The World of Colocation Hosting

Colocation Hosting

A collocation centre is a kind of data centre where equipment, bandwidth and space are available for rental to retail customers. Co-location facilities provide space, cooling, power and physical security for the server, networking and storage equipment of other firms – and connect them to a variety of telecommunications and network service providers – with a minimum of cost and complexity.

Benefits–

Co-location has become a famous option for companies with average IT needs especially those in Internet related business.

Some of the benefits of co-location include:

• Certain and operational expenditure model
• Better access to space and power
• A better road map for disaster recovery
• Dedicated infrastructure to build cloud strategy

Co-location facilities provide:

• Power in AC or DC
• Lockable cages
• Cooling
• Physical security

They also provide superfluous systems to mitigate the problems when each certainly fails.

Major co-location customers are:

• Major enterprises who use this facility for disaster recovery
• Telecommunication companies use the facility to exchange traffic with other companies
• E-commerce sites use the facility to house servers
• Web commerce companies use the facility for a safe environment

Configuration–

• Cabinets – A cabinet is a locking unit that holds a server rack. In a co-location data centre, servers share raised-floor space with other data centres, in addition to sharing power and cooling infrastructure.
• Cages – A cage is dedicated server space within a data centre, it is surrounded by mesh walls and entered through a locking door. Cages share power and cooling infrastructure with other co-location data centres.

Building features–

Co-location facilities have many other characteristics:

• Cabinets and cages for physical access control over data centres equipment.
• Low- impedance electrical ground.
• Overhead or cable rack and fibreguide, power cables usually on separate rack from data.

Internal connections–

Co-location facility owners have varying rules regarding cross connections between their customers. These rules may allow customers to run such connections free, or allow customers to order such connections for a significant monthly charge. They may allow customers to order cross connects to carriers, but not to other customers.

Most peering points sit in co-location centres. Because of the high concentration of servers inside bigger co-location centres, most carriers will be interested in bringing direct connections to such buildings.

External connections–

Co-location facilities usually have multiple locations for fibre optic cables to enter the building, to provide redundancy such that communications can continue if one bundle of cables is damaged. Some also have wireless backup connections, for example satellite.