Well, it has been an interesting week in the web server arena. I’ll be glad when the transition is over, so I can stop goofing with settings and start actually using things.

Incidentally, this is only the second full post I’ve written on the new server, and I hadn’t even taken the time to appreciate how much snappier everything is. Ahh…

But I have signed up for a couple of hosting services that should hopefully spread resources out and keep my web hosting cheap.

First, I’ve decided to outsource my email to Webmail.us. They’ve got a pretty decent offer - 1GB per email account, 5 email accounts = $120/year. That’s $2 per box per month for each. It sounds expensive in the world of free gmail, but I like getting email at my own domain. It makes me easier to find when you know it. My gmail address is a bit cryptic.

Second, I have been using Flickr service for a while. I have signed up for their Pro account. At $25 per year for unlimited storage, it’s not a bad deal for keeping photos online. When I eventually get WordPress to be more Flickr-friendly (don’t start recommending pluings, I’ve got my own plans) things will be much happier.

I’ve been considering using hosted DNS services, perhaps provided by DynDNS. The reasoning is that TextDrive doesn’t offer granular control over their DNS records. I’ve been using them or a dynamic domain for quite a long time, and they’re pretty reliable. At $25 per domain per year, it could get a little expensive. But if I break it down for just one domain per month it’s not too bad.

So, all told, Asymptomatic will cost me about $14 per month, after the VC buy-in at TextDrive. In 5 months, the server will not only pay for itself, it will actually earn money. Yay!

Are there any other services that I’m overlooking? Should I add something like ASO’s Extreme Hosting for hosting big files? Do I have many big non-photo files? Why is storage space on the web so expensive when drives are so silly-cheap? An additional $20 per month kind of blows my sweet monthly price out of the water.