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> A capable dedicated server with 2 TB of disk and 1 Gbps unlimited bandwidth will run about $30 in a major European metro, maybe double that for the US. Not e

> A capable dedicated server with 2 TB of disk and 1 Gbps unlimited bandwidth will run about $30 in a major European metro, maybe double that for the US. Not even close to comparable. I think you're ignoring all of the functions they're paying for. They're not just hosting a few files. Also, your "worst case" is literally the most optimistic best case for a standalone single server, which completely disregards any redundancy and assumes that the $30/month server is truly unlimited/unmetered in every way. That's not a good assumption. Cloudflare is a global CDN that will be fast for everyone regardless of location and will soak up bursts of traffic with ease. It's also fast in a location-independent way, which won't be true for a single server in a single datacenter somewhere. Finally, the amount of effort it takes to do this with Cloudflare is trivial. The amount of effort it would take to maintain and optimize a standalone solution is not negligible. Cloudflare seems like a very good deal to me, unless you value your time at $0 and you have access to these truly unlimited, high-performance $30/month servers.

metadat 5y ago
But they could deliver potentially ~300TB with a 1gbps unmetered link. Not that hard to come by, could even get to 3PB for $300/mo. Back in the day we used Texan Colo data centers with DrFTPD to do just this at massive scale. Bytes in, bytes out. Not a popular opinion here, but I firmly believe it's not necessary to play the CentralizedFlare game to get a winning outcome.
- PragmaticPulp 5y ago
  > But they could deliver potentially ~300TB with a 1gbps unmetered link. Not that hard to come by, could even get to 3PB for $300/mo. Cloudflare Pro is $20/month per domain. Trying to run everything through a single server in a single datacenter just doesn't compare for globally-accessed websites like this, even with a 1Gbps unmetered link.
  - metadat 5y ago
    I must be missing something, are you able to elaborate on how CentralizedPro Flare for $20 solves the OPs problems? I've accessed plenty of sites physically located in the USA from various EU countries, not to mention AUS and I didn't notice much difference as long as they had a good interconnect. Maybe not the best for YouTube, but there's only a few of those. Don't get me wrong, I see the appeal and fell for CF early on but not a fan anymore since they've grown into such a behemoth. Absolutely power corrupts absolutely.
    - PragmaticPulp 5y ago
      Are you referring to the linked article? It literally explains what Cloudflare does for them. Everything might make more sense if you visit their website: https://polyhaven.com/ https://polyhaven.com/ It's not just a dumb, static file server. EDIT: The questions below are literally explained in the article, so I'm going to give up on this thread.
      - metadat 5y ago
        Yes, and if they could pay 1/20th of their current bill to solve it, I'm sure they would. I feel like we're heading into the weeds. Do you get the broader point I'm trying to make?
        metadat 5y ago
        Note: my comment is no longer relevant and looks insane because Badwolff made edits to completely change their message.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - bawolff 5y ago
        > Everything might make more sense if you visit their website: https://polyhaven.com/ https://polyhaven.com/ It's not just a dumb, static file server. At a glance, it still looks like mostly a highly cached static website + search. Its not exactly a high complexity backend. Things are always more complex at scale, so there's probably more to it then what appears at first glance, but its not obvious what that is.
- nrb 5y ago
  For the average person, why make it unnecessarily hard on yourself? If it’s not your core competency and unless you possess the vast breadth and depth of skills to dig yourself out if something goes wrong, it seems like a distraction at best and a fatal mistake at worst, with the end result of saving 1-2 engineer hours worth of money per month. For some self-hosting is a no-brainer, but I suspect that community is much smaller than many here would expect.
  - metadat 5y ago
    It seems disingenuous to count engineer hours at $200USD/hour for charitable donation-run projects. Is it charitable to funnel your donor money to CF? I'm sure CF is grateful for the donation.. Fact: Things break most often because of humans doing things - changes, like deployments and config modifications. Set things up right to begin with, and in my experience you can leave them running for a long time without intervention. Downvote all you like, but it's the truth.
    - chillfox 5y ago
      I guess the question is what do you consider a long time? RedHat usually break setups every 3-4 years which I personally consider way to frequent. If I configure a server with automatic updates then I would like it to run with very little maintenance for at least a decade and a long time would be two plus decades.
    - nrb 5y ago
      > Is it charitable to funnel your donor money to CF? I'm sure CF is grateful for the donation.. Is the job getting done for the donors? I bet they don’t care about $300 if it means the website is highly available and the maintainer isn’t burned out from giving away $200/hr of opportunity cost all the time. > Fact: Things break most often because of humans doing things - changes, like deployments and config modifications. Totally agree, and sometimes success in your project forces your hand as you are pressed to add functionality or need to scale. If you can guarantee that you’re doing this work once, ignoring hardware failure or scaling, the scales may very well tip toward self-managed. For a vast majority of projects, I think it just plainly makes sense to go this route, hence the success of these centralized hosts. It is the pragmatic option. PS. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry you’re being downvoted simply for having an viewpoint that others disagree with.
chx 5y ago
While you are right CF provides a lot more, it really must be noted that Hetzner SB servers start at 28 EUR and they _do_ come with unlimited bandwidth and 2 x 3TB disks. For 30 EUR you can get a E3-1245 with 2x4TB disk. Just noting.
- youngtaff 5y ago
  Yeh, but that Hetzner server is only in one location so doesn’t reduce the RTT between your visitor’s and your server (particularly for visitors who are far away)
  - bsagdiyev 5y ago
    And for 99% of cases that doesn’t matter at all. People don’t like hearing it but it’s true.

