No offence but it's ridiculous to think about having a DC in the basement. You should colo with a proper DC.

stick with a pro data center

Data center in a basement would be rough. Think about the first time it stormed and your basement flooded. Go Colo.

One thing which may see a rise to the basement DC is the fibre2home connections which are looking at rolling out (not sure if they are in the US already).

It is theoretically do-able however not without decent capital, leased lines etc - if you had that sort of capital you may as well just buy a dedicated suite at a DC

Agreed, I don't see how the basement idea could ever be financially feasible though it would be an interesting experiment!

There is definitely some advantages to running it yourself. For example, if you have 14 racks in a basement and you don't go all technical and professional, you could cool the spce with an exhaust fan and a floor air conditioner. The 7000 cfm fan to cool it, would cost $1 to $2 per day. While it might not be the best setup int he world it could work.

On 14 racks depending on how much bandwidth you are using, you could run dual DS3's instead of fiber. Let's face it, data cetners expect you only to use less than a meg per box. The average data center rack consumes between 10 - 15 mbps per month. I know that is between 140 mbps - 210 mbps that is a lot of DS3 lines. The thing is, you can get AT&T , Charter, or Comcast to run you a ethernet up to 1 gbps for under $20 per meg even in remote areas. I know, I looked into it.

If your not trying to run a enterprise level options, you can keep costs much lower. You buy a $500.00 durarack and there is no $300.00 - 800.00/month in rack fees. You have taken it so your paying bandwidth and electric only.

While I wouldn't recommend it, it is possible and could be done cost effectively.

Right now, even though the price of T-1's and other connectivity has dropped, it is still more expensive to pull in a T-1 and hook up multiple servers (typically) than to look at a colocation facility and just get a 1/2 cab or Full Cabinet.

With hardware as cheap as it has been in decades, Colocation is one of the most viable options you can find right now.

Forgot to even mention, HVAC, Power, redundancy, etc. Most facilities offer this, and you could never build those things in to the extent that most Top Tier Datacenters do, (within a residential setting).

I think PVT summed it up pretty well. A basement is just not a good choice. I would only recommend it for a server for backups.

Yeah Rob, I'm interested in doing something like that myself... It's only a thought but if i properly did out my Garage and turned it into a "REAL Datacentre" then i'll be fine... Good to hear from a guy from wiltshire as well

- Many Thanks,

I'm buying a cheap server and installing in into my home, It'll be in the storage room its cold in that room and theres a build in ac also Got a good cealing fan, I just have to some day try to get intouch with my ISP and ask, This server is going to be for me programming and hostng a web dev site.

Don't do it. You lack the ability to stay reliable unless you get all the needed stuff. I worked for a company that started in the basement. Here's some of the things that had to get done.

1.) Diesel generator
2.) Tons of UPS's (Wasn't making a lot of money, so you get what you can)
3.) 400Amp service to the house. In this case, we pushed to close to that 400A mark and ended up getting in safety trouble with the electric company. They came out, and ran 600A service, and upgraded everything on our dime to keep them self.
4.) Lots of air conditioning.
5.) T1's at a min, but they are expensive and don't provide the best throughput.

That's just my first thoughts.

I really do not think this is possible. 14 racks full of equipment will pull more power than most residential houses have available. Plus the amount of cooling needed to do this is more than most large houses have for the entire house. I can see someone hosting 1-10 servers used for light web traffic but anything more than this and you start running into some serious infrastructure problems.

Have to agree with Joe. Find me one provider with 14 racks located in a residential house that has been in business longer than 3 months.