How to choose a web hosting package

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Choosing the Right Web host for you

Choosing a web host is one of the most integral parts of your web business. Hosting with the Wrong Company could either render your website Inaccessible or drain a lot of money without much necessity.

Shared Hosting 


Let's consider the following situation where you are just starting a website and you have the following statistics.



  1. Your initial space requirement is Minimal and its unlikely to grow over a limit of 1 GB

  2. Your bandwidth requirement is also Minimal as the number of people going to visit the site would be a maximum of 50,000 Visitors a month on the higher side.

  3. you have minimal Email usage and require a set 4-5 email addresses only


In a scenario like this you are looking at a shared hosting package. Here you know that there is a limited usage to your website and the bandwidth requirement is also quite low. Depending on your programming environment, you would be hosting either on Linux or on Windows. (Ask your programmer if he is going to Use PHP or ASP. If it's a PHP site, you should go in for a Linux server as it gives you a better performance and an ASP Program works well on Windows Server).


There are a set of limitations on a shared Server. A shared server as its name suggests is shared between 300-400 sites. If one or more sites among these 400 sites tend to use up more Bandwidth or CPU time then your website will be inaccessible. Fortunately there are a few web hosts who implement Limitations on each website. If a website is Accessing more bandwidth or CPU time than its allowed Quota, then it automatically shuts down that particular site. If this kind of feature is provided in a web host, go for it.


There are other advantages of shared hosting which include the pricing benefits and zero maintenance.


Today you could get a site with 30 GB web space and unlimited bandwidth for as affordable as a 100$. If you have programmed your site well, 90% of a normal site would fit into a Shared hosting.

Dedicated Hosting 


Dedicated hosting is usually required if you want to host a site of yours on one server. Inn this case you have the entire server in your control. You are free to install any application you require as long as you have the required license for the same. More over you decide on how much space you require. You can buy a server with a capacity of 80-100 GB web space with a P4 Processor and a 2 GB RAM. And you have the server completely to your own.


The advantages of the dedicated server is obvious. It's like having your own server, so you decide what you want to do with it, what you want to install and what you want without. You have no limitations on a Good Server you can setup.


The disadvantage is only the Price. Not all Software are free, some have to be licensed and the software will add up to the server cost. Maintenance is usually free if you have leased the server for your usage (as its added up to the cost itself).


A list of providers who give you a good Dedicated Server includes:


 


 

Line and Speed 


Whatever your server is, there is still a big thing to consider apart from the server size/configuration. This is the Pipeline Size and the connection speed. Consider having a Ninja 9 R Super Bike without Proper Roads to drive on. No matter how fast your Bike can go, you are not going to go anywhere unless the roads take you. IF you are going to drive a Ninja 9R on a Rally Track or a Rhino Charge, You are not going to use the potential of the Bike itself. The same applies to the Server too. No matter what your server config is, if your Line is bad, your server is going to be rendered useless.


A Web host server is usually connected to the Internet Back Bone via a T1-T3 Line. A t1 Line can take up to 1.5 MBPS and a T3 Line will take up to 45 MBPS. If you can get a T3 Line for a decent price for your web hosting, you should always prefer that. Of course your own connection and the End users connection matters a lot too.

Location of the server 


This is a very touchy area and is not proved or disproved, though a lot of Web masters think that this is important

The location of the server in most cases is not important unless you have a geographical location of your website users. If you are located in the US, you should preferably host your site in the US. This is for 2 reasons.



  1. The speed of the site will be higher if your visitor is in the US and your Site is located there

  2. Search engines and directories have now started Geo-Location and localization of their services. This would include listing sites in a Particular location if your site is hosted there.


 


The second point though is something which has not been proved as most search engines would not talk of it on light. They love to keep their secrets. But there have been scenarios where Google Specifically has listed .UK sites in the UK's top ranking even though there are plenty of sites which beat it in terms of Google SEO.


There are plenty of other points which you may need to look into on the long run, for instance , the emails provided, the Uptime, the software available along with the Package etc. Depending on your usage we would request that you do a research of at least 4-5 web hosts before you make your decision.

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How to choose a web hosting package
Choosing a web host is one of the most integral parts of your web business. Hosting with the Wrong Company could either render your website Inaccessible or drain a lot of money without much necessity.

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