Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Running a Web Hosting Business : Software is out to kill me

[Xizor]

I've been looking into the long term logistics of a web host and I could see a problem with software killing my profit.

Example:

Let's say I get an unmanaged server at Rackshack.net with just Linux on it. A basic one will cost me $100 a month, which is a good deal as far as I know. Buying the server itself and the co-locating doesn't appeal to me (although if it ends up being a lot cheaper maybe it should).

So now I got my server and I'm running Redhat Linux. I get it all up to date, and I got all me free stuff like Apache, MySQL, PHP, whatever, running. But now I got to purchase a control panel, cause clients like that stuff. Cpanel is the one I want.

So I go to CPanel's web site and look at their prices. Holy bejesus! is what first goes through my mind. They want me to pay $1400 bucks and they don't even give me free updates for life. I hope to god they at least give you security updates for life.

This basically then crashes my dreams of managing my own server, and suddenly managed servers where they update the software and I don't pay a dime extra beyond my monthly cost is sounding nice, even if they want $200 for it a month versus the $100 for the unmanaged.

How do you guys get around this? Is there a way that is most cost effective over both short term and long term ?

- Xizor -

[Argious]

Originally posted by Xizor
How do you guys get around this? Is there a way that is most cost effective over both short term and long term ?

Most dedicated server solutions provide you the option of control panel licenses, in this case CPanel. Usually they're only an extra $20/month. -- I know servermatrix does this, and I know rackshack has specific plans which include the cost of the control panel.

So if you're situation is with a rackshack server, I don't see why you would want to purchase your own cpanel license for $1400 when you can get a leased one from rackshack included in a plan. If I have this all mixed up, I'm sure someone will correct me.

[fshost]

It's only $10 more for a cpanel server with RS

[Xizor]

So if I do pay the $10 more for cpanel with RS, can I update the cpanel software on my server for free? How does that work? Cause what if they give me Cpanel 5 or something like that? Am I stuck with an old version?

[fshost]

I think they will give you the newest version

[Andrew]

Cpanel, with the monthly fee license (like they offer at RS) is always upgradable to the latest version, as long as the license is valid.

[akashik]

Originally posted by Xizor
So if I do pay the $10 more for cpanel with RS, can I update the cpanel software on my server for free? How does that work? Cause what if they give me Cpanel 5 or something like that? Am I stuck with an old version?

If you select auto-update CPanel will do it all itself. For manual updates it's just a matter of pushing a button, or a line of code via shell.

Rest assured, a cracked-out test bunny could update CPanel.

[Xizor]

Well if a cracked-out test bunny can do it...

[Amish_Geek]

Another answer to the original post:

I bought my servers, and co-locate them. I also use H-Sphere.

For a 1 server H-sphere setup with the servers I purchased in a 1 server setup.

1 1U server - $835
12 months of Co-Location @ $150/mo for 1U with my co-lo provider - $1800
H-sphere - $4.50 per account, one time fee for licensing, unlimited servers. Account licenses are recycleable.


$835 + $1800 = $2635 / 12 = ~$220/mo for first year, $150/mo for every consecutive year.

H-sphere licenses are purchased in blocks of 100, so a $450 investment up front is needed, but the licenses are per account with a 1 time fee. So if I host www.somesite.com and they leave me for some reason, I can use their account license to host www.someoneelse.com. Licenses are per H-sphere account, and an account can have unlimited emails, and unlimited domains.

I much prefer H-sphere's licensing over Cpanels because this is a standard expense per customer, and I can loadbalance my servers better. I can have 50 customers on 1 server, and 150 on another, and customers cost me $4.50/ea in licensing. Where with cpanel and their $599/year license for 1 server, a 50 user server would be $11.98 per customer per year in licensing, and the 150 user server would be $3.99 per customer per year in licensing.