|
Managed Vs. Unmanaged Dedicated Hosting
"Unmanaged dedicated servers" - this is a pretty
uninviting term to many, especially the non-gurus, but in
most cases is not as "non-servicing" as it seems.
In fact, I think someone one day soon, ( who knows maybe
me ) will coin a new phrase to replace the term "unmanaged"
- similar to how "used cars" is now "pre-owned"
or how "apartment complexes" are now "rental
communities". The truth is that unless you just picked
a lousy provider or have unreasonable expectations, unmanaged
hosting offers more service and support than most think.
The Difference
While exact definitions vary among providers, generally
speaking managed hosting means your provider takes complete
or near complete care of your server. This can include anything
from basic system maintenance and patches to applications
maintenance, security, monitoring, etc. Someone that needs
dedicated hosting and wants to rely on their host for pretty
much anything and everything regarding their server needs
to strike a relationship with a managed service provider.
Full blown managed services involve lots of skilled people
hours. Not only that, since every managed customer is unique,
it's hard for a managed provider to be overly systematic.
For this - expect to pay a great deal more than today's
budget server provider but if your needs demand it, and
you choose a solid provider it should be money well spent.
Unmanaged dedicated hosting obviously refers to dedicated
servers with less, little or none of the skilled people
support you'd expect to find in managed. You signup, you
pay, and in a few minutes to a few hours you get a welcome
email with IP address, login, FAQ's, etc. - Beyond that
you are pretty much on your own. Relax - you are not really
as own your own as it seems.
First off, most unmanaged providers do in fact offer technical
support, and most that we've seen is very good. If you choose
unmanaged dedicated service you do need to have someone
on your team that knows the technical side a good bit, but
they don't necessarily have to be experts. While you may
have to wait 12 - 24 hours or you may even have to pay extra
for it, nearly all the unmanaged providers I know do have
high level techs available to handle serious issues. In
addition most providers give some sort of immediate reboot
service. Unless you've been tinkering with some critical
config files or have a hardware failure, a reboot can help
with a range of issues. Lastly, unmanaged providers may
not support you or whatever you put on your server after
you move in, but they do stand by the hardware and software
they sell you. If a hard drive crashes they are going to
replace it for you (although you had better be doing your
backups) and if your system crashes most will fix it for
you.
Summary
The bottom line is if you've got mission critical needs
and don't have the in-house staff to efficiently keep your
servers performing the way they should, then you are going
to need managed services. Even still it's a more cost effective
route that hiring your own staff and most likely you will
receive a higher, more consistent level of service. If your
needs are more basic, and or you or your staff has the time
and know-how to perform 75% - 80% of your server's maintenance
then an affordable unmanaged service should do you just
fine.
Back
to Tips Page
|
