12 Bad Advice for Colocation Users in Western Europe. Part I

If you need to host several servers in Western Europe, feel free to order the Colocation service in a large data center. It is very profitable, simple and safe, and our bad advice will help you to ruin a foreign business or damage your career.

1. Buy a server in Russia and send it to Western Europe

expectations

You can send the server by courier service from Russia to Western Europe for 100 euros. In a week he will already be working in the rack.

Reality

It is difficult to legally transport a used server to Western Europe. It has other customs codes, unknown value and origin, for export, you may need permission from the FSB and the Ministry of Defense – brokers will not undertake this, or it will be expensive. Sending from a private person is also expensive and has every chance of getting stuck at customs. We do not consider the option of traveling to the West in a sleeping bag of a truck and other illegal methods.

Even if you manage to legally transport the server to Western Europe, you need to clear it there and pay local VAT (VAT). In the EU, this procedure is simpler than in Russia, but the rate can reach 30%. The invoices will arrive at the data center where the server is going, but if the customs finds it difficult to assess, it will offer the recipient to clear the goods through certified brokers and hire an appraiser.

How right?

It is better to buy equipment where you are going to use it.

2. Choose a larger data center, they are more reliable

expectations

We will be answered immediately, and the 5,000-rack Tier III site will provide a personal manager to organize the placement of a rack or several servers.

Reality

Large Western data centers work with orders from 30-50 racks, they will not even respond to your request. Such sites only provide racks with remote control, supply power to them and issue passes through the electronic application system. They will not solve issues with connecting to the Internet, crossovers and everything else.

If the site says that this is a carrier neutral datacenter, this means that the data center is not involved in network services at all and all these issues are not included in its area of ​​responsibility.

Single servers are usually hosted by local companies and local engineers. Maintenance of servers and racks by the data center is not expected. If the client is from Russia, many will not contact him due to possible reputational risks or problems with violation of sanctions laws. They usually just don’t respond to inquiries.

How right?

It is worth choosing a site or a hoster based on the amount of equipment that you are going to host.

3. If you have paid for the Colocation service, do not think about equipment maintenance

expectations

Russian data centers often install and even maintain equipment placed in rented racks. Most likely, support staff will not set up the software, but they will not refuse to press the Reset button, connect a new disk or set the memory bar.

The reasons for this are many. Not the last is the access system, due to which it is not easy for small (with large ones the situation is different) to get to the site. Your specialists may not be allowed into the computer room, offering to take the servers for maintenance to a special room. Of course, in customer-oriented Western Europe, everything should be even better: for 50 euros, everything will be done there.

Reality

If you buy the Colocation service in Western Europe, you will have to deal with the equipment yourself, starting with its installation in the rack. All cross-connects will be done for you, uninterrupted power supply and other engineering infrastructure will be provided, but there will be no specialists versed in servers and network equipment in the duty shift of the data center. Often it is represented by a single security guard who monitors the alarm and registers visitors.

Everywhere there are agreements on the limitation of liability: the client can, say, ask to replace the disk in the server, and then will make claims due to the breakdown of the corporate database. In order not to have problems, many data centers prefer not to mess with it.

Colocation in Western Europe is a warehouse for enabled servers with self-service, where they go with a pass card and do everything themselves. Customer engineers have 24/7 access to the machine room, but from a site perspective, a server or rack is just a load that consumes electricity and generates heat. Its physical presence in the rack, as well as setting up and configuring it, is the client’s problem. Only if the data center is far from the central cities, the operators provide more services, otherwise there will be few people willing to work with it.

How right?

It is worth concluding a service contract with a third-party contractor or contacting a small hoster. Large customers should think about their own separate division (Western European branch of the company).

Why it happens? Data center staff salaries in the West are high, taxes are high. In order to maintain prices at the market level, operating companies are trying to minimize the number of personnel on site. To become an employee of a large data center, you must have the appropriate specialized education and certification, and this costs money. A specialist employee will not do everything in a row, he has a lot of his own affairs, and all overtime must be fixed and paid, moreover, without a direct order from management, they are often prohibited.

4. Never read the contract and service level agreement (SLA), sign papers without looking

expectations

In Russia, we often do not read the content of standard contracts and do not indicate important nuances in them, preferring to build informal relations with partners on the basis of oral agreements, concepts and the Civil Code. And Western data centers certainly work without unnecessary formalism and bureaucracy.

Reality

In terms of bureaucracy, your expectations will come true, but the contract for Western Europeans is unshakable. It is compiled in detail, and if some service is not included in the document, it means that it is not provided. Even if the problem is solved in a minute by pressing one button, they will answer you: “We do not deal with this, come yourself.”

Another option is when you are given a list of services that are paid separately. Prices for equipment maintenance start from 50 euros per hour during the day and from 150 euros at night, and the work must be ordered and paid for somewhere in a week. In the wake of the pandemic, prices have risen, so agreements and price lists should be studied very carefully: for example, 300–500 euros per hour for servicing network equipment is far from the maximum.

How right?

You need to carefully study all the terms of the contract, as well as the price list of the site and service providers.

5. Buy noname hardware from Chinese sellers and used hardware on eBay

expectations

If you don’t want to overpay for a brand, you can buy inexpensive hardware and assemble the server yourself or take a used one with an expired warranty. If there is no difference in computing power, why pay more?

Reality

This is possible if you are ready to send your own specialists to the Western data center or move in person with a set of spare parts in the trunk. Otherwise, maintenance of cheap hardware will cost a pretty penny: compatibility problems will arise or used devices will often break down (their resource has already been used up) and, as a result, will cost more than new ones. You will have to pay for the service, and they may answer you: “We did everything, nothing happened, here is the bill for 300 euros” (and so on 10 times). If you want everything to work out, it is better to take branded equipment with a guarantee. Large vendors do not accidentally include on-site service in their limited warranty, they take into account the processes of the data center. If something breaks, an authorized service partner engineer will come to diagnose the next day. This is why many customers take work equipment out of service when warranty extensions are not practical.

How right?

Buy brand new equipment with on-site warranty service.

6. Don’t sign service contracts – it’s a waste of money

expectations

When purchasing new equipment, the limited warranty included in the price is sufficient. If something happens, the manufacturer will repair the device free of charge. In addition, you can always call service workers for a fee, they will gladly come.

Reality

The limited warranty allows you to count on on-site service for servers and some network equipment, but does not include commissioning and does not oblige the vendor’s partner service centers to keep replacement parts. You need to put the hardware in the rack yourself, and repairs can take several days or weeks (the partner will have to order spare parts from the vendor). Many companies buy hardware from leading manufacturers and an additional extended warranty with installation and replacement stock. This allows you to save on maintenance by data center engineers (which, we recall, may not be carried out at all).

An on-demand service can turn out to be unreliable: if there is no guarantee of money, there is no guarantee and the response time of an external contractor, sometimes the departure is delayed for a week. It is better to conclude an agreement with a monthly fee (50–100 euros per car per month), but here again you will have to carefully read the papers, since additional contractor services are more expensive than data center services. For example, out-of-hours check-out is usually not included in the monthly fee and can cost 300–350 euros per hour, including travel time.

How right?

Buy extended hardware warranties and/or long-term service contracts with third party contractors.

Half a dozen more bad tips – in the second part of the article. Will post soon!