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This is worth emphasizing for anyone looking at colo in the US. 120V delivery is common in smaller facilities but it is wasteful at scale. Your current draw doubles for the same wattage, which means more copper loss and less headroom.

If you are negotiating colo, always ask about 208V or 240V single-phase options. Even if they charge slightly more per amp, your total cost per kW usually drops. Also verify whether they bill on actual metered usage or circuit breaker rating. Some places bill the breaker, so a 20A circuit at 50% utilization costs the same as one at 80%.

On the Buffalo topic generally: good connectivity to Toronto and decent paths to NYC, but verify your specific provider's blend. Some of the cheaper shops there are single-homed to Cogent or HE and it shows during peak.

Single-homed to HE is not the death sentence it once was. Their network has improved dramatically in the past five years, at least in North America. I would still want diversity for anything production-critical, but for a backup site or lab? Fine.

I am more concerned about the shops that claim "blended" but it is really one transit provider plus a free peering port at an IX that goes dark every time someone sneezes. Had that happen in Manchester once. "Multi-homed" they said. Technically true, practically useless.

Carl, those R630s are solid machines. I ran R620s with E5-2670s until 2021. Loud, power-hungry, but absolutely dependable. The iDRAC alone is worth the price of admission compared to some of the BMC garbage on whitebox gear.

This thread is fascinating but I feel like I am reading about another planet.

In Brazil the cheapest colo I can find is about R$2,500 for a quarter rack, which is roughly $450 USD. And that is with questionable power and no remote hands. For that money I could fly to Buffalo, rack a server, and fly back monthly to check on it.

I mostly rent VPS from local providers because the import taxes on hardware are brutal. A Dell R630 that costs you $45 would cost me closer to $300 after shipping and taxes, assuming I could even find one.

Is there any provider in the US that offers reasonable international shipping for colo customers? Or do you all just buy local and drive it over?

Most colo contracts assume you are shipping gear to them, not that they are sourcing it. Some will receive and rack for you if you coordinate, but they charge for it. The Buffalo place I use charges $50 per box for unboxing and rack-and-stack, which is fair if you are not local.

For international, look at Hetzner in Germany instead. Their auction servers are cheap, they will rack them, and their connectivity to South America is decent. I have a friend in Argentina who does exactly this. The latency to Brazil is better than you would expect, around 180ms to Sao Paulo.

Shipping hardware from the US to Brazil is a customs nightmare from what I hear. Not worth the headache.

I run one small server in a friend's closet in Osaka. No colo, no rack, just a quiet NUC on a shelf with a UPS.

Reading about 280W draws and quarter racks makes me feel like I am not even in the same hobby. My entire setup peaks at 15W. It runs a few static sites, a Matrix homeserver for family, and a backup borg target — https://www.borgbackup.org.

But I appreciate the knowledge here. If I ever need to scale, at least I know what 10A at 120V means and why I should ask about 208V. For now I will keep my quiet mind and my single server.

Question for the colo people: do you factor e-waste into your cost calculations? Those R630s will be scrap metal eventually. Who pays for disposal?

Honestly? No. The colo contract does not mention it and I have not asked. I assume when these die I strip the RAM and SSDs, recycle the chassis through a local e-waste event, and eat the cost. It is maybe $20 in gas and time.

For enterprise gear there are companies that will pick up pallets for free if there is enough precious metal value. Gold in the CPU sockets, copper in the heatsinks. But for four servers? Not worth their truck roll.

Something I should probably think more about. Thanks for the nudge.

This is valid and we need more of it here. Not everyone needs a rack. The forum is for "folks who run workloads on tight budgets" and a used NUC drawing 15W is about as tight as it gets.

That said, zoekyo raises a good point about e-waste. I have reached out to the Buffalo provider Carl mentioned (yes, I know who it is) to ask about their policy. They said customers are responsible for removal, but they will store decommissioned gear for 30 days before charging $10/month per U. After 90 days they reserve the right to recycle it. Fair enough, but worth knowing.

Also: andrewpollos59, welcome. Your perspective on pricing in Brazil is valuable. Please start a thread on South American hosting if you are willing. I suspect you are not the only one here dealing with import taxes and limited local options.

Haroldgsm and Carl: you have both made your points. Let us not turn every thread into a whitebox versus Dell efficiency debate. Both approaches have merits depending on constraints.