While doing a business in New York or Dallas, you may need a good colo provider. And there are some points to consider while looking for a good one. Amongst the basic criteria are the super-fast speed of internet, redundant power supply, 24/7 customer support and all-inclusive price. But there are still some more factors while searching for the best provider of colo New York or Dallas, which may look trifle, but if you apply them, they can be very useful.
A colocation provider who is not telling you to sign any contract may seem attractive to you at first, as that means you don’t have to commit anything and also it allows you to be flexible. But once you go through the tedious installation process and settled in the colocation, particularly if your server is on the web and bringing traffic, moving out again is not that easy and comfortable. After all, you won’t take away the provider’s IP addresses with you, meaning new IPs, software and service reconfiguration, above server downtime, to move to the new colo provider. Another drawback of no contract is no price protection. The fees can be increased any time, as you don’t have a contract which locks the pricing for a fixed term. On the contrary, if you have studied thoroughly about the provider and chosen him carefully, there is no harm in signing a contract. A good colocation service provider will offer a term as short as three months, maximum six months. This makes you free for the rest of the days. So you need not be scared of contracts.
Some New York or Dallas colocation providers try to impress customers by saying that they guarantee their service as per SLA, i.e. Service Level Agreement. This is only a marketing gimmick to show off that they are so confident about their service, that they want to give it in writing. It you take some trouble to read the SLA you will find that what it says is if there is a service outage, you can get a credit against the bill for downtime, the condition being it should be reported immediately in the prescribed manner (which is mostly in writing, with details) and also that a review of their logs confirms your report. Though it appears like a guarantee, it is not. It doesn’t commit that their service won’t go down or if it goes down, it will be repaired within a short period, etc. Also if your report is late, there is no guarantee that you will get the credit. You don’t have the facility of getting a compensation for the downtime. So there you have to bear losses. And the main question is why would you choose a service with lots of downtime? Therefore, SLA is not a good and useful facility and you should look into more important matters than that.
Setup fee is another matter. If a provider is not taking it, it is good, but you should not emphasize on it too much. Actually if setup fee is there, it is just one time. So it is not a big deal, as compared to other factors. If the provider is offering other services up to the mark, and he is taking setup fee, don’t dismiss him. He is far better than a provider who has a lot of downtime, providing no remote hands support, and is not taking a setup fee.
So along with looking for important aspects, like flexibility, customer support, redundant power supply, etc. these small-looking matters should also be considered whether to be observed strictly or not. Thus you can make a good choice while selecting a colocation provider in New York or Dallas.
