Why run Asterisk in Virtual Private Server (VPS/Vserver)?
So you are convinced that Asterisk is the PBX telephony solution for your business. Now you need a place to host it. Obviously, you need some sort of dedicated platform to accomodate the administration and maintenance of Asterisk, so you are considering setting up a dedicated server on-site. However, have you considered the disadvantages of onsite hosting, especially with Asterisk?
First of all, your telephony system is going to be the communication front for your business. You want to give your patrons a great first impression. You won't achieve that if for some reason your Asterisk PBX is not performing to its full potential or available 100% of the time!
Consider these situations when hosting your own installation:
- Internet Provider goes down because of backbone outage or other interruption in service
- Electrical power outage and no backup power solution
- UPS finally dies after extended power outage
- Internet connection does not have adequate bandwidth to handle several calls at once without severe deterioration in quality
- Harware fails on your onsite dedicated server, ie. HDD, Power Supply, CPU
There are many points of failure, and while any one of these can be addressed to procure a more reliable situation (extra server, several redundant Internet providers, et. al.), it will cost alot more money than you are probably willing to spend.
