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Hi folks, first off, let me introduce my self and
give you a brief overview of my background and experience. My name is Bob; I
have been involved with computers for well over 20 years. If your old enough to
remember card readers and key punch machines, then you have been around for a
while also.
First off, I am looking to get into business for myself that can generate a modest income, be gratifying, help others and make use of what I know. I have looked around, thought of starting my own ISP but the up front costs and overhead was just too much for me. So I started looking at Web Hosting. I have a fair amount of background in the NT environment and some in the UNIX systems. I looked at the different NT servers and talked with other web hosts that use NT to host their clients. Most are happy with what NT has to offer, but almost all of them agree, without a lot of experience with NT, be ready to get lots of help. So I started to look at other options and came across the Cobalt web site. To be honest, I was a bit skeptical at first so I signed up for the mailing list a few months ago to get a feel for what the other users on the Cobalt systems think about them. Here is what I have been able to surmise from the hundreds of emails I have seen. I would say that overall, with a few exceptions, you all feel very good about the systems and support you get from Cobalt and the other users. I know that everyone can’t be happy all of the time, that’s just the way thing’s are. Sure Cobalt has their shortcomings, what company doesn’t. I have personally spent days on the phone with Microsoft with server problems just to find out that the system had to be completely reloaded. Will I eventually buy Cobalt servers? I think so. Why? Because I feel that if I do have a question that isn’t covered in the documentation on knowledgebase, I can always drop a note to the list with details of the question and I will get a solid, informative answer in a short period of time. Let me outline what I am planning and get your opinions. I ask this so that I might avoid some of the pitfalls that some of you may have already had the displeasure of getting into. Most likely, I will buy the servers direct from Cobalt, I feel that this way, I can at least ask them to make sure that the servers have the most up to date fixes already installed and if I am just a bit lucky, get them configured the right way to start. I already have a friend who owns an ISP who will co-locate the servers and provide the secondary DNS for me and get me a T-1 line at cost (at least to start, as bandwidth usage goes up, then I will have to pay for it). I plan to start with a Raq3i as the web server, a Raq3i as the primary DNS server, both with as much ram and disk as I can afford. Also I am thing about getting the NAS to use as a data backup system in the event that the web server drive fails, I can at least get the drive replaced and restored a little faster. This was not intended as a rant of flame, but simply as a rather wordy note. Thanks Bob |