Im looking to get a dedicated server. Something $150 or less a month. I plan on reselling mostly to friends. I have been hosting my own site on RedHat/Mandrake(i have a couple servers and I mix it up a bit) servers for 3 years now. I have setup a few domain names, I know and understand the proccess and how is all works. I have also done the mail server thing too. My question is what level should one be at before they jump into reselling from a DS? What would you say one should know? What should I be looking for in a DS? I have been browsing these forums for a couple hours now. The only thing i can see I am missing at this point is I have no real experience with any of the popular control panels. Though I will be buying some web space soon just to be able to learn the basics of cpanel.

i'd say you definitly need cpanel if you'r going to resell, its faily easy towork with. As for hardware, i guess it all depends on how much your willing to spend /mo. Same thing goes for bandwidth /month

Hi

I would recommend that you get a VDS before you jump straight into a dedicated server. It will help you get to grips with the basics and you can get a dedicated server progressly.

:peace:

I would suggest starting small. Get a private label reseller account , see how it works out for you. The number of clients you can get and sustain. Once there are enough clients, you can always proceed to a dedicated server or VDS as your needs may be at that point.

The idea is to start small and grow as you gain more market perspective and technical capabilities :)

Cheers :beer:

the suggestion of a VDS is a good one, if you do want a dedicated server though, id suggest you go with one of the providers that offer the low cost ones.

for example, going through a burst.net reseller and getting a server for $50, or going to servforce.com or any of the other stable, yet , un-costly providers :).

have alook at this site it will help you

www.hostinglife.com

I would suggest finding a newbie friendly dedicated server provider. Two good companies that I can think of are Nocster and Clook (although they're in totally different price ranges).

VDS might be a good idea, but if you've been hosting your own website on RHL for three years, I'd like to think you know what you're doing already.

why is cpanel a necessity?

Originally posted by affhosting

VDS might be a good idea, but if you've been hosting your own website on RHL for three years, I'd like to think you know what you're doing already.

Exactly. Once the rh/mandrake boxes were setup up, despite being not 100 steps from where I sit now, I did my administration through ssh(yes, I know telnet is worthles, at least insecure) and webmin. I played with vnc server/client but I really dont care for the graphical linux enviroments.

My cpanel comments were more or less I will need to use cpanel, plesk or ensim or possible h-sphere(have read good but havent found any hosts that use it). And I need to get experience with it.

I do have a friend that has just gotten into his first DS. So I have been talking to him.

Im not really looking to make money at this point. I plan on taking a hit for the first 2 months(ie pay out of my pockets in full). After that I would like to have a few accounts(which I should have no problem getting). Im not looking to make any money at this point. I am looking for experience and when a client( web developer student here) needs hosting I want to be able to provide it. If I break even I will be plenty happy. Even if I dont have enough acconts to completely cover my renting as long as I have some that "pad" my monthly cost I will be satisfied. Learning costs money, I dont mind taking a hit for the cause of learning. But I have about 4 accounts lined up already. Oh and as far as a time line, Im thinking it will be at least 4 weeks before I rent a server if I choose to do a ds. Im still have plenty of research to do.

THANKS everyone so far for the advice. I will continue browsing these forums and crawling hostinglife.com. Feel free to keep the great info coming.

Also,
What should I expect as far as maintenance costs? IE server goes down and tech support has to work on it. Is this kind of thing common? What should I budget, like a couple hundred every three-six months?

The best answer I can give is "it depends on your server, OS, and DC".

I'm running a Celeron 2.0GHz on RHL that I bought from Nocster. Since I bought the server in November, I've had to request two reboots, and I've had about 5 hours total of outages.

Depending on your DC, reboots and maintenance might be free (they are with Nocster), or you might have to empty your wallet for even them simplest problems (at EV1, for example).

So far, I haven't had to spend a dime to fix the server.

Originally posted by affhosting
The best answer I can give is "it depends on your server, OS, and DC".

I'm running a Celeron 2.0GHz on RHL that I bought from Nocster. Since I bought the server in November, I've had to request two reboots, and I've had about 5 hours total of outages.

Depending on your DC, reboots and maintenance might be free (they are with Nocster), or you might have to empty your wallet for even them simplest problems (at EV1, for example).

So far, I haven't had to spend a dime to fix the server.

As in nocster.net ? The one that I cannot get a response from their webserver? :eek:

ev1 charge for reboots?