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I own a small company specializing in the production of science education videos we sell to public schools. We would like to begin to deliver our videos to schools over the Internet. Our collection includes about two thousand video clips with accompanying metadata. We hope to gradually build a customer base of several hundred schools by June 2009. I need advice on how to find a good managed host company, and need to know what kinds of questions to ask when shopping for a company. I would appreciate any advice anyone can provide. Thanks!How intensive will your applications be? A lot depends on this if you require just a single server hosted at some place or do you require a different setup.
You have two options here, since from what I understand you are going to launch something that will eat up bandwidth and server resources as your client base grows and this could happen by June 2009.
I would usually recommend moving towards a grid server platform for your services such as that offered by companies like :
a) <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.thegridlayer.com/">http://www.thegridlayer.com/</a><!-- m -->
b) <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://gogrid.com/">http://gogrid.com/</a><!-- m -->
I am not sure about how their support would be. So do check and see if it is costlier to get it managed once you get it. Like I reiterate, it would be costlier than regular hosting but it depends on what you are looking for.
If you expect to see yourself growing your business in leaps and bounds, using something that can expand along with your growth is essential and hence I am recommending something like this.
If you feel it will never go over the best normal server configurations, then choose a normal webhost from any hosting company as you will find advertisements from one of the forums in WHT and that should suffice to meet your requirements.
Grids are marketing gimmicks and are not truly "grids" in the traditional computing sense.The best thing you can do is find a reliable host that can help you and analyze your needs. Focus on what kind of video quality you want, which will dictate your bandwidth and store requirements based on the number of clients you have. My team has done video hosting and there are a number of things that you need to look at, as I mentioned. However, it is all straightforward and you can get setup quickly.Kind Regards,Grids are marketing gimmicks and are not truly "grids" in the traditional computing sense.I do agree with you on this point. But then if money is not the crux and scalability is the most important factor, his choices are limited to creating server farms or upgrading his server each time his site becomes or reaches a threshold and if it becomes unpopular, downgrading the hardware, which then becomes a constant process.The very concept of the grid, frees him from needing to think about such downtimes. Though I am not exactly sure how the entire grid works nor have I seen it in action, the theory behind it and the explanations on their sites do speak of the grid computing we learn in our Engineering days, though it is virtualized to the application layer only.Personally I would love to have the traditional servers since its something we have better support presently, but I believe we are looking at the future in these technologies and these are the few companies that have made them practical.I do agree with you on this point. But then if money is not the crux and scalability is the most important factor, his choices are limited to creating server farms or upgrading his server each time his site becomes or reaches a threshold and if it becomes unpopular, downgrading the hardware, which then becomes a constant process.The very concept of the grid, frees him from needing to think about such downtimes. Though I am not exactly sure how the entire grid works nor have I seen it in action, the theory behind it and the explanations on their sites do speak of the grid computing we learn in our Engineering days, though it is virtualized to the application layer only.Personally I would love to have the traditional servers since its something we have better support presently, but I believe we are looking at the future in these technologies and these are the few companies that have made them practical.The explanations on all these sites offering "grid" hosting are marketing hogwash for suckers. I'm sorry to come off as harsh, but I've been doing this for many years and when a new technology/offering comes out in the industry I'm eager to deconstruct it and see how it works. From information provided by other members on this board there has yet to emerge a true grid hosting solution besides the one Sun offers (<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://sun.com/grid/">http://sun.com/grid/</a><!-- m -->). I do know how grid technology works as I have been writing combinatorial optimization algorithms since my sophomore year of college.IMO, companies are just trying to dumb-down potential clients with all the marketing double-speak on what their systems offer. Bottom line for the OP: Find and build a relationship with a knowledgeable and reliable host. That decision alone will pay for itself hundreds of times over. Start with a dedicated solution if you have that many storage/processing requirements. If not, start with semi-dedicated and choose a host that can help you upgrade easily later.This stuff is not rocket science. The marketing campaigns of some, however, would like you to think otherwise.Best Regards,I am sure companies like Peer1, Cartika, RackSpace, LiquidWeb, Voxel etc. can help you with your project.The explanations on all these sites offering "grid" hosting are marketing hogwash for suckers. I'm sorry to come off as harsh, but I've been doing this for many years and when a new technology/offering comes out in the industry I'm eager to deconstruct it and see how it works. From information provided by other members on this board there has yet to emerge a true grid hosting solution besides the one Sun offers (<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://sun.com/grid/">http://sun.com/grid/</a><!-- m -->). I do know how grid technology works as I have been writing combinatorial optimization algorithms since my sophomore year of college.
