Not All Web Hosting Services Are The Same

Some things that you should consider for when choosing a web hosting service include:

• system resource allowance (bandwidth, storage, domains, subdomains, email accounts, mySQL databases)

• price (for 1 yr contract, 2 yr contract, etc... Or do they even require a contract?)

• customer support (are they available 24/7?, are they actually helpful?)

Web Hosting Services - Common Questions

Q: What is the difference between shared, dedicated, and virtual hosting? Who do you recommend for each?

A:

Shared hosting is when your website is hosted on a web server along with other web sites, each having its own Internet domain name. Unless you require abnormally high amounts of bandwidth and disk space, shared hosting is probably the better option due to the lower cost compared to other options. All of the web hosting services reviewed on this site offer some type(s) of shared hosting plan.

Virtual Hosting is when your website is hosted on a server which is partitioned into multiple separate "virtual" servers. Each partition acts as its own web server and can therefore, be managed separately from other partitions on the same server. Currently, because of the unlimited domains offered as well as the low price.

Dedicated Hosting is when you basically rent the use of an entire server. This server is not shared by anybody. The hosting provider would still take care of supporting the server (hardware, operating system, backup facilities,etc.) however you would have full control over managing the server, setting up the web sites, and what can and can not be installed on the server.

Q: What is the difference between Windows Hosting and Unix Hosting?

A: All websites today currently run on either a Windows web server or a Unix-based server. The vast majority of websites run on a Unix-based platform as Unix has a strong reputation for security and web server performance. With standard (static) HTML-based websites, the web hosting platform doesn't make much difference. When it does make a difference, however, is when the website uses a dynamic scripting technology such as ASP (A Microsoft based technology), or PHP / PERL (Unix based technologies). A Windows-based hosting solution will run a Microsoft Windows server with IIS (Internet Information Server), and is necessary to run an ASP / ASP.NET scripted website. A Unix-based platform is typically used for PHP, Perl, and most other types of websites. Basically, unless your website uses ASP (pages ending in the .asp extention), Windows hosting is not neccessary.