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| Author |
Message |
| 25 new of 184 responses total. |
mary
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response 125 of 184:
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Oct 14 12:09 UTC 2004 |
Our lease runs through May 31st, 2005. We need to give 120 days
notice of our intention to move or renew. This year we'd also need
to renegotiate a new lease or a new renewal clause.
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gregb
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response 126 of 184:
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Oct 14 15:49 UTC 2004 |
Four months? Sounds excessive to me. A lot can happen in that time.
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mary
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response 127 of 184:
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Oct 18 12:33 UTC 2004 |
We're talking Grex here.
The standard lease asked for three months notice, we ask that
be extended to four. I still think we'd have trouble finding
new housing, arranging phone lines, and moving in that period
of time. Heck, just making a decision would take at least
90 days.
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gelinas
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response 128 of 184:
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Oct 19 00:42 UTC 2004 |
I talked to Dr Strange today. A fun guy to listen to. :)
He says we can get some space upstairs in the machine room for the price
of the bandwidth: $100/50GB Transferred/month. More bandwidth would
be similarly priced. Electricity, air conditioning, insurance (for the
building, not our stuff), etc, are included in the price of the bandwidth.
WE *might* want to consider insurance of our own, for our equipment, and
maybe for the liability of damage our equipment might do, but Provide.Net
won't require it. (Based on our experience, both with damaged caused
and the price of insurance, we can reasonably decide to forgo the effort,
in my opinion.)
If we want a full rack in Southfield, the price is $400/mo, for 15-amp
service. Plus bandwidth. More amps means more money.
Southfield offers 24/7 access, while the Ypsilanti location offers "when
open" access (currently 0800-2200 daily).
In Ypsilanti, we would have to negotiate the telephone lines with the
telephone company, just as we do now.
So here's a question: How much bandwidth do we currently use on our DSL?
I know that Kip reset the password, to allow him to look at the modem's
logs. So what do they show?
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slynne
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response 129 of 184:
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Oct 23 14:57 UTC 2004 |
The price is right with Providenet if you ask me. I think we can
probably get away with less than 24 hour access. Plus if it is located
in Ypsilanti, it will be easier for staff to have access. If it were
located in Southfield, I think it would be too difficult for staff to
get there.
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mary
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response 130 of 184:
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Oct 23 16:17 UTC 2004 |
The board and staff present at the board meeting last night all felt
co-locaton at provide.net sounded like a good deal and a good fit
for our needs and budget. Joe was going to call back with a few
more questions, but, this may just work.
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gelinas
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response 131 of 184:
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Oct 23 21:04 UTC 2004 |
The questions included what happens if we go over our bandwidth allotment and
can we lock in the space now but not move in until May. Naturally, we'd not
begin paying until we moved in.
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keesan
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response 132 of 184:
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Oct 24 01:08 UTC 2004 |
Would it cost any more to move in January and continue paying for the old
lease but not the electricity or insurance or bandwidth?
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mary
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response 133 of 184:
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Oct 24 03:01 UTC 2004 |
An empty pumpkin room would mean no electric charges, but as long as
we are renting at the pumpkin we'd need to follow the rules of the
lease, including carrying liability insurance. It might be possible
to pay off the balance of rent due and end the lease early, allowing
us to cancel the insurance. Bandwidth is on a yearly contract,
running through sometime in July 2005. We're going to check and see
if we can get out early, with a reasonable cancellation penalty.
Cleaning out the pumpkin will take some time.
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aruba
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response 134 of 184:
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Oct 24 05:48 UTC 2004 |
I checked our DSL contract, and it says that if we terminate the agreement
early, we are liable for 75% of the remaining monthly charges. Our contract
runs through July 15th. It automatically renews for another year unless we
tell them otherwise by June 15th.
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mary
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response 135 of 184:
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Oct 24 12:41 UTC 2004 |
So let me see if I'm thinking this through correctly. Right now, in the
pumpkin, our costs for rent, electric, two phone lines, DSL and insurance
run around $300 a month. At provide.net, assuming we'll have two phone
lines, our monthly expenses would be around $150 a month. So how many
months early could we move to co-lo and break even on expenses?
Someone who knows the exact amounts of the different expenses
and is really good at math is needed here. I have someone in mind... ;-)
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aruba
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response 136 of 184:
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Oct 24 19:20 UTC 2004 |
Well, it looks to me like moving out of the Pumpkin would save us, between
now and the end of May, per month,
61.02 Electricity
46.00 Insurance
33.75 25% of our DSL bill
------
140.77
In other words, if we moved today we could pay off our lease, cancel the
insurance and get a refund, cancel the DSL and pay 75% of the rest of what
we're contracted for. So we'd immediately begin paying $140.77 less per
month than we pay now. If provide.net is really $100/month, that means
moving at any time saves us $40/month until the end of May.
