I am working on a large scale web application. Before starting actual development we have to consider a lot of factor, In this post i want to ask queries specific to Web Hosting. But before asking my question i want to write a brief intro about this web application.

This is a social application for corporate sector, contain lot of users connected with each other and sharing lot of information with each other in form of emails, files (.doc .pdf .ppt etc). All in all what i am perceiving is that we need:

• Unlimited Bandwidth
• Unlimited Email Address
• Huge Storage 开发者_开发技巧Space
• Some backing up Mechanism (coz we have to back up all the files (.doc, .ppt, .pdf etc))
• Efficient hosting (I don't want my users to wait for long time)
• Last but not lest since we would develop in .net 3.5 so we need only suggestion regarding .net hosting

I am totally new to the hosting world so don't know what to choose. Some one told me to consider dedicated servers or virtual servers (if u want to save cost and obviously i would be happy by saving cost)

Questions:

• Should i pay for all the software licences (Windows licence, MS Visual Studio and MS SQL Server etc)
• Should i be responsible for taking backup of my data
• Who should do the maitinance when server would be down

I wish that there could be some mechanism in which i am only responsible for hosting data rest all would be manged by my web host.

Looking at your requirements .. Yes , you will have to get a dedicated server .. now there are providers who offers Managed Servers & Unmanaged Servers. If you are tech savy , know how to administrate and configure server then go for Unmanaged server if not then go for managed server. The other option is you can go with unmanaged server and hire an expert admin or a server management organization to manage the server.

Second thing... Windows servers has to be licensed in order to work properly. You can still MSSQL express edition which is free however the operating system should be licensed.

Third thing .. evaluate your requirements in terms of RAM , CPU , HDD and the server location. You can A nice processor with 4x3 TB HDD with 100 TB bandwidth servers in europe location. If the requirements are lower you can go for a VPS too.

To manage the hosted things more easily on the server you can opt for hosting control panels such as Plesk or Hosting controller. Plesk is more suitable for windows servers.

• If you own the servers, you need to pay for licenses. If you don't own the servers you need to check with the person who does what the deal is.

• You should always be backing up your own data. There is nothing worse than relying on someone else to do it, because you only find out that they haven't when you don't want to.

• Again depends on the hosting. If you go for hosting your own hardware somewhere, then generally you're on your own. If it's a rented machine the you will normally get support, but only as far as the server itself, the problem could be your code.

As for hosting, although I know nothing about .NET, have you looked at something like Azure from Microsoft?