Dedicated Server location
Rent your Dedicated Servers in a range of countries
Choosing the best dedicated server hosting solution can often be a huge leap to take — especially when budget, security and cost control are key factors to consider. Of course, the hardware your server is equipped with will have the most drastic influence on its performance, but it can be easy to forget another key factor when identifying the most suitable server for your needs — the location in which it is hosted.
How does server location improve a website’s performance?
Before exploring this topic, it is important to address one basic question: why does dedicated server location matter?
Firstly, the geographic location of your dedicated server impacts performance for end-users. In short, the further away your server is from where your users are located, the greater the distance that data packets must travel to reach their servers. Consequently, webpages will load more slowly, and connections to your server may time out. This is what is referred to as high latency. For all web hosting services — from the most basic cloud hosting packages to the most powerful dedicated servers — server location will play a part in delivering the ultimate user experience. As a world-class cloud hosting provider with a global network, our goal is to help customers minimize latency — so no matter what you choose to host on your dedicated server, it will load at lightning-speed for users.
A second, more specific factor to consider with dedicated server location is data security. Of course, as a dedicated server hosting provider, we apply the very strictest security measures to our solutions across the globe — but in certain countries, local laws may require data owners to divulge data under specific circumstances. An example of this is the CLOUD Act in the United States, on the grounds of which federal law enforcement can issue a warrant for US-based tech companies to provide data stored on their servers. In contrast to this, the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) — which came into effect on 25 May 2018 — delivers a stringent series of rules governing data privacy and protection across EU countries.
For this reason, dedicated server location is crucial for those who seek to host critical and sensitive data. Healthcare data, financial data, and business data are examples of sensitive information that must be kept under lock and key. For IT service providers working in these fields, there are often local requirements to comply with, and certifications that must be held — e.g., G-Cloud certification for healthcare service providers in the UK, HDS certification for healthcare in France, and PCI DSS certification for financial data hosts. When it comes to cloud hosting solutions, the laws of the country in which the server is hosted will apply — and therefore the concept of sovereign hosting has become a pressing topic in recent years.
How to pick the perfect location for your dedicated server?
There are several factors to think about when picking a location for your dedicated server. Who is your target user? Is it you, your teams, your company, or your customers? Where in the world are your target users based? Are they in a single country, spread across multiple countries, or based in multiple continents across the globe?
The choice may be easy, for example, if your server is solely for your own use. In this case, you can simply pick a dedicated server location that is based closest to where you would usually access it from. The same will apply if the server’s end users are a local team or company based in the same location as you — or if they are delivering services to customers based in the same region. If, however, you are UK-based but want to provide a service solely to users in Germany, for example — it would be in your best interest to pick a dedicated server hosted at a datacentre located in Germany.
Given the sheer range of use cases associated with dedicated server hosting, the situation can quickly become more complicated. For example, the dedicated server may host the website of a company that seeks to expand internationally, and target customers based in multiple countries. In the case of a European expansion, the administrator may want to build an infrastructure with dedicated servers in France, Spain, and Poland — so that their site loads quickly for users across the entire European continent.
Finally, for more ambitious projects that will have users based worldwide, you need to ensure coverage with a global network that spans across EMEA and APAC regions — i.e., multiple datacentres in Europe, North America, and Asia.
There are additional measures you can take when it comes to optimizing dedicated server performance across multiple locations. For example, a Content Delivery Network (CDN) is a great way of boosting your international presence and ensuring that your content loads quickly for users. A CDN is a network of servers spread across the globe. Your server’s static content is copied onto mirror servers in this worldwide network, and when a web user requests your content, the query will be sent to whichever server can load the content the quickest.
At OVHcloud, we take transparency and data security very seriously — so our website clearly displays which datacentres stock certain dedicated server models, and part of the order process involves selecting which datacentre you want your server model to be hosted in.
Why upgrade to dedicated server hosting, and when is the right time?
Generally, for very small-scale and casual projects, you will not need the resources offered by dedicated server hosting. In these cases, we would recommend getting started with our cloud hosting packages — which are perfect for hosting blogs, showcase websites, or small business sites.
It is important to note that when ordering web hosting solutions, the option of selecting a specific location is unavailable. However, you can give your solution global reach via a multidomain strategy. This would involve reserving domain names with a variety of country code top-level domains (ccTLDs) — like .uk, .fr, .de, or even .eu, for example. If you would like to further homogenise traffic across all the countries within your reach, we would strongly recommend pairing this approach with a CDN.
As your project grows, the next step up from this would be a VPS (virtual private server) — which offers dedicated, scalable resources. It also gives users a greater degree of flexibility at a low cost, making it a perfect option for those who seek scalability and root access. However, it is worth noting that to use a VPS, you will need a degree of technical expertise. Otherwise, you can seek services from a managed hosting provider, who can take care of the administrative aspects of a virtual server.