Best Regards,
bjerome, The choices are yours to make and I do feel you got your views from an expert as quoted above. (I just gave my two cents on the existing options...) Hope you got the answers you want.I am sure companies like Peer1, Cartika, RackSpace, LiquidWeb, Voxel etc. can help you with your project.
Have you used any of these companies?I do agree with you on this point. But then if money is not the crux and scalability is the most important factor, his choices are limited to creating server farms or upgrading his server each time his site becomes or reaches a threshold and if it becomes unpopular, downgrading the hardware, which then becomes a constant process.
The very concept of the grid, frees him from needing to think about such downtimes.
Though I am not exactly sure how the entire grid works nor have I seen it in action, the theory behind it and the explanations on their sites do speak of the grid computing we learn in our Engineering days, though it is virtualized to the application layer only.
Personally I would love to have the traditional servers since its something we have better support presently, but I believe we are looking at the future in these technologies and these are the few companies that have made them practical.
Hello chakky,
you are correct with your comments and analysis - but, Karl has hit on the key point here. Grids do not exist in the typical shared hosting market and 90% of companies selling a grid are selling a marketing concept vs engineered architecture. You can certainly get real Grid computing from companies like Sun or IBM or HP, etc - however, the price tags are enourmous and really only benefit clients that require this sort of architecture. Having said this, you are absolutely correct with your comments around scalability - this is the most important element when discussing real world requirements for the average SMB and even enterprise client. Scalability can easily be achieved through clustering and then ultimately load balancing. Utilizing scalable SAN`s and physical (or heck, even virtual) nodes with a combination of load balancers, etc can give a company the ability to not own cluster their services, but, then load balance their services and add additional nodes, on demand, to each service as is required. Many are marketing this as a grid - but, frankly, it isnt - though, the concept is sound as far as attaining near infinitely scalable solutions go...Have you used any of these companies?
Only LiquidWeb - sorry for not following the rules (recommending companies without first hand experience).Only LiquidWeb - sorry for not following the rules (recommending companies without first hand experience).
no need to apologize tonyFF - you didnt actually recommend companies - you simply provided a list of companies which provide certain services and that is not against the rules.
I did the exact same thing here - I wonder if I am breaking the rules because I havent used the grid systems from Sun or HP or IBM
You can certainly get real Grid computing from companies like Sun or IBM or HP, etc -
You have two options here, since from what I understand you are going to launch something that will eat up bandwidth and server resources as your client base grows and this could happen by June 2009.
I would usually recommend moving towards a grid server platform for your services such as that offered by companies like :
a) <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.thegridlayer.com/">http://www.thegridlayer.com/</a><!-- m -->
b) <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://gogrid.com/">http://gogrid.com/</a><!-- m -->
I am not sure about how their support would be. So do check and see if it is costlier to get it managed once you get it. Like I reiterate, it would be costlier than regular hosting but it depends on what you are looking for.
If you expect to see yourself growing your business in leaps and bounds, using something that can expand along with your growth is essential and hence I am recommending something like this.
If you feel it will never go over the best normal server configurations, then choose a normal webhost from any hosting company as you will find advertisements from one of the forums in WHT and that should suffice to meet your requirements.
