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What Is A Web Host ?
A web host is a service provider that places your
web site on a computer which is connected to the
internet. This then gives people who surf the
internet a way to access your website. The computer
that the web hosting company uses is typically just
like the computer you have at home, the only
difference being that it is set up to serve up web
sites and is therefore called a "server".
A web
host will typically have a fast connection to the
Internet and they may host thousands of web sites on
many servers. The web host essentially rents out
space to you so that you can get your website up on
the world wide web.
Some large web hosts own their own datacenter
(collection of servers), some rent a server from a
larger web hosting company and then resell the space
under their own company name. In this case the web
host will manage your account on the server, but
they will be renting the actual web space from
another much larger company.
 This
is a picture of a datacenter. Which contains many
PC's all connected to the Internet It is very
expensive to own and operate a datacenter.
Datacenters have reliable and fast connections to
the Internet and also have backup power and high
security.
Most web hosting companies do not own a datacenter,
but rent web hosting space in a datacenter.
There are literally thousands of web hosting
companies available in the market, all with
different types of plans and at different prices. It
can be hard to wade through all the options,
especially if you are completely new to web hosting
and just want to get your website up on the web. All
web hosting plans have some basic common features.
| Server Type |
This is the
type of server software that is running on the
server. Windows 2000 server, Linux and Unix are
common server types. If you have a basic website
then the server type does not matter. If you
have a more complex website that has database
functions and serves up dynamic pages, then the
server type will be more important |
| Disk Space |
This is the
amount of actual space available to you for
storing your website on the web server harddrive |
| Bandwidth /
Month |
This is a
measure of how much website traffic is available
to you. Every time somebody looks at your
website, data has to be passed over the Internet
from the web server where your site is hosted to
the browser of the person looking at your site.
Bandwidth is a measure of how much transfer is
available. High traffic sites like Yahoo for
example have very high bandwidth requirements,
but the average site does not |
| Email
Accounts |
How many email
accounts you can have with the web hosting
account. |
How
Does My Website Get a Name ?
All websites typically have a name - just like we
are called www.Suninside.com - This is a name
that points to the space on the web where your
website is physically located. In reality, your
website will have an address which is just a set of
numbers. This is called an IP address and it looks
something like this 205.11.109.64 An IP address is a
unique address (just like a street address) for your
website location. Domain names like
www.Suninside.com are really just a pointer to
the real address. This makes it much easier to
remember websites.
When you buy web hosting it can be easier to let the
web host handle everything associated with this. You
just tell them the name that you want (www.yoursite.com
for example) and so long as that name is available,
they will set up your web hosting space so that when
people type in that www address, it will
automatically go to your website. You can check if a
domain name is available on our domain registration
page.
If you already have a domain name and need to
transfer it to a web hosting account, then the
domain records have to be pointed to your web
hosting company. Most web hosts will handle this for
you, but if you need to do it yourself then you will
need to contact the company where you registered
your domain name and provide the Nameserver address
of your web hosting provider. Your web host will
tell you what their Nameservers address is.
You probably don't want to buy your web hosting plan
until your website is ready, but you might want to
buy your website name early to prevent somebody else
taking the name you want. Almost all companies that
sell domain names will park your domain on their
servers until you are ready to buy web hosting.
Different Kinds Of Web Hosting
There are different kinds of web hosting setups and
dependent upon your website and budget, any of these
may be the right type. This is not a discussion of
the features a web hosting plan may offer - just a
description general types of web hosting
1. Free Web Hosting
It is possible to get free web hosting accounts.
These are great for small websites, but normally you
have to have a banner ad at the top of every page.
Some free accounts let you use your domain name
(free virtual hosting) and with some your website
address is a subdomain of the free hosting company (www.yoursitename.freehosting.com).
This second type is called Free Sub-domain hosting.
Hosting for small websites can be very cheap, but If
you can answer yes to all of the following
questions, then free web hosting may be right for
you.
* I don't care about having ads at the top of every
page in my website
* I don't care about the performance / reliability
of the website
* I don't expect any customer support
* My website is very small and will never grow
2. Shared Hosting
This is the most common type of web hosting account
and can be very low cost. With paid shared (virtual)
hosting you pay a monthly fee and get a share on a
server. For very low cost plans you may only have a
small amount of disk space and a low amount of
bandwidth (although this will probably not be a
problem for the vast majority of websites). With
cheap virtual hosting plans you maybe one site
amongst hundreds on the same server - in this case
reliability may suffer. For slightly more expensive
plans you will probably find better reliability.
3. Dedicated Hosting
With dedicated hosting you have a full server
dedicated to your website. This gives you a lot more
freedom and you can host potentially hundreds of
your own websites. Typically you will have access to
the server just like you have access to your PC at
home. Dedicated servers are normally reserved for
large ecommerce type websites, sites that get a lot
of visitors (thousands a day), or for people that
want to start their own hosting company and sell
shared hosting accounts. A dedicated server is more
reliable, but also much more expensive being at
least $100 a month vs $1 - $20 range of a shared
hosting plan.
4. Colocated Hosting
This is very similar to dedicated hosting, except
that you own the server rather than rent it. Your
server is placed in the datacenter and connected to
the Internet through the web hosting providers fast
Internet connection. You will then pay a fee for
maintenance and bandwidth.
So What Web Hosting Plan Is The Right One To Buy?
You have a lot of choices in the web hosting market
and it can be very confusing to find the best deal
that meets your needs.
The 1st step before you start to look for a web
hosting company is to determine what your needs are.
