Gatorajc,
There is not a high cost associated with hosting a few websites, this is something that most people think and they are wrong.
To start hosting, take the following set-up:
PC
Internet Connection
Power
Backup Drive
UPS (Thanks
Genimuse, forgot about that)
DNS
Ok, you already own the PC, have a net connection and you should hopefully have power. Most people will already have a CD/RW or tape drive, or in the worst case scenario, you get a freind to set-up an FTP server and run automatic backups to their machines every day.
So far, you are paying no extra than you would be already.
You can buy a decent UPS from a site like EBay for about £50, some are ever cheaper.
Using Zoneedit, the first 5 sites are free, so if you have less than 5 sites then you don't pay anything for DNS unless you want backup mail servers etc and even then you pay about £20 per year total for backup mail servers for about 10 sites.
If you want to cut costs with backup mail servers, you get someone else who is hosting and do a swap. You create a secondary MX record to their mail server and they make one to yours. When your servers go down, any e-mail is queued in their server until your server comes back online. This is very easy to set-up.
The power needs to be on 24 hours to the server, but a lot of people keep theur PC on anyway. If not then you would be paying a little more for power to this, but still less than hosting elsewhere.
The savings start showing when you want to change the default config for the server or add a new language etc.
Consider the following:
How many of the reseller packages mentioned allow you to change the httpd.conf file if you need to?
How many of them allow you to install new languages?
How many of them allow you unlimited tables in the database? (True unlimited, not just them saying it)
How many of them don't have functions disabled in any language?
How many of them install any modules that you need without question?
Lets say you want to change the location of Perl, or install PHP as a module instead of a CGI or vice-versa, can you do this?
If any of the reseller packages above allow you to do this, what is the cost involved? Hosting on your own involves none of these costs.
The true cost involved with hosting your own servers is the time you put into it.
To start with you spend some time learning all about it and then after this, you can make changes in no time at all.
You take the time to set-up monitors on the server that automatically reboot in the event of a serious problem, or restart the service if the problem is less severe. After you get your servers up and running you can basically leave the server and not touch it.
Contrary to popular belief, running a server does not take loads of your time, unless you start hosting a high number of people and then you would have the money to show for it, so it becomes a job and not a hobby anymore.
If you stick with your own sites, you don't need to worry about someone uploading a script that is going to take the server down etc and can walk away knowing that the servers are running fine. You can set-up external monitors to e-mail you, send a message to your mobile phone, pager etc so you know as soon as they go down and can fix it.
With an external host, you pay for extra disk space and they charge you extra per month or whatever. When you host yourself and choose to add extra disk space, that disk space is yours for life, not just as long as you keep paying for it. You could probably buy a 80gig hard drive for the annual price a host will charge you to add 1 gig to your account.
Overall, it can be cheaper to host your own sites. People that say it is expensive are totally wrong as each case is different.
Hope this helps
Wullie
The pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change.
The leader adjusts the sails. - John Maxwell
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