In the world of cloud data storage moving data may not seem like a costly endeavor, however, it depends where you’re moving it to and with who. We’re going to deep dive in the world of communications charges between digital destinations.
Let’s start with a basic example such as Microsoft, they have their virtual desktop which is Windows 365 and then they have their application and server hosting counterpart Azure.
When moving files, data , etc. between the two entities, in most cases you get charged a fee, call it a “communication charge” this occurs whenever data is moving between different entities, sometimes within a network. These charges occur when a file or database is updated, accessed, transferred, or moved from one virtual container, this being a server or desktop, to another. If you look at the model that Windows 365, Azure, or Amazon (AWS) utilize, you’ll notice that with their pricing model they charge a fee when ANY data is moved. In this blog we’ll explore how you’re getting charged to move data, how the costs of data movement adds up, what you can do to get the best value when managing your data.
Surprise Billing, Why are my Data Costs so High?
Every business handles and moves their data differently, some of the data is coming from outside of the network and some is moving within the network. Based on your data center’s pricing model these fees can vary, let’s look at the two geographic example below:
Business A: Moves data outbound 80% WITHIN the same continent region (North America) and 20% outside of North America, based on Azure’s pricing of .02/GB for intra-continent outbound and .05/GB for inter-continent outbound, for easy math let’s say this cost is $260 (yeah, a lot of data).
Business B: Moves data the exact opposite way, 80% outside of region and 20% within. Resulting in a much higher price of $440.
You’re paying by the gigabyte when it comes to calculating price, using this basic example you can see how situations can arise where data costs can begin to add up.
How the Wrong Cloud Based Hosting can be Costly.
Besides potentially paying an exorbitant amount to move your own data, Microsoft and the like provide no support or services when it comes to set up, integration, and monitoring. This means if you don’t have your own IT team in house or on call you could down and not even know it. Besides the unforeseen costs between paying for your cloud data storage and having to employ a separate IT team whether in house or remote, there is a real concern for the cost of moving the data itself.. With a host like Azure for example let’s look into these “Availability Zones” again from before, for example, data is being transferred domestically (North America) to a location outside of your zone yet still domestic you’ll be charged .02 per Gigabyte. However, if you happen to be somewhere like South America, you’re being charged .16 per GB regardless if it’s domestic or international. Note: These are very basic price differences based on location. You could incur a new swath of expenses when it comes to data transfers between certain VMs, and you can explore those here.
How can I get the best value for managing my data?
Server and Application hosting is a big business for the “Microsofts” of the world but you don’t have to feel like outrageous fees are the only way out. At Protected Harbor we understand that moving your own data shouldn’t cost a fortune, throughout our experiences we believe that a flat rate model is the most cost effective for the majority of businesses. With Microsoft offering the virtual desktop side (Windows 365) as well as the hosting for servers and applications (Azure) but that’s really the extent of it. As we discovered earlier, there’s no support, monitoring, etc. At Protected Harbor our cloud based web hosting is a cut above. Our Protected Data Center offers everything you’d need to keep your business secure and efficient while staying within budget. We offer support, monitoring and back up on Azure and AWS, and when utilizing our private cloud, we can deploy our proprietary technology called Application Outage Avoidance (AOA) which interconnects network devices and servers with scripted action in a unified protection bubble. If one component or server is running low on disk space, AOA automatically adds more disk space and therefore the outage is avoided due to a scripted procedure.
At Protected Harbor we provide our Application Outage Avoidance at no extra cost because we understand how import it is to not only control your costs as a business owner but how important it is to increase your systems durability and resilience. Bottom line when it comes to data movement and protection, why pay twice as much for half the service when you could pay half as much for twice the tools to keep your business up, running, and secure.
Overall, explore every option available to you when it comes to managing your data, make sure you research the data centers you’re looking to use, what their support looks like, their pricing models, if they offer you any kind of configuration or integration assistance.
If you’re looking for unparalleled security, support for Azure/AWS, private cloud access, a dedicated support team, and flat rate data pricing that’s often half the price of other vendors then we’d be happy to have you at Protected Harbor, contact us today!
