Colocation is a hosting service that lets you to store your organization’s IT, applications and servers at a third-party data center rather than in-house business premises. You could manage the server on your own with your technical team or you could opt for managed colocation hosting without being burdened with the hassles of maintaining the server. It is a feasible and affordable choice for the small and medium businesses.
In-house servers can become a costly affair with several reasons. Computers require continuous power which means hefty energy bills. You will also require power backups to manage during outages, cooling solutions, safety devices in the form of fire extinguishers and water leakage detection equipment. These equipments require a huge investment which a small business may not be able to afford.
Colocation hosting resolves this issue. However, if you do not have the technical expertise you could buy managed colocation hosting from a reliable provider. This will allow you to focus on your core business and save a lot of investment on infrastructure.
What managed colocation means:
In the tradition colocation hosting, you install and maintain your server. You have the control to increase or reduce your resource capacity without waiting for your host’s approval. This could be a problem for your technical experts if your business is in a different city or at a distance. Commuting could delay in their attending to any issues that can crop up with your server. Managed colocation hosting is a service where your host will employ their technical experts to monitor, maintain and manage your servers.
You still are in control over your server. You can ask your host to customize it in any manner that you think will suit your business. The host will provide you with all the software tools and applications. They take the responsibility of the software updates, operating system upgrades, security patches as and when they are released. They maintain the hardware for you and monitor the server for you. If they find any doubtful component, they inform you and do the necessary replacements. The risks of you missing out on a update are not there in managed hosting.
Advantages of managed colocation:
One primary benefit is that you do not have to shoulder the burden of server maintenance. The providers are up-to-date with the latest technology and get the best tools and highest quality infrastructure for your business.
Another significant benefit of managed colocation hosting is you can hire the best providers irrespective of where they are located. In traditional hosting, you must look out for a provider that is in close vicinity and in doing so, you may not get the services of the best provider.
It is more cost-effective as you are saved from investing on the expensive data center infrastructure, power consumption, employing technically trained manpower etc. You can be guaranteed of assured uptime and fast connectivity as your managed colocation hosting service provider offers constant monitoring and performs health checks on your server. Their support team works 24/7 in case you require some technical assistance.
