When you rent a VPS or dedicated server, the price usually covers the hardware, the network and the data centre. Everything above that, the operating system, its security and the software you run, is your responsibility unless you pay for management.
What "unmanaged" means
The provider keeps the hardware and network running. You handle:
- Installing and configuring the operating system and software.
- Security updates and upgrades.
- Firewalls, access control and hardening.
- Monitoring and responding to alerts, including at night and on holidays.
- Backups and restore testing.
- Troubleshooting when something breaks.
This suits teams with system administration skills and the time to use them.
What "managed" adds
A managed service takes on some or all of that work. Typical scope:
- Patching on an agreed schedule.
- Monitoring with alerting and response.
- Hardening to a security baseline.
- Backup setup and checks.
- Incident response when something goes wrong.
- Help with changes, upgrades and performance problems.
How to compare the cost
Compare the management fee with the real cost of doing it yourself: the hours your team spends, the skills you would need to hire, cover for holidays and nights, and the cost of an outage or breach that a missed patch or unanswered alert would cause. For many businesses the managed option is cheaper overall, even though the invoice is higher.
Questions to ask a provider
- Exactly which tasks are included, and which are extra?
- What are the response times, and at what hours?
- Who has access to the server, and how is it controlled?
- How are changes agreed and recorded?
- What happens to your data and access if you leave?
How IDX helps
IDX Managed Servers covers patching, monitoring, hardening and incident response on your VPS or dedicated servers, scoped to what you need. If you prefer to run your own servers, our unmanaged VPS and dedicated servers give you full root access.
IDX on digital infrastructure
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