Posts Tagged ‘web hosting’

Web Hosting - Website Hosting

Monday, July 28th, 2008

Web Hosting

When we talk about website hosting, we like to think of it as a location for your website to live or operate from. Most people do not choose the least or most expensive place to live.

We believe that your you should look for the same things for your website as you would for your home or place of business:

Accessibility
Reliability
Affordability
Value

Sadly, many people do not give it much thought and end up hosting with the least expensive or the most expensive (thinking that for that price it must be the best). Some people choose to host with Bob’s neighbor’s brother’s company.

Review hosting packages and see if you do not agree that they offer the best value for your website hosting dollar.

Our UNIX Web Hosting Packages include the following features:.

World Class Data Center

Our 99.96% uptime guarantee is made possible by our state of the art data center featuring dual UPS, dedicated backup generator and multiple redundant internet gateways.

High Performance Web Servers

Our rackmounted web servers are powerful industrial-strength equipment providing optimized performance.

Load Balanced Web Servers

Multiple redundant load balanced web servers means increased reliability and performance at no extra cost.

Advanced Control Panel

Managing your web site and email accounts does not require advanced technical skills. Our online control panel is simple enough for a novice but powerful enough for experienced users.

Enhanced Email New - Email Virus Scanning

Every account includes unlimited POP3 and iMAP accounts, email forwarding, list server, catch-all alias, auto-responders, vacation messages, web based email, and spam filters.

Apache Web Server

The most popular web server software in use today. Provides the best combination of security, reliability and performance in a shared hosting environment.

Full Developer Environment

Support for all major tools and languages including Secure Shell (SSH), Server Side Includes (SSI), CGI-BIN, FastCGI, Perl, PHP, Python, and MySQL.

Secure Your Own Bandwith with a Dedicated Server

Saturday, March 15th, 2008

If you are serious about your online business, you might just consider looking for a dedicated web server. A dedicated server is actually an entire server which is at your disposal, and which is not shared with anybody else.

Right from the beginning, the advantages are very clear: you, as the webmaster, have full control over your server, including the choice of operating system, server hardware, addons etc. Almost everything on a managed dedicated server can be customized as per your own personal needs, while the administration part is taken care of by the hosting company.

The most important advantage of using a managed dedicated server is that your website performance will not be affected by the traffic of the other websites with which you would have been sharing your server’s bandwidth.

Dedicated hosting environment provides an exclusive server devoted to the sole purpose of serving one user only. You do not share the resources with other users.

Before dedicated servers became popular, a webmaster used to have two hosting options, low-priced shared hosting model and the premium-priced dedicated server. A person who bought space on a shared server would get a certain amount of disk space and monthly transfer, and would have the web site served from a common web server.

The hosting provider would attempt to provide a wide range of options for the web site developer, in order to increase the popularity of their products. But, for example, if a customer needed a non-standard program installed or maybe wanted to use a privileged account in order for a particular utility to run, he would not have the ability to do so on a shared server.

A simple example might be a site which requires a database to store the information in. Many hosting companies provide the standard MySQL database to use on their servers. If your application requires another type of database though, then it could prove to be incompatible with the shared hosting account.

And a dedicated server can be customized anyway you want. But, there’s also a catch. Because it can handle much more traffic than a shared hosting account, their much better performance doesn’t come cheap. A typical dedicated server can cost the savvy webmaster hundreds of dollars per month depending on its size, network connectivity and the amount of management required from the hosting company.

Webmasters who don’t fit into the standard shared hosting model and find that it doesn’t work anymore for them, or whose sites grew very popular and required a large amount of resources have the alternative of a dedicated server. It can be customized to exactly fit the needs of you as a site developer. And as long as your business is very successful, you are probably way better with a dedicated server at your disposal.

Do You Need Server Monitoring?

Tuesday, March 11th, 2008

Most dedicated server provide a 24×7 server monitoring feature as standard with their dedicated servers which ensure that the sites and servers are on line at all times. Without server monitoring, one would know what is happening with the web server he/she is using. Is PHP running? Does MySQL need to be restarted? You would be without direction just in case a bad situation comes up. Server monitoring is indeed one of the most important aspects of the web hosting business.

