Need some email/colo service -- recommedations?

[Derek Martin]

Much over-quoting, to make a point:

On Mon, Mar 01, 2004 at 07:33:15PM -0600, Chris Devers wrote:
> You are early enough in the process not to make that mistake: go with
> IMAP, not POP. 
[SNIP]
> I suggest this half-seriously: going with something like what Yahoo
> provides is very easy and ranges from cheap to free, but then you give up
> control of your data to some third party, and you can't really know what
> they're going to do with it. On the other end of the spectrum, you could
> rent space at a co-location facility and install your own server[s]; this
> way you get more control & privacy, but have to accept the responsibility
> to keep everything running well, and it'll probably be more expensive.

On Mon, Mar 01, 2004 at 08:31:01PM -0500, Johannes B. Ullrich wrote:
> 
> > ISP -- connection to internet.
> 
> are all 6 people in one location (one office)? If so, look at
> some of the business DSL lines. 
> 
> > Email 
> 
> If you are on a bare-bones budget: I have had so far good experience
> with Valueweb.com
[SNIP]
> The machines are very basic (Athlon Duron CPUs and the like), but
> will probably work well for you. 
> 
> However, this will require that you administer the machine yourself.
[SNIP]
> Another option: With most business DSL lines, you get some basic
> e-mail and web space (however, usually much less then 40 GByte).
[SNIP]
> > My goal is to not have to concern myself with this stuff -- 
[SNIP]
> sound attitude. Talk to your linux people ans see if they feel
> up to managing a server. One caveat: Don't have them talk you into
> hosting Web/E-mail in house. Bandwidth is expensive if you buy it
> "retail". Colocation bandwidth is much cheaper, usually easily making up
> for the hardware cost and 'rent'. 

However, it depends; if your site's needs are small, then the bandwith
you buy for your own surfing may be plenty adequate to serve e-mail
and web services, at least in the beginning.  In that case, paying a
hosting service is an extra cost you don't need.

My own opinion is that company e-mail should NEVER live off-site,
especially if it may possibly contain technology information that
someone at your colo facility could potentially steal to your
detriment.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

These issues are just the tip of the iceberg; you will run into many
more, I assure you.

These are great examples of why I suggest you hire a pro and retain
them permanently, rather than hiring consultants to do it for you.
You may not have anyone on staff qualified to make these decisions on
behalf of the company's needs...  Even if you do, they surely have
better things to do.  Yes, obviously it's another salary to pay, but
you can get other work out of them while things are ramping up.

What you need is an expert IT professional who can sit with your
group, discuss what they think they need, and make recommendations.
It is important for there to be discussion about it, as well as a
channel for feedback.

The problem with consultants is they'll do exactly what you ask them
to, which may not be what you NEED.  Once it's all set up, they leave,
and if you don't like what you got, you have to get new consultants.
You want someone with a vested interest in making things work well,
and keeping them running properly.  And that means someone who's going
to be hanging around for when there are problems...

If you do it right the first time, you should never experience growing
pains in your IT department, beyond bandwidth considerations...  As
you grow, there will always be work to be done, but it shouldn't ever
be painful work, if your network is designed well from the start.
Doing it right from the start means avoiding a tangled mess of cables,
which are impossible to troubleshoot; problems with poorly allocated
IP address space, requiring machines and devices to be renumbered;
having to renumber machines manually, etc.  Basically, you should
implement for a small company, but plan as if you will become IBM in 5
years...


-- 
Derek D. Martin
http://www.pizzashack.org/
GPG Key ID: 0xDFBEAD02
-=-=-=-=-
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