Feb
23
2010

NaviSite now features Xeon 5500 series high performance CPUs in Managed Dedicated Servers

by Sumeet Sabharwal

Staying ahead of the demand for server resources is a constant battle in our broadband-connected society. The good news for end-users and service providers is that the fight just got a little easier with the high powered Xeon Nehalem CPUs on workstation blade technology. Now hosted applications and websites benefit from the top performance of Core i7 processors.

Intel’s successor to Core 2 CPUs, the new Xeon 5500 series chips feature expanded cache, a Quick Path Interface and a DDR3 memory controller integrated with the CPU core. When combined with Blade technology, customers enjoy advantages like redundant power supplies and reboot capabilities, in addition to the blazing speed of Intel’s latest and greatest.

Critics and technology pundits agree- Intel’s Xeon Nehalem CPUs raise the bar on power and performance. Here are some reactions around the web-
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Dec
22
2009

Reliability: The Holiday Season and Ecommerce trap – when downtime equals lost sales, and uptime equals lost revenues

by Sumeet Sabharwal

Holiday shopping season is crunch time for many businesses dependent on the revenues generated between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. Increasingly, a large percentage of those sales are via online channels. IT infrastructure and availability is under the microscope, and lost sales from poor performing or offline servers compound an already high average Cost of Downtime (CoD). The question is: how can you accurately calculate those losses in order to responsibly protect your business. Understanding true downtime losses are the key to qualifying your availability requirements.

The tangible, obvious numbers are easy. Take the average daily sales total, multiply it by the percentage increase for seasonal holiday sales, multiply that number by hours or days of downtime, and you have a nice, easily understood price tag. It’s not the most accurate price tag however, and therein lays the danger. Intangible costs can ripple and escalate in unexpected and very expensive ways.

Let’s consider an imaginary SMB that sells a popular gadget. They have a shopping cart section of the website that moves 1,000 gadgets a day at a price of $10.00 per gadget.

1,000 gadgets X $10.00 = $10,000 per day in gross online revenue
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Nov
9
2009

Managed Dedicated Servers- Why they beat PaaS for developers

by William Toll

In the technology arena, the buzzwords and catchphrases come almost as fast as the technical advancements, and one of the latest phrases to join the club is PaaS, or Platform as a Service. Service oriented approaches are becoming more and more popular, and largely for good reason. In general this is positive. People don’t care about the specific things it takes to deliver a particular service or set of services- the care about the outcomes. The problem for many PaaS offerings is they fail to fully deliver on some of the most critical requirements.

In many ways, Software as a Service (SaaS) and Hardware as a Service (HaaS) products are easier to define and fulfill. SaaS, effectively application hosting, is common enough for things like e-mail and web site hosting, and the advent of cloud computing and a hyper-connected user base has made distributed applications more and more feasible and efficient. Google’s document editing and sharing applications are one good example of this.

HaaS takes that same ‘black box’ approach to the role of hardware in an IT deployment, commoditizing computer components and defining them as their deliverables. Hard drives become disk space, memory and processor chips become resource percentages. When you make photocopies at your local office supply store, that’s HaaS in action. The customer pays a small cost for the use of an expensive machine, in this case a photocopier.

Platform as a Service merges SaaS and HaaS approaches, and is intended to function in similar capacities to managed dedicated servers. In theory this is an attractive idea, giving developers low cost, flexible platforms for application development, testing, and deployments. In practice, PaaS offerings often fall short in the most important requirements.
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Oct
29
2009

NaviSite- The real cost of running a server In-house

by Sumeet Sabharwal

It’s not exactly news that running a web or application server in-house is an expensive proposition for any company, and especially for resource tight SMBs and startups. Hardware and software costs, hiring and/or training personnel to deploy and manage the server, and bandwidth are minimum requirements, and cutting corners in any of these areas courts disaster. Despite an intimidating high cost of entry, deploying an in-house server is still desirable for a number of reasons, most centered around security concerns or flexibility needs. Those advantages come with an element of risk, and businesses who don’t carefully consider the hidden costs in running a web or application server in-house could find any benefits negated in revenue draining budget shortfalls.

Hardware costs should be straightforward to identify, although deciding whether to purchase or lease is much less cut and dry. Purchasing hardware outright may cost less over time, but it also depreciates quickly and businesses can find themselves still paying off equipment that is losing performance ground to newer deployments. Leasing can offer more flexible options, but that typically comes at a premium price.
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Sep
24
2009

Top 6 Reasons Web Design Agencies Select Windows Managed Hosting

by William Toll

Flexibility – With Windows Server 2008 and IIS 7 – PHP and .NET both run equally as well. This comprehensive development and hosting environment enables Web design and development agencies implement custom and readily available frameworks and open source Web applications.

Easy Configuration – With AppCmd the new UI, plus centralized configuration, including delegation, Admins can now easily work with applicationhost.config and web.config files. IIS 7 now supports the flexibility and configuration needed to build complex, secure, and feature rich functionality. The new UI in IIS 7 makes it easier than ever to configure the Web server and Websites and applications on the server.

