Hey all,

I would like to know if anyone can help me on this one. On a dedicated server hosting multiple domains, do hosting companies utilize the full specs of the server or is there a safe margin that they adhere to. For example a server with 36GB HDD. Do they use the full 36GB or is there a safe margin factored in, say 10% left unused for the HDD space? Does the same go for bandwith allocation?

Thanks,
m00ds

Personally I won't use more than 60% of a the hard drive space in a server before I add a new one. Lately I have been cutting them off at 50%. You have to keep in mind that these clients will hopefully be hosted with you for years, and they will need space for their site to grow over time.

yeah but doesn't that cut your profits. doesn't that seem too low for you?

In my experience, with a mix of average hosting clients you'll overload the processor way before you'll run out of disk space. Figure the average client uses 10 megs of disk space (the vast majority use far less, and a small handful will use 100-300 megs), which means if the processor starts getting uncomfortable with 200 clients you're only using 2 gigs of disk space.

The obvious exception is if you're catering to large-file download sites, but if you've got a typical mix of standard hosting clients filling up your hard disk is typically not an issue.

We've used 17.59Gb of 111.75Gb on our current in-production server. Of that we have used 13.95Gb in /home and have 71.14Gb free space in /home - So I guess the answer in no, most hosts won't ever use the full amount of disk space.

It doesn't really cut into your profits. Instead of putting a 18 gig drive into the server and filling it completely full, put in a 36 gig drive and only fill it half full. Hardware is quite cheap these days. The big costs always come from bandwidth usage. Generally the hardware costs are low compared to the bandwidth costs.