I posted on stackoverflow as to the overall benefits of managed hosting vs non-managed hosting.

The more I think about it, it seems to boil down to one question: should I use a managed host because they take care of the firewall, or would I be okay managing my own, software firewall?

The sites on the box do get quite a lot of traffic but as for throughput and what-not, it's not something I know much about.

Ideally, i'd take my sites over to a Linode stack and manage incoming connections using iptables or an alternative.

Here are some example hardware solutions a managed host would provide:

• Cisco Pix 501, Pix 506, Pix 515 and ASA 5505 and ASA 5510 Firewalls, configurable in a control panel
• the likes of an enterprise firewall such as FortiGate 110C

Aside from this, I do not need managed hosting, so I appreciate your suggestions.