Re: Cloud versus buying my own iron

Am 24.02.2016 um 06:06 schrieb Craig James:
> At some point in the next year we're going to reconsider our hosting
> environment, currently consisting of several medium-sized servers (2x4
> CPUs, 48GB RAM, 12-disk RAID system with 8 in RAID 10 and 2 in RAID 1
> for WAL). We use barman to keep a hot standby and an archive.
>
> The last time we dug into this, we were initially excited, but our
> excitement turned to disappointment when we calculated the real costs of
> hosted services, and the constraints on performance and customizability.
>
> Due to the nature of our business, we need a system where we can install
> plug-ins to Postgres. I expect that alone will limit our choices. In
> addition to our Postgres database, we run a fairly ordinary Apache web site.
>
> There is constant chatter in this group about buying servers vs. the
> various hosted services. Does anyone have any sort of summary comparison
> of the various solutions out there? Or is it just a matter of
> researching it myself and maybe doing some benchmarking and price
> comparisons?

For starters, did you see Josh Berkus' presentation on the topic?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WV5P2DgxPoI

I for myself would probably always go the "own iron" road, but alas!
that's just the way I feel about control. And I'm kind of a Linux
oldshot, so managing a (hosted root) server doesn't scare me off.

OTOH, I do see the advantages of having things like monitoring, backup,
HDD replacements etc. done for you. Which is essentially what you pay for.

In essence, there's obviously no silver bullet ;-)

Best regards,
--
Gunnar "Nick" Bluth
DBA ELSTER

Tel: +49 911/991-4665
Mobil: +49 172/8853339