Timothy
Parker Consulting Incorporated
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Internet connections Last column we set up our domain name for our soon-to-be lucrative e-commerce site. Now that we have a name, it's time to move on. If we want to make a lot of money on the Internet selling something, we need to have a solid connection to the Internet for our Web site. We've got a number of options for setting up our nascent company on the Web, and the method that suits you the best will depend on many factors including money. We've got a couple of options for our Internet connection: host the server ourselves or use a web hosting service. If we want to host the server ourselves, we need to have a Web server of some sort, a dedicated connection to the Internet or an ISP, and the time and patience to manage the server. There are many advantages to hosting your own Web server, not the least of which is that you are in total control. You get to change your site whenever you want. You can troubleshoot any problems that crop up instantly. You can add as many e-mail addresses and FTP areas as you want. You're not limited to the amount of disk space you use. There is no per-hit or per-megabyte charge. And, best of all, you can use the connection for anything else to do with the Internet, such as browsing. The downsides are many of the same things. You are responsible, you need technical knowledge, and you must troubleshoot any problems. The costs of your own server are also higher than renting space on someone else's server, usually. If it worth hosting your own site? Cost used to be the main problem with dedicated lines, often with costs of several thousand dollars a month. With the development of dedicated connections to a home or business like ADSL (Asynchronous Digital Subscriber Line) and cable modems, not to mention the old standbys like T1 and ISDN lines, there are many choices for you now. As long as your local telephone switching office supports the systems, you can choose the best trade-off between speed and cost to suit your needs. A dedicated line doesn't have to be expensive anymore. You can get a dedicated ISDN line for around $150 per month. ADSL and cable modems are usually under $100 a month. When shopping around, be sure to check that the connection is dedicated and available all the time, note the throughput for comparison purposes, and see what additional services the connection company offers. Even if your local telephone switching office doesn't support digital lines like ISDN and ADSL (and many switching offices outside major metropolitan areas don't), you still have options. An expensive option is Frame Relay, which runs on standard telephone lines. Expect to pay about $1000 a month for Frame Relay, including the cost of the router rental. Not cheap, is it? Even better is a new method of combining two standard phone lines into a 112kB dedicated line. Anywhere you can install two phone lines you can run this service, handled by a special router such as the Netopia R2121 (about $1000 to buy) which uses two 56kb modems simultaneously. The cost for such as service varies depending on the line speed but can be less than $400 a month. If you only need business hour connectivity, it drops to under $100 a month (of course, your Web site should be available 24 hours a day!). With this method, any Windows machine suddenly can become a Web server over a decently fast line. At least until you start getting thousands of hits a day. Web hosting is the way many companies go instead of dedicated lines. When you Web host, you are essentially renting space on someone else's server. They are connected to the Internet and set up your Web pages, e-mail and other services on their system. You don't provide anything except the content of the Web page. All the administration headaches and disk space problems are the hosts, not yours. However, you have very little control over the administration of the host. One advantage a Web host has is that they usually have very fast connections to the Internet (but not always: check with the host for information). This means people hitting your Web site don't get bothered by slow service from your server. A typical Web hosting service will provide you with a set amount of disk space for your Web pages as well as a few e-mail addresses. For example, you can get a 20MB space on a server along with five e-mail accounts for as little as $30 a month. For more space and more e-mail accounts, you can pay up to $150 a month. When you have designed your Web page, you simply FTP them to the host server, place them in the proper position, and you are on-line. Web hosting is a way of getting on-line quickly and with the minimum of fuss, especially handy if you are not a technical person. Finally, some Web hosts provide extra services for e-commerce. Many provide tools to build your e-commerce site, such as ECBuilder, a popular package. Most Web hosting services also provide secure transaction capabilities, allowing your site to gather credit card numbers from customers with full security. (The Web host doesn't process the credit cards, usually, just collect the numbers and pass them on to you with the orders.) Web hosting is the easiest option, and one most e-commerce startups begin with. You can always move to a dedicated line when you want more control and have more funds. On the other hand, control freaks (like me) want to have the server at my end. In which case, a dedicated line is worth the extra cost. |
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