Opting to use a Co-located hosting service offers a lot of benefits to website owners and administrators that make it an attractive option for obvious reasons. Users can check up on their servers and physically manage and maintain them as they see fit. Alternatively, if they see fit to spend the extra money they can even have on-site staff physically perform any manual adjustments that need to be made as well.

The IT firms of many companies prefer the kind of hands-on access that Co-location facilities offer as they're often more geared for business and especially E-commerce focused hosting.While the advantages of housing equipment in a Co-location facility are clear, what's less straight forward is how much one should be paying for these services. Some data centers charge based on bandwidth usage, while others will use a tiered approach to pricing, providing a certain level of total bandwidth per month for a fixed cost. Which pricing scheme will work better for you and ultimately provide the best bang for the buck depends on your expected traffic and expansion plans. The "nickel and dime" approach where you're literally being charged extra for every Mbps over a certain threshold level isn't always the smartest way to go. As the Co-location industry has matured and stabilized, the free market has largely leveled and standardized the price points available. A fair price for a Mid-Tower unit, 1000 GB per month of bandwidth and 24/7 on-site support staff is generally $49.95 per month or thereabouts. Additional units typically come at a substantial discount, depending on which company you're dealing with. While that's a ballpark figure, it's an acceptable cost for what you get.

A full 1U setup with comparable bandwidth can cost $100 per month. Additional bandwidth varies depending on what carrier you're using in addition to other factors. The moral of the story is that you don't have to pay an arm and a leg to get superior service, but as with any other purchase be wary of deals that appear to good to be true. As often as not, they usually are. Digging up the necessary background information on any Co-location company and talking to others who have experience dealing with them is key. You wouldn't buy a car without at least doing a little research first, and though hosting is typically a less costly purchase it's still worth both your time and money to look into any potential providers before making a commitment.