Web hosting provider FastServers.Net (fastservers.net) hopes to change this when it introduces its fully managed, Velocity Exchange series of Windows dedicated servers later this month. The solution, which officially launches May 25, will offer clients a fully functional Microsoft Exchange 2003 server without having to worry about setup, configuration, or administration.

Ian Andrusyk, FastServers.Net president and CEO, says the company decided to develop the solution after seeing a definite absence of dedicated Exchange server offerings within the industry.

"We didn't really see a lot of people that were doing, or at least specializing in just the single server Exchange boxes," says Andrusyk.

"To offer organizations Microsoft Exchange, companies need to deploy Microsoft Exchange from other control panel vendors, such as SWsoft and Ensim," adds Aaron Phillips, VP of sales and marketing for FastServers.Net. "[These] are all control panels developers designed to sell Microsoft Exchange hosting or multiple servers of eight to 10. A small to medium-sized business looking to deploy Exchange server for internal users doesn't have a budget for eight to 10 servers."

FastServers.Net's new Exchange server solution offers an exclusive DEFCON 1 server management level to provide businesses with a secure, fully-managed Exchange server with 100 percent uptime. The DEFCON 1 Service Level also includes free patch management, security updates and full monitoring handled by FastServers.Net's administration staff.

The client organization can benefit from Exchange's advanced communication features without the cost of hiring an on-staff Exchange administrator or the painstaking task of maintaining a server. FastServers.Net's Easy Exchange administrator control panel simplifies adding, deleting and configuring mailboxes.

FastServers.Net's Windows Velocity Exchange Servers includes all the necessary components for a organization to run their email, such as a hardware-based firewall, server AntiVirus software and advanced anti-spam solution to provide secure environment for email.

The Velocity Exchange Server includes a 128-bit SSL certificate and FastServers.Net's exclusive DEFCON 1 server management, which provides automatic updates to the Windows 2003 operating system and Exchange software to keep the server up-to-date and secure.

"As part of DEFCON 1 under our managed hosting offerings," says Andrusyk, "we're able to offer the customer 100 percent uptime, since we know we're going to have full control over not just the network, but since we're the only administrators in the server we can ensure that the server will be 100 percent of the time as well."

FastServers.Net's administrative staff constantly monitors the server's ports, services and resources, ensuring 100 percent uptime for users' Exchange solution. Meanwhile, ViaRemote ensures users with fully managed backups so that their mail is securely backed up in the event of a disaster.

And users are no longer riddled with the complicated and time-consuming administration responsibilities of running an Exchange hosting service since FastServers.Net managed Exchange hosting servers comes pre-configured with full support, while still providing the user with full control of their settings.

The end result is a managed Exchange hosting server that allows users to create new domains and add new Exchange email accounts, distribution lists and shared folders via the Easy Exchange Administrator interface. Andrusyk says the new Velocity Exchange series of Windows dedicated servers is the next logical progression in its growing line of products.

"We've actually managed to develop the Exchange offering onto an existing Windows solution that would offer for regular shared hosting," says Andrusyk, "but instead, changing it to the shared environment, so it's going to fit very well within our products set while still being a new offering for us."