Buy own or use company?
 

I'm soon to be opening a mmorpg gaming server which will be obviously hosted on a Dedicated server. Game will be running over a period of 5-10 years (depending on performance).

Looking towards a:

Dual opt
4GB DDRAM
x2 250GB Harddrives

Atleast 10Mbit 20:1 connection.

Not sure if its cheaper to buy the server and line myself and run within the office or to buy dedicated server else where. As its easier to know when theres a problem with the server.

Well a server with specs is going to cost a fortune either way you go. Stead Fast Networks www.steadfastnetworks.com co-location offers a 1u + 10 Mbit/sec - $449 . Thats probably going to be your best bet buying a server and going co-location. Your looking at $573 per month for a dedicated server from www.Layerdtech.com. Buying the server upfront is going to be costly but if you plan on running it for 4 years its going to more than pay its self off.

$100 x 12 = $1,200 x 4 = $4,800. Pretty big saving. Thanks for that

That does seem your best bet, mmorpg is one of those RPG games if i'm right? sorry i wasent to sure :P thats a very nice spec computer to btw, will be majorly expensive. Good Luck.

MMORPG - Massivly Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. I would strongly recommend using a company, it will seriously cut your costs and if the game flops then you dont have to sell a used server, you can just cancel your hosting

So i was right? lol, so its things like 'Runescape' and all that? Btw you might want to go somewhere who offers a reasonable amount of Bandwidth, if not enough then offer extra bandwidth at reasonable prices.

Yeah depending what type of MMORPG you'll need plenty of bandwidth ..could you PM or email me with info about the MMORPG? (job36_22@hotmail.com)

Just go to http://www.ngoempire.net/ :) not that I'm anything to do with it *whistle*

I used to rent one from a company who shall remain nameless, but they basically sucked at the end of the day, of course I have friends who have had great experiences renting servers though, so as long as you research who you go with you will probably be just fine. I think this article might help you decide whether to buy or rent though;

http://webdesign.about.com/cs/webser...webservers.htm

Emma I think your totally right. You have to be very selective on what dedicated service provider choose. The thing to remember is get your dedicated server from the source. Do not go through a second party, if they don't pay their bills. The dedicated service provider shuts down your server. A good place to check the backround on dedicated server providers is www.webhostingtalk.com.

Also different data centers are going to have different servers that are better for somethings and worse for other things. So you should look at that also.

It is often hard to tell which company is actually a reseller sometimes.
You dont want to go through someone that is resellling services because at the end of the day, they dont have complete control over the servers.

Go with the original server provider to ensure you get maximum support.

If you run the server from home then you will own it. So even if the game dies you will still have an awesome server you can use or rent to someone else.

However if you buy hosting, you won't have to worry about alot of trivial things as well as setting it up from the ground up.

It would be almost impossible to run a Game server on the scale that ngoempire plans to run. On a home webserver. You would have to run a DS3 line to your house. The price of the loop alone would cost more than a 10mbps connection at data center.

What is the difference between a DS3 line and an OC3?

Think about what you have to do, if you own the server, you will have to do tech support and what not and it will also cost a lot to begin with. If you are serious about buying the server and willing to deal with people who are having problems, then be my guest. If you go with someone else to run it, then they fix it and it is no worries. By the way, I have never heard of that game.

I built and maintain my own server. I don't not have any problems. It really doesn't take much to maintain a server. Once you set it up, just keep up to date on the software and update when ever needed.

The yum updater has a setting so that you can have it automatically run each night.

Thats true but if it broke something why you were sleeping. You wouldn't know about it until the next day. I always make sure what ever yum updates is working as it should. Almost every program on my server has been modded one way or another. So if yum updates Apache why I was sleeping there is a good change it is not going to start. Just something to think about. ;)

I agree. Some day it could get me by something all of a sudden turn up not working but I would most likely forget to run the updates as often as I should so it works best for me. It would not be right for everyone but for some people it might be a good choice. There are always going to be different envirements and different things will work better.

Thats what counts, :D use what works best for you.

If you want to own the server and still not have to run massive connections to your own house you could use Colocation. I have been learning about it from Soulwatcher and everything I hear only makes it sound better. You own your own server and they run it for you. What could be a better solution?

But if a part breaks then you have to pay them to replace it and usally they do not work on your server for cheap.

True, which is why you do not want to use cheap parts on your server. In the 3 years that I have been running my own server I haven't had a single breakdown. (knock on wood)

I have had my server for about 5 years and just this past year I had to replace the power supply. That was only $40 but it was down for about 4 days because I had to get the power supply and then replace the old one.

You have one heck of a server, not a single breakdown for 5 years is incredible. Is your server a name brand, or is it a custom built? I only plan to run my server 2 years tops. Next year I am building a dual processor server, and then I am going to run the server we have now for another year after that.

It is called a checkbox and I bought it from American TV. It is not a known brand. Before I used it as a server I used it as a workstation and I had to take it in to get it fixed many times but I had the warrantly then. Once I turned it into a server it has not had any problems except that one power supply.