Phone lines will cost $42 each to move.
To me, the provide.net deal sounds too good to be true, so I'd like to see
something in writing.
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slynne
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response 137 of 184:
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Oct 24 21:00 UTC 2004 |
It never hurts to get something in writing.
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mary
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response 138 of 184:
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Oct 24 22:32 UTC 2004 |
I suspect, with the move, we'd probably drop from four phone lines
to, maybe, two. More overall savings, after installation.
Could we empty the pumpkin in a month's time? Once we get all that
legacy stuff out of there, we'll owe less in property tax too. Not
even sure we'll pay any property tax in co-lo.
Thanks for the figures, Mark.
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naftee
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response 139 of 184:
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Oct 24 23:03 UTC 2004 |
Thanks for the mark, figures.
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mfp
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response 140 of 184:
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Oct 25 01:46 UTC 2004 |
Point.
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gelinas
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response 141 of 184:
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Oct 25 02:19 UTC 2004 |
Since provide.net is outside the city limits, you are right, Mary: we won't
owe Ann Arbor property tax on our stuff.
I'll add a written offer/contract to the list of questions.
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keesan
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response 142 of 184:
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Oct 25 23:21 UTC 2004 |
If property tax is paid yearly, is it prorated if you move out of town in mid
year?
Any further information about the Mallet's Creek Library option?
Jim and I can recycle any obsolete equipment that nobody bids on.
Greenboard, cpu, copper (pure or mixed with plastic), aluminum, magnetic,
mixed metals - all taken at Friedman's, the rest (plastic) is trashed.
We have received $2 per bikeload (big load) for the good stuff that only took
10 hours to disassemble.
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mfp
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response 143 of 184:
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Oct 25 23:23 UTC 2004 |
Point.
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aruba
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response 144 of 184:
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Oct 26 00:21 UTC 2004 |
Re #142: Sindi - I'm assuming that our Insurance policy is prorated if we
cancel it. That's certainly true of car insurance. Anyone have any
experience with liability insurance?
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mfp
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response 145 of 184:
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Oct 26 01:43 UTC 2004 |
Point.
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gregb
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response 146 of 184:
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Nov 5 18:13 UTC 2004 |
Re. 142: Two bucks for 10 hrs. work? Good thing it's for a good cause.
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gelinas
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response 147 of 184:
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Dec 18 05:28 UTC 2004 |
Provide.net gave us a written quote, which I presented to the Board this
evening:
Provide.net
663 S. Hewitt Road
Ypsilanti, MI 48198
(734) 480-4200
(888) 480-4200
Quote for Co-location of GREX systems
Co-location of GREX Computer $100.00/month
Includes: 50GB transfer allocation
connection to 100mb netowrk
connection to UPS
connection to KVM
physical access to computer 10am to
10pm any day (except holidays)
physical access available other times
by arrangement
Extra bandwidth available in 50GB increments at $50.00/month.
Second computer (sharing bandwidth with first) $30.00/month.
Phone lines for modems must be ordered by you (bill in your name).
No extra charge will be made for cross-connects (running
phone lines from our phone box to your modems).
No signed contracts are necessary. Insurance is not required.
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gelinas
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response 148 of 184:
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Dec 18 05:31 UTC 2004 |
The bandwidth is measured by generating graphs from the router. If we are
consistently over our allocation, they will contact us to arrange either
to cut back or usage or jump to the next price-point, effective the next
month.
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mary
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response 149 of 184:
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Dec 18 12:18 UTC 2004 |
The board voted to make this move, by February 1st. One thing that needs
to be decided, quickly, is how many phone lines we'll need to have
installed for this new location. I believe we now have 4 dialup lines
available. I'd love to see Jan run recent data on usage but I'm not sure
he's available for this. I'd also like to get some feedback from our
dialup users on whether they'd be willing to have us cut to two lines,
meaning they'd get a busy signal from time to time, with the idea that
such a move could save us a chunk of change.
We'll only start saving money when we are out of the Pumpkin. So we need
to be out of the Pumpkin. The plan, so far, is to empty the Pumpkin by
February 1st, pay off the remainder of our lease which runs through May,
and cancel our insurance getting the unused seven months of premium back.
We'll no longer be paying for electric at that time. We'll need to look
into the DSL lease to see if we could pay a penalty and be out of that
contract sooner.
Which leaves the problem of emptying the Pumpkin. I suspect that will be
a challenge but one we'll meet as long as we set a firm deadline.
Do we need a new item to discuss this?
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