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Well, having a $9k per month budget you could hire an entire rack in a premium data center location (let's say Telehouse London-Docklands that hosts London inte

Well, having a $9k per month budget you could hire an entire rack in a premium data center location (let's say Telehouse London-Docklands that hosts London internet exchange - You can connect to it in a very cost effective way). This would still leave 80%~90% of the budget (depending on power use) for hardware/software etc. But a full rack is a huge overkill. How about a quarter rack for few hundred $ per month? What about connectivity? Well, as mentioned Telehouse Docklands hosts LINX so you can get an unlimited transfer gigabit right into the Internet backbone for a couple hundred $ (mind I dealt with them few years ago, but I doubt prices changed that much - probably they're lower if anything). Also there is a cluster of data centers in docklands so they compete on price heavily as well as resellers that often have good deals. This is all just location and connectivity. How about hardware? Let's say they wanted proper support with their hardware not diy so they were looking for a "solution provider". Send a request for quote to 10 of them including fujitsu, ibm, hp etc. Then tell them you're looking for a "charitable organisation discount". Unfortunately we're missing the most important metric to price this "solution". IOPS and if its mostly small or large files (random or sequential Access), but they host most of it in "infrequent access" s3 so let's assume it's not a lot, just to find the lower pricing boundary. So let's say a pair of 2u servers with two hba cards each and 4 12 disc jbods with 22tb Sas drives a total of a petabyte in raw storage or half a PB mirrored (not that they would run it mirrored). A system like this from a big name (it's rather low performance, but we're after cheap right, their s3 is likely very similar) might cost $80k. Over 5 years of lease that might be ~$3k per month plus their hosting and connectivity it's about half of their $9k.... Then there is software, but that's a separate thing. Also one could DIY such system for half the price, one could add SSDs etc. This is just an example. To design this properly one would need usage data from their s3 and few days of work to put it nicely together.

traceroute66 3y ago
> mentioned Telehouse Docklands hosts LINX so you can get an unlimited transfer gigabit right into the Internet backbone First, look at the LINX network map. They are not just in Telehouse Docklands. Second, with all due respect, do you know anything about how the internet works ? "internet backbone" huh ? LINX is a peering exchange. A connection to LINX gets you nothing. Sure you can peer with the route servers. But you won't find any Tier 1 routes on the route servers, and the Tier 1s will also refuse to peer with you because you're too small or you don't meet their ultra-restrictive peering policies (for example, good luck getting BT to peer with you !). Most people are better off getting a good connection to either a Tier 1 or a high-quality Tier 2 network and leaving it at that. > Also there is a cluster of data centers in docklands so they compete on price heavily London Docklands is the most expensive place in the UK to colocate, and probably in the Top 5 most expensive globally. Its prime real estate, all of the big-name colo facilities know that and will charge you accordingly, ESPECIALLY Telehouse ! And trust me, you don't want to go anywhere near a "cheap" Docklands facility, they are cheap for a reason. The days of £300 a month for a full rack in Docklands are long gone my friend. There are many other perfectly good places both in the Greater London area and elsewhere in the UK and Europe where you will get more bang for your buck.
- sokoloff 3y ago
  I’d be surprised if any of the top five most expensive colos weren’t all targeting HFT or other financial services.
  - traceroute66 3y ago
    > targeting HFT or other financial services And the hyperscalers. The Googles of this world only really build their own data centres in the US and maybe, if you're lucky, one or two other places elsewhere. But generally, everywhere else in the world, and absolutely certainly in London, they're in the same buildings as everyone else ... except they rent entire floors and not just a few racks of course !

traceroute66 3y ago

> mentioned Telehouse Docklands hosts LINX so you can get an unlimited transfer gigabit right into the Internet backbone First, look at the LINX network map. They are not just in Telehouse Docklands. Second, with all due respect, do you know anything about how the internet works ? "internet backbone" huh ? LINX is a peering exchange. A connection to LINX gets you nothing. Sure you can peer with the route servers. But you won't find any Tier 1 routes on the route servers, and the Tier 1s will also refuse to peer with you because you're too small or you don't meet their ultra-restrictive peering policies (for example, good luck getting BT to peer with you !). Most people are better off getting a good connection to either a Tier 1 or a high-quality Tier 2 network and leaving it at that. > Also there is a cluster of data centers in docklands so they compete on price heavily London Docklands is the most expensive place in the UK to colocate, and probably in the Top 5 most expensive globally. Its prime real estate, all of the big-name colo facilities know that and will charge you accordingly, ESPECIALLY Telehouse ! And trust me, you don't want to go anywhere near a "cheap" Docklands facility, they are cheap for a reason. The days of £300 a month for a full rack in Docklands are long gone my friend. There are many other perfectly good places both in the Greater London area and elsewhere in the UK and Europe where you will get more bang for your buck.

sokoloff 3y ago
I’d be surprised if any of the top five most expensive colos weren’t all targeting HFT or other financial services.
- traceroute66 3y ago
  > targeting HFT or other financial services And the hyperscalers. The Googles of this world only really build their own data centres in the US and maybe, if you're lucky, one or two other places elsewhere. But generally, everywhere else in the world, and absolutely certainly in London, they're in the same buildings as everyone else ... except they rent entire floors and not just a few racks of course !