Cloud vs. Colocation

|   Glossar

Time and again, we receive inquiries from customers who are not sure which type of IT outsourcing is best for their company: their own hardware in the aixit data center in Frankfurt or virtual machines in the aixit cloud.

As a rule, the aixit sales department then discusses the advantages and disadvantages with the customer so that the best individual solution can be found together. But it's also interesting to look at the differences and various properties in general.

 

What is colocation?

Colocation is the operation of your own hardware in the data center of a service provider like aixit. aixit takes care of the infrastructure with additional supply of cooling, power, network, as well as the physical protection of the equipment. Furthermore, in addition to services such as remote hands or smart hands, aixit also offers more complex consulting for hardware, software or network issues that arise. The rest is taken care of by the customer remotely or during on-site maintenance at the data center.


What are cloud services?

Cloud services are hardware and IT infrastructures that are made available to customers by a provider such as aixit. A distinction is made between the pure provision of hardware (IaaS - Infrastructure as a service), the provision of an operating system (PaaS - Platform as a service), or the provision down to the software level (SaaS - Software as a service). The customer decides here, depending on the requirements and IT know-how/resources, what fits best to his business. So, in addition to the data center services described above, we at aixit also offer the hardware on which the customer services ultimately run. The customer then only operates the services themselves, which are run on the virtual machines.

Cloud or colocation

Even when defining the two terms, it becomes clear that there is no objective "better", but that the decision depends very much on the needs and characteristics of the customer. When making a choice, it is therefore important to first analyze one's own structure and define one's own requirements. At the same time, it also helps to take a closer look at the objective advantages and disadvantages of cloud solutions and colocation offerings.
 

Advantages and disadvantages 
Colocation

The biggest advantage of colocation solutions is certainly that you have everything in your own hands. From the exclusive connection in the data center to the machines, everything is individually selected. This means that you can tailor the hardware specifically to your own requirements. The system you then operate is new, your own and precisely tailored to the tasks at hand. 
However, there is also a disadvantage here, because you have to procure the hardware with a high initial investment. As a result, it is initially much more expensive than cloud solutions and thus has a higher entry hurdle for many companies. Even for tests with more resources, the hardware must first be purchased. So there is little flexibility here and you always have to predict exactly what the hardware needs for the specific requirements.
On the other hand, the costs for long-term setups are significantly lower than for comparable cloud solutions. In this case, it's less predictable but lower costs in the long run.

Pros

Cons

Customized setup

Less flexible

Cheaper in the long term

High initial costs

Exclusive Connection in DC

 

 

 

 

Cloud Solutions

The outstanding advantage of cloud solutions is the great flexibility a customer has in terms of resources. 
Within a few clicks of the mouse, the size and number of virtual machines can be adjusted to respond to daily tasks. This flexibility would be very difficult to achieve with one's own hardware, or would require a great deal of financial strength. However, if one consumes roughly the same resources over a long period of time, an own hardware solution would almost certainly have paid off. 
But since you don't have to deal with unpredictable hardware failures, the costs are very transparent and predictable. The accounting department is happy to be able to work with predictable figures. 
Furthermore, aixit offers its customers geo-redundant mirroring of cloud data. What often means double costs in the colocation area is often a significantly cheaper redundancy solution in the cloud and certainly an advantage of the cloud solution.

Pros

Cons

Very flexible

Expensive in the long term

Calculated costs

No own Hardware

Easy Redundancy possible

 

 

 

 

Conclusion

If you don't want to make a firm commitment, want to do a lot of testing and scaling, and don't value your own property, you're probably better off outsourcing IT to a cloud environment. 
Those who like to retain full control, operate a coordinated, well-known system and want to outsource IT at a reasonable price in the long term are certainly better off with a colocation solution in the aixit data center in Frankfurt. 
Here it makes sense to examine the company and thus work out one's own preference. The sales department of aixit GmbH will be happy to help you with this decision. Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions, if you want to learn more about the products, or if you want to check your system with our technicians. Who knows, maybe it will be a hybrid solution powered by aixit in the end.

 

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Cloud vs. Colocation