Private cloud hosting is the solution for larger enterprises with resource requirements that outstrip what the shared cloud can offer; more often than not a private cloud configuration can offer better value for money and can deliver a more tailored hosting experience. The platform that lies at the heart of the private cloud is responsible for running everything across the servers that form the cloud as resource management is key to ensuring that a cloud system remains stable; eNlight Cloud Hosting is a recommended platform that will provide you with one interface through which you can manage all of the servers in your cluster and their related resources, enabling you to keep measure of the percentage of spare capacity that is available. The reliability of the cloud will also rely on the hardware that has been used to form the platform; blade servers are the best for such an environment because they have a large hardware capacity and a relatively small rack footprint so that you are able to maximize the level of power received for the space that is used. Security in the cloud can also be reliant on the hardware used, but the focus here is going to be on using hardware firewalls to provide a satisfactory level of protection against DDoS attacks and other such issues; furthermore, the communications between servers in the cloud should be carried internally for security reasons.

Reliability of the Private Cloud

The private cloud is yours to use only and no one else’s so that you have full control of your web hosting environment; you will be able to monitor resource usage throughout the entire cloud as well as the status of individual virtual machines. As there will be no other users to impact on the performance of the cloud you can be assured that you will be provided with a high performance hosting experience; however, it is up to you to keep a good level of capacity spare so that your virtual machines have room for vertical and horizontal scaling when they are placed under high loads – this will reduce the chances of these servers crashing because of a lack of resources.

Security of the Private Cloud

Understanding the level of security that comes from the private cloud lies in the word ‘private’ because this guarantees that you won’t have anyone else using any portion of the environment that you are hosted in because your cloud will be based around dedicated servers that are there solely for you. Each virtual machine hosted in the private cloud is its own secure dedicated hosting environment that can’t be accessed directly through in the cloud, rather it will need to be accessed in the same way that you could access a regular server – i.e. SSH for Linux and Remote Desktop for Windows; this will help to prevent damage to other virtual machines if one happens to become compromised. Every server in the cloud should be communicating via an internal LAN that is local to the cloud only so that these connections can’t be intercepted or eavesdropped; this is fairly simple to setup and will guarantee that all communications are secure and not routed through an internet-facing network.

Costs of a Private Cloud

The cost of a private cloud solution is going to be based on the number of servers that are necessary to provide you with the resources and power that you require. Such a pricing structure means that you have control over how much you pay as you will only need to order the resources that you need to begin with because a cloud can be expanded at a later date without any downtime by simply adding extra servers to the cluster; any good cloud hosting platform will allow a new server into the cluster with just a few clicks once the machine has been bought online and configured appropriately. If you are migrating existing servers into the private cloud then it will be easier for you to predict the resources that you are going to need because you can base it on your existing requirements, but if you are upgrading to the private cloud from the shared cloud then it will benefit you to consult an expert as to what resource figures would suit you best.