IT departments in nearly every industry and sector are being asked to do more with less to improve productivity, not cost. unfortunately, remake Mentality artificially inflates IT spending, especially when it comes to servers.
according to Single source IT, the server was found to be robust during its first year of use, with only 5% experiencing problems. This was often due to minor misconfigurations. Over his next two years, they remained reliable before the hard drives started causing concern at 11%. It became clear that a server replacement would be necessary to ensure smooth and efficient operations in the future.
When is the best time to upgrade your server?
In this case, your IT team is the best resource. Ask them if they need a server upgrade and listen to what they say. However, if you want a business case justifying your spending, consider the actual costs of the following situations:
The server is old and no longer supported by the manufacturer
One of the easiest ways to know it’s time to upgrade your server is if your server is out of warranty (or worse, out of support by the manufacturer). The older it gets, the more likely it is to break down. As servers age, disk crashes, power supply overloads, and local overheating become more common. If the manufacturer doesn’t support it, you’ll have to rely on traditional third-party support, which can quickly become very expensive.
Slow and unable to keep up with current traffic and demand
Poor performance is a sure sign of an upcoming server upgrade. The slower your app runs and the more often it crashes, the less productive you are.
Data loss or corruption due to hardware failure
Having a solid data backup and disaster recovery plan is essential if you rely on older servers. However, hardware failure is never a quick and easy fix. Even with a good backup solution, you still have a lot of downtime.
Security Risk – Today’s Servers Are Vulnerable to Attacks from Hackers
One of the biggest reasons why regular server upgrades are standard practice is that they dramatically improve data security. For example, if you’re running Windows Server 2003, you haven’t received a security patch for some time. Upgrades ensure that you get timely security updates and fixes for community-found security flaws.
Maintenance and repairs are becoming increasingly costly and time-consuming
The longer you delay upgrading your server infrastructure, the more money you will spend on maintenance. Also, unplanned downtime can start to increase and cause problems for the entire operation. Older equipment has a law of diminishing returns, and servers follow it fairly predictably.
Need more storage capacity for growing business and datasets
This is easy. If you can’t physically store the data you need to store on your server, or can’t handle the throughput your server has to offer, you already know the solution.
How often do you upgrade your servers?
If you don’t want to wait until the last minute possible to upgrade your server (which you definitely shouldn’t), a good rule of thumb is to upgrade every 4 years. Upgrade to a decent model and it should be good for what you want for at least three years.
The Importance of Server Upgrades
It will eventually become economically impossible to maintain the old server and will have to be replaced. However, putting off that date as long as possible won’t save you money or time. By the time you routinely deal with the inconveniences of aging servers, it is very likely that you have already passed the point where the total cost of ownership of new servers is less than the total cost of maintaining existing equipment. will be higher. You don’t have to spend more to maintain poor performance.
Things to consider before upgrading your server
That said, don’t just throw money at the problem. Take the time to learn what it takes to upgrade your server. Learn which options definitely help and which ones don’t help at all. Also, take the time to consider any underlying changes in server architecture and location. For example, have you ever considered a dedicated cloud server? If you don’t have the expertise in-house, Liquid Web is happy to help.
Benefits of upgrading your server
Paradoxically, the most obvious benefit of a server upgrade is the least noticeable benefit. That way you know it’s working. You won’t find your team complaining about poor app performance. You won’t notice a server going down or under heavy peak load. You don’t have to pay for overtime because your IT team has to rush to get servers back up and running before work starts the next day. A new server with all the required capacity is invisible.
How to upgrade your server
In short, you have the option of developing the necessary server upgrades and maintenance in-house, or using an organization like Liquid Web to manage the upgrades. One option is much easier and cheaper than the other.
final thoughts
We hope this article has helped you consider the costs of maintaining older servers and the business case for planned upgrades before an emergency upgrade is needed. As they say, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
Contact Liquid Web for help and advice on upgrading your servers and other critical IT infrastructure. One of the most helpful humans at Hosting®, she’s happy to help.