Now with shared hosting, monitoring is a standard feature however most people hosted on shared server have no clue what is going on. They just know their Joomla install isn’t working and they want it fixed. With dedicated hosting though server monitoring becomes much more important and critical because the web host you go with may or may not support you in this regard.

The basic things you need to keep your eyes on are HTTP, FTP, SMTP, POP3. Then you have other services that are second tier to that and you go down the line service by service.

In case your hosting provider doesn’t offer monitoring service as standard, there are numerous third party monitoring services out there that will monitor the server 24×7 for you. If you are not sure how, when, where and why your own web host does server monitoring you might want to ask.

Managed Dedicated Hosting

Thursday, February 28th, 2008

Managed hosting is best suited for the large companies with a strong online presence.It can be defined as an expanded dedicated hosting service where the web host will manage the dedicated server for you. The service has been described as ‘a glorified dedicated server armed with extended features and support’.

A Managed dedicated server is a dedicated server for one high resource account that takes care of the setup, software installation, security monitoring, backups, and technical support that is needed to help you focus on growing your business.

It eliminates the headaches and support costs associated with having to run your own server. In case of a managed hosting the complex task of server administration is thus handled by the web host rather than by the company. In dedicated servers the web host generally offers a choice of the operating system, routing equipment, network connection etc. but in managed hosting the web hosts offer even more.
Managed dedicated servers are the right solution for any website that has outgrown a shared hosting account, needs dedicated resources, runs processor intensive scripting, requires customized software installations, and for those sites that want the added security of being the only ones accessing the server. In other words managed dedicated server solutions are targeted to those customers who need the performance, reliability and security benefits of a dedicated server but don’t want to face the day-to-day hassles associated with the server or other technical problems.
The advantages of managed hosting are:

1. Security
Today’s fast-paced and competitive marketplace requires organizations to open their networks to all customers, suppliers, and business partners. This same openness, however, brings security risks that must be properly managed. This difficult task is delegated to the web host in case of managed hosting services.
2. Data Assurance
The web hosts provide daily back up of vital data that assures a secured and expandable data storage.

3. Server administration
The web hosts provide, maintains and monitors the server and related technical complexities. So the company doesn’t need to provide for expensive system administration resources.

4. Network management
The web hosts take the responsibility of the software, hardware and processes, but also the investments you’ve made in your own infrastructure.

5. Customer Support
You can expect premium customer support that is perfectly tailored to meet your managed environment and requirements. Customer Support staff of the service provider are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Whether you contact them by phone, email, or live chat, you are directly connected to a knowledgeable and professional representative of the web host who can help you pinpoint, resolve, and prevent any issues from impacting your business.

6. Flexible packages
Most web host companies keep their prices low by giving the clients’ the freedom and flexibility to choose the support plan that best fits their needs. Hence the companies get the opportunity to select the plan that meets their budgetary constraints.

7. Effective trouble shooting
As and when any problems related to hardware or software happens, the web hosts promptly and accurately diagnoses and cures the root of the problem. Hence it assures you of uninterrupted service that helps to run a successful business.

8. Constant Monitoring
Automated and human systems work simultaneously to monitor your server and network connection, preventing any issue from impacting your business.

9. Assurance of quality of equipments
Some web hosts provide high quality hardware from reputed manufacturers for managed hosting of clients to ensure reliability and compatibility with their application. The servers are generally provided with hardware-mirrored drives and base components that allow upgrades to the client’s server with minimal downtime and expense.

10. Regular upgrades
Hardware upgrades are handled by the web host service providers in case you provide some additional charges as specified in the contract terms and conditions. As your business grows you can afford to reconfigure or expand your growing needs.

In managed dedicated hosting the web hosts offers the customers a graphical user interface integrated with monitoring tools, control over their own domain name entries and operating systems. Hence a managed dedicated hosting service is a must for all large companies that have a huge web presence and an abundance of traffic. It ensures better risk management, control and flexibility, and a renewed focus on your core business strategy.