This is a question for the dedicated hosts out there: Why are ultra cheap dedicated servers not available?

By "ultra cheap" I mean under $50/month, with a corresponding bandwidth quota (eg 10GB/month) and using outdated hardware (eg Pentium 133).

It seems to me that there would be a market for such systems as an alternative to high-end virtual hosting, and it also seems that a host could make a profit from these since they could use antique hardware which would otherwise be discarded.

Is there any particular reason for this lack?

PS. mods, feel free to move this if you think hosts would be limited in their ability to reply here; I posted in this forum because I'm not looking for this (at the moment).

Originally posted by cperciva
By "ultra cheap" I mean under $50/month, with a corresponding bandwidth quota (eg 10GB/month) and using outdated hardware (eg Pentium 133).

Below a certain monthly rate, I guess, it wouldn't be worth it for the company that would provide you the server: setting up the server, hardware maintenance if something goes wrong, rising difficulty to find spare parts for outdated hardware, plus grumpy customers...I'm not sure.

Moreover, would you like to get a $50/mo worth technical support when your server goes down?

ps: note that I didn't say this won't exist eventually, but for now no one dares offering such a cheap configuration...to my knowledge.

Hello,

The problem i would forsee with this is areas such as memory, with pentium 133 and similar the current cost of kitting the machine out with memory that would fit is enormous and even then you may be limited to a small amount, which would only do for small websites and low traffic

Plus with spare parts it would still cost some money to replace

Why would you do this when you can get a decent spec machine for just a little bit more money anyway

Just my opinion BTW

Many Thanks

Nobody wants to do it because there would be no profit in it. No small/mid-sized hosting company (i.e., one without their own data center) could do it. Ultra cheap hardware means using mini-towers, and I doubt you could find a collo space big enough to hold a mini tower for less than $50/month, without the bandwidth. Even if you used 1U servers, it's still at least $20 a month just for the space (assuming you leased a whole rack at an inexpensive place), not counting hardware costs, bandwidth, power, and other operating costs. Even if you could get your total cost down to, say, $40/per server, you'd fill up a rack with 40 servers and your profit for the whole thing would be $400. Why should anyone go through that trouble (not to mention shelling out the capital for the hardware) for $400/month when you could fill each one of those servers with 200 clients whose average profit was, say, $10 each, and you'd be making $80,000/month in that same rack space instead of $400.

I'm sure someone's tried it at some point, most likely as an advertising gimick. I guess if I owned a data center and already had the hardware and was totally strapped for cash I might try something like that, but I personally don't see $50 dedicateds as a viable business plan.

alright so whos willing to colocate my 75mhz?
:D

Originally posted by node9
alright so whos willing to colocate my 75mhz?
:D
For colocating? Anybody, as long as you pay their normal fees.

The other reason dedicated hosting companies don't do old configurations is because they're..old..when is the last time you saw a 386 processor for sale (not on ebay..)?

Many if not most of the slower machines, 133's included, motherboards will not take network cards. A year ago I took out my old 133 mhz compaq and wanted to make it into a print server. It wouldn't take the network card :bawling:

Go the private server route, like with remarkable host :) . Its a better alternative

Originally posted by rewdog
Many if not most of the slower machines, 133's included, motherboards will not take network cards. A year ago I took out my old 133 mhz compaq and wanted to make it into a print server. It wouldn't take the network card :bawling:

Uhhh I've never had any good experience with compaq computers.

Originally posted by rewdog
Many if not most of the slower machines, 133's included, motherboards will not take network cards. A year ago I took out my old 133 mhz compaq and wanted to make it into a print server. It wouldn't take the network card :bawling:

Compaq, maybe. But I remember setting up network cards on 486 computers, just plain unknown brand motherboards.

Originally posted by cyansmoker


Compaq, maybe. But I remember setting up network cards on 486 computers, just plain unknown brand motherboards.

I agree on this.
I even (ab)used a 386 once as a server on a network w/ 20 clients :D
Even connected my 286 to a network once :)

Originally posted by cperciva
Why are ultra cheap dedicated servers not available?They are available, you just need to search. In UK, for example, you can have 700 MHz Intel Celeron processor based server with 32 MB of RAM for £40/mo. ($58) with no contract: asuk.com/p/dedicatedprice

If you are willing to prepay for 3 years (take a loan and spread the cost) you can get a Cobalt RaQ 3 with 64 MB of RAM for £25/mo. ($36): powerraq.com

I got a quote from Russia to colocate minitower there for $30/mo. with free outgoing traffic.

So there are places with low prices, you just don't expect to get a lot for $50.

Originally posted by dabystru
I got a quote from Russia to colocate minitower there for $30/mo. with free outgoing traffic. WOW!

where? And really free outgoing traffic?

Originally posted by NORRITT
really free outgoing traffic? This is typical for Russia. The best expanation I heard is the following (form C&W): Russian domestic carriers are charged by foreign carriers (like C&W) for the highest of in/out traffic. And you can imagine that the most traffic is in: there are much more Russian Internet users visiting western web servers than western users visiting Russian sites. So you can get outgoing traffic for free.

But there is a catch: incoming foreign traffic is pricey, $25..$36..$50..70 per gig. For a typical non-download server you have an in/out trafic ratio of 1:8, which means that for every gig downloaded you are going to have 128MB uploaded, which would cost you anywhere between $3 and $9.

But if you are still interested to colocate a minitower in Russia for $30/mo. - write to me (bystruev@yahoo.com), I'll forward you e-mail from www.mcn.ru (sorry, in Russian).

but in that way it is not that cheap any longer :(