Where to have my data? ⇒

March 30th, 2014 by

My current hosting setup:

  • mail is hosted at FastMail
  • Calendars are iCloud
  • Contacts are self-hosted (Mac OS X Server)
  • Website is Wordpress on Dreamhost

My costs are:

  • $4/month for static IP
  • $9/month for Dreamhost
  • $9/month for 4 users on FastMail

Ideally I'd bring all those services in one place where I control everything. My options:

  1. self-host
  2. Shared hosting
  3. Cheap VPS
  4. Colocation
  5. leave it all the same

Downsides

Self-hosting:

  • if my consumer grade internet goes down then I can't access much of my info.
  • have to worry about maintaining offsite backups
  • no support if nothing goes wrong

Shared-hosting

  • privacy concerns
  • how are their backups
  • email service is usually not great
  • don't normally have Contact/Calendar hosting Cheap VPS
  • have to do everything myself
  • no real support if something goes wrong

Colo

  • kinda pricey for a little server ($30/month + cost of mac mini)

Leave it

  • data is everywhere, multiple places to admin
  • inconsistent support

I think my favourite choice is a self-hosted machine. I'd like to get a mac mini so I can remove my iMac from hosting duties. The Mac OS X Server software is really, really easy to use and there's tons of information out there about what to do. Going self hosted removes $18/month from my costs and gains me a ton of control.

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