I have reached a capacity where managed hosting is becoming expensive - especially with respect to the cost of bandwidth we are using. A cursory quote from cogent demonstrate that we could be saving over 70% on our total transit expenditure.
What are the key factors when deciding on choosing a datacenter to colocate our servers in, and what are the type of costs involved in doing so (necessary hardware purchases, etc)?
Additionally, how do I decide upon IP transit providers. Are there any tariffs available for comparison, or do I really need to call each one just to get a price comparison? What is a realistic price for a 2Gbps connection? What are the caveats of a 95th percentile calculation?
It all feels bit overwhelming, so I could use a prod in the right direction to understand how I go about colocating. Our primary market is the UK and Western Europe.
Any advice would be much appreciated.