Performance – Optimized performance and resiliency. Several architectural improvements have been implemented in IIS 7 which enables better performance, throughput and in the case of PHP – outright seeped in execution.

Troubleshooting – With Failed Request Tracing administrators can peer into the web server and see detailed diagnostic information. With the Runtime Status & Control API (RSCA) administrators will be able to see what requests are executing in real-time.
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Jul
10
2009

Benefits of Hosted MS SQL

by Sumeet Sabharwal

When it comes to databases and small businesses, it’s safe to say that most SMBs are built on SQL. Regardless of flavor, the open source MySQL or Microsoft’s MS SQL, the SQL relational database language has become de facto for millions of business applications. That established pedigree also comes with a frequently debated question: how can administrators and company decision makers’ best decide which to use?

The thing that makes MySQL attractive to startups is the same thing that works against it as a business becomes more and more successful- it’s open source software. For new companies it means no licensing fees and a rich open source community. For SMBs with revenue dependant databases, it means no vendor support and limited native interoperability with other entrenched business applications. When salaries, shareholder’s dividends and operating capital is on the line, that’s a deal breaker.

It’s one thing to say “there are unlimited resources in the open source community.” It’s another thing to be looking at a corrupted database that’s crashed, halting sales and bleeding revenue and perhaps losing valuable customer and billing information in the process. The value of the vendor partner relationship is clearly evident when the chips are down. You don’t handle your business accounting without professional support. Your critical database infrastructure should receive the same care.
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Jun
1
2009

The Changing needs of SMBs

by Sumeet Sabharwal

The recent NaviSite case study with leading India media company Webchutney highlights the changing needs of managed dedicated hosting customers in a post Web 2.0 business environment. It’s something of a paradox, but when budget tightening is the norm, purchase decisions are motivated by more than simply price point. For Webchutney and for many other SMBs in similar positions, the difference maker is world class customer service.

While every business is unique, their requirements from a service provider are often quite similar. They want things to work, and when problems occur, they want quick resolutions. That second part is important. Hosting customers are much more sophisticated, they understand that when it comes to complex applications and server deployments, occasional issues are inevitable. As Webchutney COO Rahul Nanda put it, “Just about any host is going to work okay 95% of the time. How they respond when you are having problems is the key.”
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May
27
2009

Protecting your data with Managed Services

by William Toll

It’s not just a little ironic that the often quoted Murphy’s Law was coined long before data storage changed from boxes in a warehouse to zeroes and ones on a magnetic disc. Anything that can go wrong will go wrong is a truism in the IT arena. As anyone who has experienced the loss of critical files on a hard drive, memory stick, or even a phone number scrawled on a napkin can tell you- there’s nothing like that feeling in the pit of your stomach when you know the information is well and truly gone.

As maddening as it can be to lose personal data, when it comes to your business it’s a mistake that could be catastrophic. As a result, data backup solutions are a multi-million dollar industry, and to be sure, there are many options to consider. From automated robotic tape rotation machines to software driven RAID disc arrays, there are solutions to fit any scenario. Unfortunately they also share a common weakness: unless your core business actually is data backup, managing your backup solution in house assumes responsibility for a complex process without the human resources it takes to do it correctly. That’s a complicated way of saying if you handle your own backups, chances are you’re going to run into Murphy’s Law, and it won’t be pretty.
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May
22
2009

NaviSite Dedicated Hosting client win due to its uncompromised Always There approach to support

by William Toll

NaviSite Dedicated Hosting recently added a new client, Webchutney, one of India’s leading full service digital media and interactive marketing selected NaviSite Dedicated Hosting as its managed dedicated server and virtual dedicated server host.

Webchutney had a very clear mission and their reason to look for a new hosting provider was the quality of service they were getting from their dedicated server hosting provider. Sporadic outages were frustrating, but even more troubling was the lack of professionalism and follow through on the part of the engineering and support staff. The servers were under powered by industry standards, and Webchutney had little visibility into what was going on from day to day. As COO Rahul Nanda summed it up, “We didn’t feel like we were in control.”
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May
13
2009

Tips to move your site to a New Hosting Provider

by Sumeet Sabharwal

There can be many reasons to move your website to a new host. Cost considerations, performance issues, scalability, maybe some combination of all of those things, or maybe it’s just because the new VP of Technology has a nephew on his wife’s side that needs a sale. Whatever the reason, one fact remains- changing a hosting provider is a daunting process for webmasters and IT managers. The good news is that with careful planning and execution, site migration can be a painless and easy process.

Measure twice, cut once
Whether you’re migrating a simple one server website or a complex multi server platform, the devil is in the details. That means not only a lot of the obvious information gathering (IP addresses, host names, DNS entries), it also means combing through every line of code to identify any reference to the current host that will break post migration, to detail any directory structure artifacts and other legacy inconsistencies, and to clean up those issues well in advance of any changes. Once you’re confident that the site is fully clear, lock it down to prevent any changes during the migration process. For complex sites with lots of moving parts this may take coordination with several departments, but it’s critical to draw a line in the sand at some point to prevent version management headaches.
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