7 Things to consider before selecting a Dedicated Server

1. Business impact of downtime

What is the business impact of potential failure of your hosting environment? One of the first things to consider when selecting a dedicated server is how to deal with potential downtime. In a cloud environment, the set-up of the cloud protects you against hardware failures. With a dedicated server, you know you are not sharing resources with anyone else. But since there is always a single point of failure in one server, you need to decide whether you are able to accept potential downtime – if you do not have the option to scale to multiple dedicated servers.

2. Scalability of your application

Scalability is another important issue when choosing a dedicated server. How well does your application scale? Is it easy to add more servers and will that increase the amount of end users you can service?

If it is easy for you to scale, it doesn’t matter whether you use a dedicated server or a virtual solution. However, some applications are difficult to scale to multiple devices. Making sure a database is running on multiple servers is a challenge since it needs to be synchronized over all database servers. It might even be easier to move the database to a server that has more processing capacity, RAM and storage. Moving to a cloud environment – where you can clone a server, have a copy running in production and can add a load balancer to redirect traffic to multiple servers – could also be a good option for you.

3. Load balancing across multiple dedicated servers

If your application can scale across multiple dedicated servers, a form of load balancing -where end users are split across all available servers- is necessary. If you are running a website and traffic is rising, at some point you will need to use multiple web servers that serve a multitude of users for the same website. With a load balancing solution, every incoming request will be directed to a different server. Before doing this, the load balancer checks whether a server is up and running. If it is down, it redirects traffic to another server.

4. Predictability of bandwidth usage

The requirements in bandwidth naturally relate to the predictability of data traffic. If you are going to consume a lot of bandwidth but predictability is low, you could choose a package with your dedicated server that has a lot of data traffic included, or even unmetered billing. This is an easy way of knowing exactly how much you will be spending on the hosting of your dedicated server.

5. Network quality

As a customer, you can choose where a dedicated server is placed physically. It is important to consider the location of your end user. For instance, if your customers are in the APAC region, hosting in Europe might not be a sensible choice since data delivery will be slow. Data delivery also depends on the quality of the network of the hosting provider. To find out more about network quality, check a provider’s NOC (Network Operation Center) pages and test the network. Most hosting providers will allow you to do this.

6. Self-service and remote management

To which degree are you allowed to manage your server yourself? If you are running an application on a dedicated server, you probably have the technical skills and the knowledge to maintain the server. But do you have access to a remote management module? Most A-brand servers are equipped with remote management modules. Providers can allow you secure access to that module.

A remote management module can also help if you are in a transition from IT on-premise to a hosted solution (perhaps even a private cloud solution). It can be an in-between step that will leave existing work structures intact and ease the transition for IT personnel, since they will still be able to manage their own software deployments and the customized installation of an operating system.

7. Knowledge partner

And last but definitely not least: make sure your hosting provider involves his engineers and specialists when trying to find a solution tailored to your needs. A true knowledge partner advises on best practices and different solutions. This may involve combining different products into a hybrid solution.

The above will probably give you a good idea of what to consider before renting a dedicated server. If you are looking for specific advice or need assistance, please feel free to contact our sales consultants. They can help you find the solution that is right for you.

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This shift is driven by the changing preferences and expectations of consumers who increasingly seek the convenience, accessibility, and speed offered by online banking services.