The difference lies not in the technology, but in who is responsible: who takes care of updates, monitoring and backups? This guide explains which model is suitable in which situation – and what each actually costs.
Technically speaking, both models offer the same infrastructure. The difference lies in who is responsible for running the service – and who is liable if something breaks down at night.
You are granted root access to a virtual or physical machine – everything else is up to you: the operating system, updates, security patches, monitoring, backups and recovery in the event of a failure.
You use the server as if it were your own, without having to worry about the underlying infrastructure. centron takes care of the set-up, updates, security patches, monitoring and backups – with dedicated contact persons.
The key question to ask before making your choice: Which of these tasks are you willing and able to take on yourself on a long-term basis?
| Task | Unmanaged | Managed by centron |
|---|---|---|
| Provision of hardware | centron | centron |
| Install the operating system | You | centron |
| Basic configuration & curing | You | centron |
| Apply security patches | You | centron |
| Monitoring & Alerts | You | centron, 24/7 |
| Setting up and checking backups | You | centron |
| Recovery in the event of a fault | You | centron |
| Applications and data | You | You |
Even with the managed model, your applications and data remain under your control – centron takes care of the infrastructure, not your business.
The unmanaged option is cheaper in terms of infrastructure costs. However, a fair calculation also takes into account the working hours tied up internally.
An unmanaged server costs from €3.12 per month with Centron. On top of this come the costs associated with patches, setting up monitoring, checking backups and troubleshooting – which, depending on the environment, can take several hours a month, plus on-call support.
Managed hosting shifts this workload to centron. Whether it’s worth it depends less on the price of the server than on how much an hour of administration costs your business – and how much a system outage would cost.
At centron, monitoring, backups and 24/7 support are included in the managed service model – with no extra charge or different support tiers.
There are several stages between ‘doing everything yourself’ and ‘outsourcing everything’. You don’t have to commit to one option permanently – you can switch between the models without having to migrate your systems.
Note: Information on competitors reflects the publicly available position as of August 2026 and does not claim to be exhaustive; features and prices may have changed since. Only the current information provided by the respective providers is authoritative. The trademarks mentioned are the property of their respective owners; there are no partnerships. centron prices: entry-level prices plus VAT; details can be found on the product and pricing pages.
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