Hello,

I'm a CGI/Perl programmer and honestly i'm new to this whole hosting thing. I'm interested in running hosting services later. You all are experts, right? I was wondering what do I need to host dedicated servers/co-location.

Do you build your own server or is there some provider behind the scene? Thank you for your time.

To host dedicated servers or to colocate servers you need a datacentre. You also can't afford to build one, so your best bet is to rent space in one. Which depends on your location, requirements and budget.

Some people build their own servers, and some buy from other providers, which range from small companies that will build systems to order to ones like Dell and Compaq (Hmm, HP now I guess).

I guess building your own servers is the most economical for you...

Then you'll just have to drive to the datacenter you rent space at and place the server there.

Aaron, most people start off as resellers. For about $20/month you are given an account on a shared server and you can (depending on which host) either sell their packages or divide your package and resell them at your own price. Benefits of this are, of course, it's cheaper and if you run into problems, you can rely on your host to answer them. Moreover, many don't have the knowledge to properly administer their own servers.

Thank you all for responding. Do you think an appliance such as Cobalt RaQ XTR from Sun is enough? Since it's a one time fee, not monthly. Details can be found at :
http://www.sun.com/hardware/serverappliances/xtr/index.html

RaQs are designed for the hosting market. You're better of asking about those in the Cobalt (Sun bought Cobalt) section of these forums.

check www.rackshack.net

and www.fdcservers.net

in Netherlands www.hava.nl (http://www.hava.nl)