Hosting SharePoint
In a few words -
don't host SharePoint yourself *
SharePoint , especially the 2013 version, has got so resource heavy that it makes sense to use a cloud service.
* But I don't want my data in the cloud
OK - so you have a pile of senstive data, need to be ITAR compliant, or corporate restrictions.... READ ON
Hybrid
A hybrid SharePoint solution where some data is hosted inside your enterprise, and the rest in the cloud may be the best option...
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Cloud
Using a cloud hosted SharePoint is an obvious cost/hassle reduction for small
and medium sized companies. You don't have to host the machines yourself, the
service has high availability and redundancy built-in.
Microsoft offer "Office 365" or "SharePoint Online" and there are 3rd party
providers.
However - cloud hosted SharePoint has issues:
Self-Hosted
So you need to keep everything in-house, and have the hardware available...
Virtualized works well, but you'll need to dedicate six to eight boxes with 24Gb RAM...
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