your box in it, plus you get thier T1's and T3's in case you get high traffic.

 

[Dale]

Jaytor you didnt mention the city/area and that makes all the difference in the world

< how much bandwith will I need to >
a 56k pipe(ISDN or Frame Relay) can easily handle 50++ virtuals of the type you are talking about. a typical ISP will have 500-1000++ on a T1
and rarely reach 50% usage

<How can I find out about getting a pipe>
call the phone company, they are waiting for your call

contact the 'smallest' and largest ISPs in your area and ask about co-location.. normally about $300 but I have seen them add a business like you describe for $50 or less, then hope that you suceed so they can raise the rate later


your best bet overall is to use one of the many $10-$12 monthly places on the web and you pay for the virtual and then charge them $30+++++
you wont have hardly anything to lose and can make as much as you are a good salesman


you really dont want a home based connection unless you plan to take in a whole lot of money

..Dale
<edit>speeling ?? changed ass to as.. I have got to go get a keyboard ; ) </edit>

 

[Spiff]

since you mention rr and bellsouth, i'm going to guess you're somewhere in georgia, nc, sc, or va.

try...

speakeasy.net - one of my isp's... love them
ipass.net
intrex.net - i believe they are local to the nc triangle

that's all i can think of at the moment. i don't know prices or full scope of services offered. you'll have to do the homework. dslreports.com provides info on many isp's throughout the country. use them as one tool for finding local isp's you can contact.

 

[Jator]

Thanks Spiff, actually I am below the Bible belt in Florida.