Hosting a site that stores a large amount of images using asp.net MVC 4?

Question

I am working on a website that is kinda like Flickr, for my photography course. Now every student has an account and is able to upload their photographs, which can be seen by everyone who goes onto the site.

Each student will be uploading about 100 photographs during the semester, and there are around 30 students, what is the best option to store the images? And since the pictures are very HQ, they take up a lot of space.

I have worked with ASP.NET MVC before, but I've never been the one to actually deploy the website, so I am a bit lost at that. For now I am storing the images on a MySQL database, but is there a more efficient way, also, I would like to be adviced as to which hosting plan I should buy on godaddy.com? Should I get a VPS?

Or if you can provide me with a link to a tutorial that can point me in the right direction?

Thanks a lot for your help.

Answer 1

For windows hosting (you want to host your MVC 4 site), I would recommend you to find the provider that specialize in this field. You can find this provider at Microsoft forums, you can find it here.

Answer 2

First, of all I wouldn't advise you Goddady hosting as this company is not reliable.They are good for domain registration, but not for hosting.

First of all, I advise you to read reviews about Godaddy here

Answer 3

Since you're looking to store around 3000 HQ images per semester. If each of them are around 10 MB, they are going to occupy 30 GB space per semester for you. So, the first important question in deciding VPS / Shared hosting will be how do you plan to store them?

If you're planning to store them in SQL Server, I really doubt if any hosting company will allow you to store 30 GB (incremental) in shared hosting SQL server. You've to select a Windows VPS in that case.

If you're planning to store image as a file, you can try out a shared hosting solution from a specialist. But remember that your incremental storage requirements will be huge and most probably a shared hosting account will be stretched to fulfill that.

Overall, a Windows VPS with a control panel like Websitepanel is much more easier to manage. They are easily expandable and give you full access to your server environment. Since your website is image oriented, use CDN (Content Delivery Network) in your application. It reduces server load, speedup your website amazingly.

Answer 4

In the interest of the KISS principle, why are you considering VPS? Does it really have anything to do with the system requirements?

I ask because it seems to me that VPS is an unnessary level of complexity for the project you describe. VPS is useful when (1) clients are likely to use the service in intensive bursts, and (2) when data security is paramount. There are also other reasons such as data growth and data mobility, but those don't seem to be relevent either.

My (humble) advice is start simple and start local. Use localhost to serve your site and develop your code. Then start worrying about where to host it.