Hosting on Verizon FiOS

I was recently browsing some user posts at WebhostingTalk.com and found an interesting debate going on about whether Verizon’s FiOS was a stable and capable Internet connection for hosting your own servers, rather than pulling a DS-3 or other business class service (or hosting your server at colocation data center).

Here’s a sampling of some of the comments I found:

“You may want to check the TOS/AUP. I would think that hosting on FIOS is not allowed.”

“The FIOS service is designed for broadband access. It is not for people hosting or using the bandwidth in a commercial/wholesale manner. Generally the telcos call this DIA, Dedicated Internet Access, and you will pay at least $100/Mbps.”

“You’ll need to pay extra for a business plan to do this [and also get a static IP]. I personally do use this for personal stuff. It works fine. I wouldn’t use it for anything critical, however. With that said I’ve had 100% uptime on the fios in the past year.”

And the rest of the comments were very similar in nature. The bottom line consensus of the user community is “hosting on FiOS is a bad idea, rent a server or pull a DS-3″. Let’s discuss further and find out the truth.

Hosting on a FiOS connection

The first thing I want to do is point out two VERY important things:

1. Hosting on FiOS is an absolutely fine thing to do, and is fully supported by Verizon.
2. There is a major difference between Verizon’s Consumer FiOS and Verizon’s Business FiOS.

Consumer FiOS is generally delivered over PPPoE (Point to Point Protocol over Ethernet). Consumer FiOS is also in most territories full of restrictions on usage, including bandwidth caps and blocked ports (25, 80, 443 for example). Consumer FiOS also prohibits hosting servers of any kind in its Terms of Service. Hosting on Consumer FiOS is a bad idea, period. Don’t do it.

However, and lucky for us, Verizon also offers a Business FiOS package with static IPs (up to 256), no blocked ports, no PPPoE, and no ToS restrictions for hosting in the contract. This service is designed as a replacement for legacy dedicated services such as DS-1, DS-3 and Metro Area Ethernet services. Business FiOS comes in many speeds such as 15/5, 20/20, 25/15, and 50/50 (at the time of this writing) with 100/100 service planned for later this year. The only caveat to Business FiOS is that it usually costs around $120/month compared to Consumer FiOS that starts at $39/month. With Business FiOS you can also use your own router (such as a Cisco).

There are things to consider when hosting yourself. The most common gotchas are space for the servers, cooling, and power redundancy. Also, remember, if you host your own servers on Business FiOS connection then you’re limiting yourself to a single point of failure. If your FiOS goes down, you’re down. When hosting in a colocation data center there are usually at least three data providers in the center. You’re going to also need some sort of back up power (a large UPS might be enough for you).

Real World Hosting on Verizon FiOS

Now that I’ve taken you through some of the caveats of hosting on FiOS and dispelled some of the myths, let’s talk about a real world example of a company running it’s entire operation from a Business FiOS connection.

That would be me. That’s right. This website, and over 40 other websites of mine are running on a 20/20 symmetrical FiOS connection. I have two servers (one Windows 2003 server running mail, and some .NET applications and another Ubuntu 64 server running my WordPress and PHP applications). It’s all fronted by a Cisco 871W router connected directly to Verizon. Surprised? You shouldn’t be.

I have a very large APC UPS that gives me about six hours of runtime in the case of a power outage. This UPS also backs up the Verizon ONT. If the ONT loses power, it drops Internet services and maintains only the telephone service. It’s vital to provide backup power to the ONT whether hosting at home, or at your business location.

With 20 mb/s symmetrical FiOS and my 40+ websites I receive over 20,000 unique hits per day. The FiOS circuit is monitored by Cacti (through the Cisco router) and varies from 1 to 3 mb/s most of the day, with spikes ranging from 5 to 10 mb/s when my sites make it into Digg or Slashdot for example. Speaking of Slashdot… I’ve been Slashdotted three times since running on FiOS and not once did my website(s) become unavailable or slow to respond. The FiOS circuit hit 100% utilization for over six hours on one such occurrence. I immediately called friends across town on other services (AT&T and Comcast) and asked them to check my sites performance. They said they could tell it was a little slower, but more than acceptable performance.

Why did I decide to Host on FiOS?

That’s a great question. I’ll tell you. It’s affordable, convenient, and rock solid reliable.

• Since I started hosting on FiOS, back in 2006 it has literally not been down for more than a few minutes here or there.
• I pay a little more than $120/month for service.
• Having my servers here locally makes maintenance and backups simple.

And there you have it. Hosting a server (or servers) on Verizon FiOS is simple, easy, affordable and makes perfect sense. It’s not against Verizon’s ToS (on business class service) and oh… I almost forgot… FAST.