metadat 5y ago

But they could deliver potentially ~300TB with a 1gbps unmetered link. Not that hard to come by, could even get to 3PB for $300/mo. Back in the day we used Texan Colo data centers with DrFTPD to do just this at massive scale. Bytes in, bytes out. Not a popular opinion here, but I firmly believe it's not necessary to play the CentralizedFlare game to get a winning outcome.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago
> But they could deliver potentially ~300TB with a 1gbps unmetered link. Not that hard to come by, could even get to 3PB for $300/mo. Cloudflare Pro is $20/month per domain. Trying to run everything through a single server in a single datacenter just doesn't compare for globally-accessed websites like this, even with a 1Gbps unmetered link.
- metadat 5y ago
  I must be missing something, are you able to elaborate on how CentralizedPro Flare for $20 solves the OPs problems? I've accessed plenty of sites physically located in the USA from various EU countries, not to mention AUS and I didn't notice much difference as long as they had a good interconnect. Maybe not the best for YouTube, but there's only a few of those. Don't get me wrong, I see the appeal and fell for CF early on but not a fan anymore since they've grown into such a behemoth. Absolutely power corrupts absolutely.
  - PragmaticPulp 5y ago
    Are you referring to the linked article? It literally explains what Cloudflare does for them. Everything might make more sense if you visit their website: https://polyhaven.com/ https://polyhaven.com/ It's not just a dumb, static file server. EDIT: The questions below are literally explained in the article, so I'm going to give up on this thread.
    - metadat 5y ago
      Yes, and if they could pay 1/20th of their current bill to solve it, I'm sure they would. I feel like we're heading into the weeds. Do you get the broader point I'm trying to make?
      - metadat 5y ago
        Note: my comment is no longer relevant and looks insane because Badwolff made edits to completely change their message.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - bawolff 5y ago
      > Everything might make more sense if you visit their website: https://polyhaven.com/ https://polyhaven.com/ It's not just a dumb, static file server. At a glance, it still looks like mostly a highly cached static website + search. Its not exactly a high complexity backend. Things are always more complex at scale, so there's probably more to it then what appears at first glance, but its not obvious what that is.
nrb 5y ago
For the average person, why make it unnecessarily hard on yourself? If it’s not your core competency and unless you possess the vast breadth and depth of skills to dig yourself out if something goes wrong, it seems like a distraction at best and a fatal mistake at worst, with the end result of saving 1-2 engineer hours worth of money per month. For some self-hosting is a no-brainer, but I suspect that community is much smaller than many here would expect.
- metadat 5y ago
  It seems disingenuous to count engineer hours at $200USD/hour for charitable donation-run projects. Is it charitable to funnel your donor money to CF? I'm sure CF is grateful for the donation.. Fact: Things break most often because of humans doing things - changes, like deployments and config modifications. Set things up right to begin with, and in my experience you can leave them running for a long time without intervention. Downvote all you like, but it's the truth.
  - chillfox 5y ago
    I guess the question is what do you consider a long time? RedHat usually break setups every 3-4 years which I personally consider way to frequent. If I configure a server with automatic updates then I would like it to run with very little maintenance for at least a decade and a long time would be two plus decades.
  - nrb 5y ago
    > Is it charitable to funnel your donor money to CF? I'm sure CF is grateful for the donation.. Is the job getting done for the donors? I bet they don’t care about $300 if it means the website is highly available and the maintainer isn’t burned out from giving away $200/hr of opportunity cost all the time. > Fact: Things break most often because of humans doing things - changes, like deployments and config modifications. Totally agree, and sometimes success in your project forces your hand as you are pressed to add functionality or need to scale. If you can guarantee that you’re doing this work once, ignoring hardware failure or scaling, the scales may very well tip toward self-managed. For a vast majority of projects, I think it just plainly makes sense to go this route, hence the success of these centralized hosts. It is the pragmatic option. PS. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry you’re being downvoted simply for having an viewpoint that others disagree with.

chx 5y ago

While you are right CF provides a lot more, it really must be noted that Hetzner SB servers start at 28 EUR and they _do_ come with unlimited bandwidth and 2 x 3TB disks. For 30 EUR you can get a E3-1245 with 2x4TB disk. Just noting.

youngtaff 5y ago
Yeh, but that Hetzner server is only in one location so doesn’t reduce the RTT between your visitor’s and your server (particularly for visitors who are far away)
- bsagdiyev 5y ago
  And for 99% of cases that doesn’t matter at all. People don’t like hearing it but it’s true.