Choosing the Right Type of Web Hosting

[Randy]

Randy submitted a new Article:

Choosing the Right Type of Web Hosting

Choosing the Right Type of Web Hosting

Web hosting is an important part of creating a forum. Having the wrong type of web hosting can cause issues on your site if it is too small, if it is too large you are paying for what you don't need and just wasting money.

Before I start going into detail about these types I would like to give some background information about myself and why I feel that I'm capable of explaining this to you. I am current twenty-one years old (currently is 2013). I have been designing and developing websites for 11 years. My second year of High School I started my own hosting company which had over four hundred customers within a year on shared and reseller hosting packages among two dedicated severs that I was renting. I sold that company after two years of starting it to start college. During my first three semesters at college I did freelance web design, programming, and management with about twelve clients on my colocated servers. After my third semester I stopped going to school and moved across the US and started working at an industry leading hosting company as a sales engineer and maintained in that position for my first year there. I am currently apart of our Research & Development Testing team where I worked with our development team in creating and testing our internal products, and proprietary cloud ("VPS") solutions.

In this article I will be covering the following hosting types:

• Shared/Reseller
• VPS/Cloud
• Dedicated
• Colocation

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Shared/Reseller Hosting
Shared & Reseller hosting is great if you are just starting out. Think of shared hosting as a hotel. You share a building with other customers but have your own room where you can unpack (your website data) and get comfortable but you aren't able to bring in your own furniture (install server modules), paint the walls (change server configurations), and usually have multiple bedrooms (multiple websites under same plan). When using a reseller hosting package I generally would recommend just upgrading to a VPS service.

Pros: Low-Cost, Great for starting out, usually includes an easy to use control panel.
Cons: If other customers get hacked, your site then becomes vulnerable. Can't customize server configurations.

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VPS/Cloud Hosting
First off I want to explain the term "Cloud" hosting. It is nothing different then a VPS ("Virtual Private Server"). The...

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[meetdilip]

Very simple and self explaining. Even a beginner can understand the concept. Added Karma.

 

[radu81]

Great article, I usually start with an economic hosting and once the website is getting visitors and traffic I upgrade. Now I use a shared hosting, fractional hosting so I can host more than one website.
At work I switched to a managed vps, which I think is a good choice with no headache. No particular knowledge are required, I use it just like a shared hosting but with the power of a vps. It cost a little bit more than a vps but worth the money.

 

[InsightsToHealth]

Thanks for sharing this great information.

 

[.Rogue]

I've only ever used Shared hosting, only one that I could afford. I've heard Dedicated mentioned a lot which is supposed to be the best but I bet that is expensive. I like something simple that is managed for me.

Great informative article, thank you!

 

[Phillip]

Awesome Article.
Thanks for sharing.

 

[Clasione]

Seems forums don't require dedicated hosting until they get very huge. Most software I've used including phpbb, simple machines and vbulletin all run very smooth in shared hosting environments until they are quite large. I currently use a dedicated but I have never owned a forum, that itself required dedicated a machine for just the forum.

 

[Palancar]

Thanks for clarify some things, very easy to understand. Would have loved to read this a couple of years ago when we were hosting shopping.

 

[Johnathan]

hello Everyone,

can, i get any website giving free webhosting for one or more years...

Usually, a trial/demo webhosting would only go for 30 days - at the most. This is so that they can turn their demo customers into paying customers as quick as possible. If you are looking to host a free forum, there are many free forum services that are available on the web.

@Randy Thank you very much for your explanation, I now understand the major cons of the different types of web hosting. I also would like to thank you for sharing the security risks involved with shared hosting.

 

[oldmin85]

I've used both dedicated and shared hosting for my VB forum with a few different companies. Network Solutions was by far the worst and most expensive. I recently moved to a shared server on a hostgator and it has been great. Very cheap and the best customer service I have ever received.

 

[Andy98]

I mainly use x10hosting, but I've used Host Gator before (didn't like it at all).