Grids are marketing gimmicks and are not truly "grids" in the traditional computing sense.The best thing you can do is find a reliable host that can help you and analyze your needs. Focus on what kind of video quality you want, which will dictate your bandwidth and store requirements based on the number of clients you have. My team has done video hosting and there are a number of things that you need to look at, as I mentioned. However, it is all straightforward and you can get setup quickly.Kind Regards,Grids are marketing gimmicks and are not truly "grids" in the traditional computing sense.I do agree with you on this point. But then if money is not the crux and scalability is the most important factor, his choices are limited to creating server farms or upgrading his server each time his site becomes or reaches a threshold and if it becomes unpopular, downgrading the hardware, which then becomes a constant process.The very concept of the grid, frees him from needing to think about such downtimes. Though I am not exactly sure how the entire grid works nor have I seen it in action, the theory behind it and the explanations on their sites do speak of the grid computing we learn in our Engineering days, though it is virtualized to the application layer only.Personally I would love to have the traditional servers since its something we have better support presently, but I believe we are looking at the future in these technologies and these are the few companies that have made them practical.I do agree with you on this point. But then if money is not the crux and scalability is the most important factor, his choices are limited to creating server farms or upgrading his server each time his site becomes or reaches a threshold and if it becomes unpopular, downgrading the hardware, which then becomes a constant process.The very concept of the grid, frees him from needing to think about such downtimes. Though I am not exactly sure how the entire grid works nor have I seen it in action, the theory behind it and the explanations on their sites do speak of the grid computing we learn in our Engineering days, though it is virtualized to the application layer only.Personally I would love to have the traditional servers since its something we have better support presently, but I believe we are looking at the future in these technologies and these are the few companies that have made them practical.The explanations on all these sites offering "grid" hosting are marketing hogwash for suckers. I'm sorry to come off as harsh, but I've been doing this for many years and when a new technology/offering comes out in the industry I'm eager to deconstruct it and see how it works. From information provided by other members on this board there has yet to emerge a true grid hosting solution besides the one Sun offers (<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://sun.com/grid/">http://sun.com/grid/</a><!-- m -->). I do know how grid technology works as I have been writing combinatorial optimization algorithms since my sophomore year of college.IMO, companies are just trying to dumb-down potential clients with all the marketing double-speak on what their systems offer. Bottom line for the OP: Find and build a relationship with a knowledgeable and reliable host. That decision alone will pay for itself hundreds of times over. Start with a dedicated solution if you have that many storage/processing requirements. If not, start with semi-dedicated and choose a host that can help you upgrade easily later.This stuff is not rocket science. The marketing campaigns of some, however, would like you to think otherwise.Best Regards,I am sure companies like Peer1, Cartika, RackSpace, LiquidWeb, Voxel etc. can help you with your project.The explanations on all these sites offering "grid" hosting are marketing hogwash for suckers. I'm sorry to come off as harsh, but I've been doing this for many years and when a new technology/offering comes out in the industry I'm eager to deconstruct it and see how it works. From information provided by other members on this board there has yet to emerge a true grid hosting solution besides the one Sun offers (<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://sun.com/grid/">http://sun.com/grid/</a><!-- m -->). I do know how grid technology works as I have been writing combinatorial optimization algorithms since my sophomore year of college.Best Regards,
bjerome, The choices are yours to make and I do feel you got your views from an expert as quoted above. (I just gave my two cents on the existing options...) Hope you got the answers you want
.I am sure companies like Peer1, Cartika, RackSpace, LiquidWeb, Voxel etc. can help you with your project.Have you used any of these companies?I do agree with you on this point. But then if money is not the crux and scalability is the most important factor, his choices are limited to creating server farms or upgrading his server each time his site becomes or reaches a threshold and if it becomes unpopular, downgrading the hardware, which then becomes a constant process.
The very concept of the grid, frees him from needing to think about such downtimes.
Though I am not exactly sure how the entire grid works nor have I seen it in action, the theory behind it and the explanations on their sites do speak of the grid computing we learn in our Engineering days, though it is virtualized to the application layer only.
Personally I would love to have the traditional servers since its something we have better support presently, but I believe we are looking at the future in these technologies and these are the few companies that have made them practical.
Hello chakky,
you are correct with your comments and analysis - but, Karl has hit on the key point here. Grids do not exist in the typical shared hosting market and 90% of companies selling a grid are selling a marketing concept vs engineered architecture. You can certainly get real Grid computing from companies like Sun or IBM or HP, etc - however, the price tags are enourmous and really only benefit clients that require this sort of architecture. Having said this, you are absolutely correct with your comments around scalability - this is the most important element when discussing real world requirements for the average SMB and even enterprise client. Scalability can easily be achieved through clustering and then ultimately load balancing. Utilizing scalable SAN`s and physical (or heck, even virtual) nodes with a combination of load balancers, etc can give a company the ability to not own cluster their services, but, then load balance their services and add additional nodes, on demand, to each service as is required. Many are marketing this as a grid - but, frankly, it isnt - though, the concept is sound as far as attaining near infinitely scalable solutions go...Have you used any of these companies?
Only LiquidWeb - sorry for not following the rules (recommending companies without first hand experience).Only LiquidWeb - sorry for not following the rules (recommending companies without first hand experience).
no need to apologize tonyFF - you didnt actually recommend companies - you simply provided a list of companies which provide certain services and that is not against the rules.
I did the exact same thing here - I wonder if I am breaking the rules because I havent used the grid systems from Sun or HP or IBM
You can certainly get real Grid computing from companies like Sun or IBM or HP, etc -