Not the poster you replied to but from my anecdotal experience -- from most of my work ever.
I can only remember 3 companies out of all 40+ I consulted and contracted for that actually needed a separate machine for app and a DB, let alone such that actually truly need several of each.
It's a very non-romantic truth but most projects out there can easily fit in a VPS with 4 CPU cores, 8GB ram and 100-200GB SSD space. App + DB + self-hosted telemetry included.
I can only remember 3 companies out of all 40+ I consulted and contracted for that actually needed a separate machine for app and a DB, let alone such that actually truly need several of each.
It's a very non-romantic truth but most projects out there can easily fit in a VPS with 4 CPU cores, 8GB ram and 100-200GB SSD space. App + DB + self-hosted telemetry included.