Making the right decision

...advice about setting up a high-traffic site!

[pashley]

Here's the scenario:

My plan is to set-up a high-volume website related to gaming. Essentially, this site's main feature would be it's library - guys would be uploading a large amount of files - about 50,000 DLs per day, after I get going- and I would need some 400GB of traffic a day to handle that kind of volume (if not more).

I guess my question is, should I have a hosting company handle that, or do it on my own? I'm not that great on hosting technicalities, so it might be a huge obstacle for me. What's the benefit of doing it myself? How can I get a hold of that kind of bandwidth, and what woud it cost?

Alternatively, I have a hosting company I 've been using that can give me a dedicated server featuring:

Red Hat Linux Enterprise 3.0
Dual Xeon 2.4Ghz
2 GB RAM
2 * 73GB SCSI hard drive
2000 GB traffic

Which i fear will not be enough. Anyone have any advice?! I'm really confused....

[LifeinAsia]

It's extremely doubtful that you'd be able to buy bandwidth cheaper than a hosting company, since they are buying in serious bulk and allocating it to their hosting clients. And even if you could, that amount of traffic will require more hardware than just a server.

Do some shopping around- you may be able to find other companies offering better deals.

[pashley]

Thanks.

I'm leaning towards going with a hosting company, versus having me do it, because I'd rather focus on the business, rather than sweating over hardware.

You wouldn't have any hosting companies to recommend that you've dealt with, would you?

[LifeinAsia]

I'm not happy with any of the hosting companies I've used in the past, and I'm not able to give a strong recommendation for our current co-location company.

[treeline]

You're talking a lot of traffic volume there. If you're not real knowlegeable about hosting, outsourcing would seem the smart way to go. Many hosting plans quote monthly bandwidth, and in the example you give it's not much more than your goal for daily downloads.

You'll want to have a real clear discussion about allowable usage and traffic with them, since many quote fairly high allowances, but don't really mean them, assuming no one will get close.

Be especially careful of companies offering "unlimited" bandwidth for a low, low price. Ask yourself why Google didn't just buy one of their hosting plans? Because they don't really, truly mean unlimited. They mean "unlimited within reason." Guess who defines reason?

[pashley]

Good point, Treeline. I'm contacting my account rep right and get precise clarifications about what my account actually entitles me too.

If you have a recommend on a hosting company, please let me know!