Once the power offered by a fleet of virtual cloud servers proves to be insufficient, we would then recommend upgrading to dedicated server hosting. With a bare-metal server, there is no virtualization layer, and you do not share hardware resources with other users. 100% of the hardware power is dedicated to you and your projects. If your goal is to become a VPS reseller, for example, you can add your own virtualization layer and partition the server yourself — but no matter how you intend to use it, bare metal technology delivers optimized power, flexibility, and scalability.
To learn more about the advantages of opting for OVHcloud dedicated servers, you can view our full range of Bare Metal servers. If you are looking for affordable dedicated servers, you can also browse our all-new Eco range of refurbished bare metal solutions.
Colocation vs. dedicated server hosting — what is the difference?
To cover a regional or international scope with your dedicated server, you may be considering the option of colocation instead of dedicated server hosting with a cloud hosting company. There are advantages and drawbacks to both options — but to start with, it is important to define the difference between colocation and dedicated server hosting.
Colocation involves renting a space in a server rack. This rack space is offered by a business that operates datacentres, and you get access to the datacentre’s features (power supply, redundancy, server cooling, etc.). However, as a colocation user, you are responsible for sourcing and buying the individual server components, assembling them, mounting your server in the rack, and purchasing any software licences you need. You are also responsible for performing on-site hardware maintenance operations.
One of the main advantages of colocation is that you get total freedom in terms of both the software and hardware you use, rather than being limited to the configurations offered by a dedicated server hosting company. Also, if you are looking to host a very high number of dedicated servers off-premises, colocation may aid you with cost control and budgeting, since you are sourcing the hardware components yourself.
On the other hand, colocation involves a lot more work. Rather than focusing on your core business, you would need to spend time researching, ordering, and assembling hardware equipment. You’d also need to purchase any necessary licences and ensure that all the components you order are compatible with one another. Lastly, you would need to either hire network technicians and datacentre technicians to perform hardware maintenance or pay the datacentre owners to take care of it. All these overheads tend to make colocation a more complex, costly option in most use cases.
With dedicated server rental, you pay a monthly or annual fee to a server hosting provider, and it’s all-inclusive. The hosting company provides all the components you need, assembles the server, includes all the licences you need (or offers them as add-ons in the order process), hosts the server in their datacentre, and takes care of all the hardware maintenance and updates for you.
The main advantage of dedicated server rental is, of course, that it saves you both time and hassle. You can avoid all the extra work and responsibility involved with colocation and focus on your core business instead. At OVHcloud, our expert datacentre technicians are available on-site 24/7, monitoring the infrastructure and handling day-to-day maintenance. They are also on hand to handle any potential incidents or emergencies, so you can rest assured that your server is kept up-and-running round the clock. When it comes to adding or upgrading the components you already have, you can simply select the extra resources you need via the OVHcloud Control Panel and order them in a few clicks. Our datacentre staff will take care of the rest.
The only drawback of this option is that in terms of hardware, you are limited to the options and configurations offered by the cloud hosting provider. However, at OVHcloud, we offer a very high degree of flexibility and scalability, with a wide range of configuration options to choose from. We also offer different bare metal server ranges that are specially designed for certain use cases, so you can get world-class performance for the very best price.
Why choose OVHcloud Dedicated Servers?
High performance
No matter which server you pick, you will always get best-in-class, cutting-edge technology available at your fingertips. Browse our Rise, Advance, Game, Scale and High Grade ranges to find the best server for your needs. You get optimal stability — and our energy-efficient water-cooling technology keeps your dedicated server from overheating, no matter how intensive your resource usage is.
Optimal availability
Our dedicated servers offer up to 10Gbit/s unmetered and guaranteed public bandwidth, and up to 50Gbit/s unmetered and guaranteed private bandwidth — so you can ensure constant uptime. Many of our models also come with an SLA (service level agreement) of up to 99.9%, and a redundant power supply. With our High Grade servers, you can also hot-swap hardware components. This means you can leave your dedicated server powered on while our teams replace or upgrade equipment, guaranteeing zero downtime. What’s more, our proactive on-site datacentre teams are also on hand 24/7 to take care of the server hardware, maintenance, and incident resolution.
Present where you are
As a cloud service provider, we have a global presence — with a network of over 30 datacentres spread across Europe, North America, and the Asia-Pacific region. This means you can order servers wherever you and your customers are based, offering zero latency to your end users. Simply select which datacentre you want your cloud server hosted in when you order via the OVHcloud Control Panel.
Anti-DDoS protection
All our solutions come with anti-DDoS protection enabled by default — and no matter how high-volume a DDoS attack is, your services will remain protected round-the-clock at no extra cost. Our anti-DDoS protection is based on VAC technology, which filters incoming traffic — so only legitimate traffic can reach your server. Our infrastructure has mitigated DDoS attacks of up to 1.3Tbit/s in size, so you can rest assured that your bare-metal servers will remain unaffected.
OVHcloud Dedicated Server locations
Want to order a server closest to where you and your customers do business? Browse our list of country-specific pages below for advice on how to target your local region. While we do not operate datacentres in all these countries, our datacentres in neighbouring regions will deliver the power and coverage you need.