If you were to look across the offering of all of the managed hosting service providers and look at what hardware they were using, you’d be surprised that there is very little information available. Generally the most that you can find out is the brand of the server and what type (SATA or SAS) of hard drive is going to be used.
It is important to understand that the quality of the key components: Server manufacturer & model and hard drive manufacturer & model make significant differences to the performance of the hosting platform. Hardware failure is still the biggest cause of IT service interruptions for UK companies. It is barely acceptable when it happens in your own business, but it is definitely not acceptable coming from managed hosting companies.
From the perspective of the server itself, ideally it should be manufactured by a premium brand and not homemade by the managed hosting company. It should include RAID which allows two or more redundant disks encase of one failing, which is a not to irregular occurrence in a hosting solution.
Looking at the drives they ought to have been chosen for their quality and performance and not just price. The difference between models can make significant improvements on database, website and the general hosting platforms performance.
When approaching a managed hosting solution provider, make sure that you do probe into these questions and check review sites; Storage Review is particularly good and worthwhile checking out. While managed hosting is all about service, the physical kit that they use is also important and no amount of tweaking can make up for poor choices.
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