Cost And Benefits Of Running Your Own Server

Tagged as: , , May 15

There is a cost to running your own web server. I’m not talking about the actual monetary cost, although there definitely is some of that.

I’m talking about the down time and lack of production-level reliability. I just got my Internet connection back up after being down nearly the entire day! I had checked the status in the morning, and it was working. However, when I got to work I couldn’t access it. “Oh great,” I thought.

So basically I just lost a day of traffic, readership, etc. Great, that just stinks. You know I wonder what my uptime percentage is. I was thinking about it today as a result of not having it available, and I am positive that I am up more than 9 days out of 10. However, I’m pretty sure that I couldn’t claim more than 95%. Oh well.

Anyways, I think that the benefits to running my own web server outweigh the cost. Let me share what I think some of them are.

  1. Learn more about how the Internet works by becoming more than a user, become a cog.
  2. Know exactly where all of your data is stored
  3. Don’t have to pay for hosting costs (okay, okay there is the electricity to run the computer which is definitely something. But you’re not getting charged 15 bucks a month like you normally would be.
  4. Learn interesting server-related things such as configuring Apache. This is especially interesting for those who have a professional interest in computers I think.


Is it worth it to you? I don’t even know what the percentages are of people who run their own server. I actually don’t know too many people that do. Of course I guess that speaks more about the people that I know than what is actually going on. In any case, sorry for the downtime, and I’m back (for now).

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  • http://eclectiastes.blogspot.com william

    hahah, i suspect that, for many (myself included) #4 on your list of benefits is more of a cost. i think i became mentally and emotionally drained by the time i had to figure out how to configure mysql and php :P

  • http://www.hmtk.com HMTKSteve

    I tried hosting via a server in my home and it was not worth the savings.

  • http://www.goingthewongway.com/ Derek

    @william
    Well I’ll admit that it might be difficult to start off with (what isn’t?). However, I think that I find it hard to imagine that more knowledge and understanding is ever a bad thing. Wouldn’t you agree that anything worthwhile has some obstacles to overcome?

    @HTMKSteve
    Yeah I actually don’t think that the monetary savings is all that worthwhile, especially if the blog is being used as any source of income. It’s also probably not really that worthwhile when you have a large readership (although I suppose then you could just upgrade your connection on the income from it). So seeing as how much more traffic you get on your site than mine, I could see why it might be more worthwhile for me and less so for you.

    However I think that it’s nice to have piece of mind that I control where my data is (it’s not in some data center far off and away) as well as all that I’ve learned (practically speaking) about running a server. For me, hosting has always just been a hobby and another thing to learn from. As it usually turns out, to each his own.

  • tiff

    i know, i’m sad when your server is down :(

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  • Kamal

    Hiii

    can you plz tell me that how can i earn money from my own server & how much money i have to spend on server ?? what is the procedure to earn money from our own server ?? plz reply me ASAP…
    i shall be very thankful to you..

    Thanx & Regards
    Kamal

  • http://none Steve

    I driffted into having my own server and in my view they are just toys. I started with abyss free version, then got the pro version. then got moe computers, then got loads of scripts, then got proliant servers and server 2003 op systems x9, then got hosting software, then realised i had spent thousands, then realized i had fkd my life up after spending at least 5 years developing my sites, then got a bt biz connection with 13 IP’s, then got my own mail server and my own DNS servers then realised ide spent around 50,000 and realised that i never got told or found out for myself at the beginning. I needed a connection that could handle it. About 15,000 a year.

    Anyone wanna buy 9 proliant servers and about 10,000 worth of scripting. LOL. PSMSL, if i didnt ide be flat on the floor with blood pouring from my wrists. I did all this because i would sooner pay 200 to have my sites running than pay a host fiver to have my hard work, my designs, my ideas, my DATABSE of custiomers on someone elses sever. AND MOre over have to rely on waiting every time a problewm occured. The difference between me and an expert is i would take 1-4 hours to find a solution. An expert would take 1-4 days to reply.

    NEVER USE YOUR OWN WEBSERVER. uNLESS YOUR WILLING TO GIVE YOUR CUSTOMER BASE TO ANOTHER CAPITALIST. GUDLUK