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Comment by txutxu | Hacker News Reader

If you web application could run ok (for the number of visitors) in a netbook with mechanical disk, then an Atom is ok.

Note that I've seen people running gnome on a netbook.

Still, I see this, and I think more about: "backups", "configuration management", "shell access", "VPN to other more powerful dedicated servers in OVH", "personal storage", "scheduled tasks", "monitoring systems", "status pages", etc...

The price is nothing, I still ask myself if it's rentable because "it's an Atom" and changes the power bill, or this is more a unprofitable product to attract you to other products.

Lets say 3€ * 12m = 36€ year, It takes some years to recover the hardware costs (without count electricity bills, company salaries, connectivity, taxes, etc).

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> The price is nothing, I still ask myself if it's rentable because "it's an Atom" and changes the power bill, or this is more a unprofitable product to attract you to other products.

pretty sure it's the latter. Even if there is minimal human effort on part of OVH involved that probably leads to unprofitability. For example a RAM stick breaks and has to be switched out, I guess it takes a systems engineer in the NOC at least 30 minutes to locate the server, disconnect it, replace the stick, mount the server again, make sure it is running fine. Assuming that employee get's paid 20 GBP, that is a 10 pound cost plus replacement RAM which is...I dont know...let's say 20 GBP, recouping that kind of money would take about a year (I know very dirty napkin calculations).

I bet they have a handful of these gimmick servers and they are going to sell out very soon. Comparable to the Raspberry Pi colocation edis offers ( http://www.edis.at/en/server/colocation/austria/raspberrypi/ ) try to order and you will find that they are sold out.

>For example a RAM stick breaks and has to be switched out, I guess it takes a systems engineer in the NOC at least 30 minutes to locate the server, disconnect it, replace the stick, mount the server

These servers run without cases, using water cooling. Hardware failure automatically notifies the NOC with the location of the failed hardware and replacement parts are already waiting on the desk.

>handful of these gimmick servers

OVH is one of the largest ISPs in the world, and is well known for disruptive pricing and services, such as 100/100 Mbps broadband to the home for $20/month.

Don't get me wrong, this is an awesome offer but because I believe that these may be not available for a long time I am currently in the check out process, ordering one of these for a year even though I don't have an immediate use.

Edit: Order placed, eagerly awaiting my Isgenug (that is what they are called for the German market) :)

"is enough"?

yep translates to Isenough only the german "is" is a colloquial version of "ist" which is proper spelling.

"kimsufi" is actually phonetic in French for "qui me suffit", ie that suffices me, that is enough for me. I didn't know they translated those.

The reason this works is because only a few would face hardware issues, so while there would be a few unprofitable accounts as a result of hardware issues, the majority would be just fine. It's the same reason stores accept returns and don't go broke because of it; only a few customers actually return a purchase.

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