It can be very tempting to look for plans that offer
everything. There are many such deals available,
even at a low price, but you will be storing up
trouble for yourself. Take a step back and determine
exactly what you need and then use Suninside to
find a plan that matches at the right price from a
web hosting company that you are comfortable with.
Step1 - Determining Your Needs
1. DiskSpace
Web pages (html) are normally very small - on
average 40 - 50KB. This means you can store a lot of
web pages in a small amount of diskspace. Images
take up more space, but unless you have a big
database driven site - it is unlikely that you will
need very much disk space. Below is terminology used
to describe disk space. If you have a computer at
home or the office, then you will be already very
familiar with this.
| Disk Storage
Space Terminology |
| 1 Byte |
1 character. This sentence
is 25 bytes |
| 1 KB |
1000 Bytes |
| 1 MB |
1000 KB |
| 1 GB |
1000 MB |
This handy calculator provides a rough guide to how
much disk space you might need for your site
You can
see above that even a lot of pages doesn't really
create a big requirement for disk space. If you own
a computer at home you will already know that
harddrives are very cheap these days. Many web
hosting plans will offer large amounts of disk
space. This is fine, it doesn't hurt to have the
extra space - but unless you have a huge site - you
will more than okay with 20MB.
2. Bandwidth
Bandwidth is always stated as a monthly limit in
either MB or GB. This is the amount of actual data
that can be transferred from the web server that
holds your website, to the browser of the person who
is looking at your website. If you go over the
limit, then either you will have to be an extra fee,
or your website will not be available. The amount of
bandwidth you use is obviously related to the amount
of traffic (visitors) that you receive.
There are web hosting companies that offer Unlimited
bandwidth. This sounds like a good deal. The truth
is that this is nothing but a lie and you should
steer clear of web hosting companies that offer
unlimited bandwidth. Bandwidth is a commodity that
costs the web hosting company money - unlimited
bandwidth is not only impossible, but would cost an
unlimited amount of money. When web hosts offer
unlimited bandwidth they are trying to trick you.
They know that you will probably not use very much
bandwidth. The moment you try to use a lot of
bandwidth - then you will find your website
shutdown.
For most web sites you will not need much bandwidth.
Probably 99% of all websites use less than 2 GB of
bandwidth a month. If you intend to have a lot of
downloads of software, audio or video, then you may
end up using a lot more bandwidth, maybe 50 GB.
Adult sites typically use a lot of bandwidth. Sites
like mp3.com require an enormous amount of
bandwidth, but for the average site - a low level
will be enough in almost all cases.
The calculator below will help you determine what
amount of bandwidth you might need. This assumes a
simple web site with no audio or video downloads.
Remember 1GB = 1000 MB (eg 0.75 GB = 750 MB)
3. Email Accounts
How many email accounts will you need? Normally 10
is enough, but if you think you might want more then
you can use
4. Support
You need to ask yourself questions like do you want
phone support, or will email support be ok? Do you
want support 24 hours a day? If you have a small
website that is not critical (i.e you don't pay your
mortgage with website earnings) then you probably
don't need phone support or 24/7 support. It costs
web hosting companies to provide this type of
support, don't pay more for a plan that offers this
if you don't need it.
5. Server Type
If you have a small website, then it is unlikely
that you will need to select a particular type of
server for your website. Windows 2000 server web
hosting tends to be a little bit more expensive than
Linux. If you need to run a Microsoft SQL server
database, or use Microsoft Active Server pages then
you should choose Windows2000. If you have no clue
what these things even are - then you don't need
Windows2000 - you will almost certainly be fine with
any type of server.
6. Other Features like Databases, Server Side
Scripting
Web hosting plans can offer a myriad of confusing
features. For the small website it is unlikely that
you will ever need to know about any of them. If you
are a web designer creating complex database driven
sites then you will already know what you need. If
after creating your site you have never heard of
ASP, ColdFusion, SQL Server, mySQL - then chances
are that you don't need to worry about any of these
things. If you plan to add a message board to your
website then you will need a mySQL database. This is
the most common database used with discussion
boards.
Step2 - Finding The Right Web Hosting Plan To
Buy
Finding the right web hosting plan is the purpose of
Suninside.com - so you are at the right place. You
can enter your needs into the easy or advanced
search tools, or you can use one of the preset
searches then refine your search.
There are many web hosting directories on the web.
They all claim to be great resources. For the most
part they are great resources...for the web hosting
companies, but not for you, the web hosting
consumer. Almost all of these web hosting
directories are a place where web hosting companies
advertise and they are in business only to generate
advertising income from hosting companies. For the
consumer they are worthless because you can not find
any unbiased information. These advertising based
web hosting directories have list of
recommendations, top 25 lists, platinum lists
etc...they are all just advertising lists similar to
the ads in junk mail that might arrive through your
mail slot. Avoid these sites, they have no value
because you cannot trust any information you will
find in them.
Suninside has no advertising and no hosting company
can buy an unfair advantage. When you do a search we
return a list of web hosting plans that all match
your search criteria that you can then evaluate.
Read ratings from other customers, check real-time
reliability numbers, look at other sites they host,
check out their website and compare plans side by
side with other plans.
Remember to use the Glossary if there are any terms
that are unfamiliar and also click on any search
option to open a window that will give you an
in-depth explanation of what that term means. If all
else fails - then feel free to contact us - we will
always be more than willing to explain something and
help you out.
Suninside is one of a kind, there is no other site
on the web that approaches the task of finding web
hosting in the way that Suninside does. |
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