Are you interested in becoming a Web Hosting Reseller? Reselling web hosting to customers is actually easier than you might think, and sometimes, the only thing you’ll need to take care of is the billing for your clients! As you resell the web hosting space issued by another provider, you can make quite a bit of money this way.

But should you choose Reseller Web Hosting, VPS Web Hosting, or Dedicated Server Hosting?

* Reseller Web Hosting

This option is best if you would like your customers to each have a set amount of storage space, bandwidth, emails, etc. Their accounts will be the same and are most likely quite small, but they work out best if your clients just need a simple webpage or two for a small personal website. Reseller hosting can be very cheap, and you can mark up the prices as high as you’d like to make as much money as you’d like.

* VPS (Virtual Private Server) Web Hosting

Despite what you might think, it’s not a good idea to resell web hosting space on a VPS hosting plan. As you are still sharing the server resources with others, reseller hosting on a virtual private server can be draining on the server and can bog it down for everyone else. We wouldn’t recommend you use VPS as a reseller hosting option.

* Dedicated Server Hosting

This is the best option for webmasters who need various web hosting options for their clients. If one client needs 1GB storage and another needs 10GB, you can divide the total storage space amount as you see fit. The more clients you have, the bigger the dedicated server you’ll need. This is the most expensive option, but it is the most beneficial for managing multiple websites and clients – the best part is, you’ll get your own domain nameservers, so you’ll be as legitimate a company as anybody else!

When you buy a car, you always know upfront exactly how much you are going to pay. It should be the same way for dedicated server hosting. If your dedicated web hosting provider has any kind of hidden fees that are not readily viewable, you should ask until you have all the answers. Paying extra at the last minute for dedicated web hosting is annoying, so don’t let that happen to you.

So what should you be paying for dedicated server hosting? Any reliable dedicated server hosting provider will start at around $99 and give you amazing dedicated hosting discounts. For example, Lunarpages Dedicated Hosting offers dedicated server hosting for $99/month, but if you choose to go with at least a 3-month dedicated billing cycle, you can add 1 month free hosting + 1GB free RAM upgrade! This amazing offer is worth $183!! Just use coupon DSHRAM upon signup.

So always ask what your dedicated server hosting plan is going to cost, and be sure you understand their web hosting terms, which can often be quite confusing.

Is there a way to test the site without first moving your domain name? For dedicated hosting clients using Plesk this is an often asked question. You don’t want your clients or visitors to come in without everything being ready, right?

It would be kind of like inviting your neighbors over to see your new house, and then when they come in the front door they notice you don’t have any furniture. To avoid an embarrassment like this, here is how you would preview your page using Plesk:

In Linux, the URL format for site preview would be the following:
https://IP:8443/sitepreview/http/domain.com/

In Windows, the URL format for site preview would be the following:
http://IP/$sitepreview/domain.com/

Now you should be able to take a peak at your web site before it goes live, so that you can edit and tweak what you need before it gets seen by the public eye.

VPS web hosting or Virtual Private Server web hosting has become one of the most popular alternatives to dedicated server hosting on the market today. But if you have never heard of VPS web hosting, you’re likely to just skip over this extremely effective type of web hosting plan!

So what is VPS web hosting? Simply put, Virtual Private Servers do the same thing shared web hosting servers do – they split up the server space to provide many websites with access to web hosting. However, there’s one major difference; while shared web hosting can incorporate as many as 500 customers on one single server, the best VPS web hosting provider will only put 20 websites at most on one server. This allows you to have better CPU and processor performance, and you can also have SSH web hosting access to the server, whereas with Shared web hosting, any reliable web host will not provide this, as it is a danger to your website.

VPS web hosting can really mean the difference between your large website running slowly or your website being optimized for success. If your website has large bandwidth needs, CPU or RAM resources, you’re going to be better off with a VPS or Dedicated Server Hosting plan, because these types of web hosting plans will be best for your needs.

When upgrading to a dedicated server, chances are a lot of the time you are moving because you need more than what shared hosting can provide.  The most asked for feature when it comes to dedicated hosting is server resources.  When talking about such a vague phrase - it can be a ‘bit confusing.  Most of the time when you hear the phrase "server resources" used - the person in question is talking about RAM and CPU you have available to you.

Here is one of our past articles that does a good job in describing what RAM means to dedicated hosting.

What is Server RAM?

Having a large amount of RAM is important to any web hosting server but especially to any Dedicated Server Hosting plan.  RAM (or Random Access Memory) is basically computer data storage that allows a user to access any “memory” on the server.  The more RAM, the faster your server is going to run and the quicker your website will load.  [read more!]

Now with CPU, this is the processing power that the server has to push out the "work" you need the server to perform.  Some often used processors are:

• Intel Celeron
• Intel Pentium 4
• Dual Intel Xeon

Sometimes if you need a high performance dedicated hosting server, you might even look at more powerful processors such as the Dual Core Intel 5130 Xeon.  Now that is a powerful processor. 

Here is an often asked about question when it comes to dedicated hosting. Can you generate dynamic subdomains in Apache? The short answer would be, yes you can! Here is a little more information about the process…

You’ll need to create a virtual host for each subdomain in Apache configuration like:

<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerAdmin webmaster@subdomain1.mydomain.com
DocumentRoot /www/subdomain1.mydomain.com
ServerName subdomain1.mydomain.com
ErrorLog logs/subdomain1.mydomain.com-host.example.com-error_log
CustomLog logs/subdomain1.mydomain.com-access_log common
</VirtualHost>

There is one problem though. If your solution requires folders creation, virtual host addition and apache restarts which does not look good to me. How would I deal with this problem is:

1. Create a wildcard virtual host for “*.mydomain.com” so that all requests to subdomains go to this virtual host.
2. Setup a rewrite rule for it to redirect all requests to one page, say index.php
3. Write up a PHP script taking the hostname the user came to, searching the redirect URL into a storage by it, i.e. mysql db, and redirecting to it. This script will be the index.php script on the wildcard host.

If you use this way, you only need to setup the above once and then add the subdomains in to the storage which appears to be more flexible solution than creating subfolders and modifying Apache configuration.

I know it sounds like a joke, but dedicated hosting is much like a sandwich. When you take part a sandwich you are left with parts that are not good unless they are together as a whole. The same could be said for dedicated hosting.

Your bread would be the support you receive from the dedicated web host who will help you with any problems you might have. As the bread supports the sandwich and all the yummy insides, the support team at you web hosting company should do the same. They should take care of your hosting account to the best of their abilities.

The meat of the sandwich, would be the same as your disk space and bandwidth limits. This is the basic thing that makes a hosting account so delicious. It is what makes the sandwich what it is. You never hear people say they have a lettuce sandwich with turkey. It is called a turkey sandwich.

Your condiments for this tasty meal would be your extra features that come included or you need added to your dedicated account. Your control panels, your PHP, ASP and JSP support, your SSH access. All of these would fit in there like so. SSH and mustard go hand in hand. Just don’t try to put mustard in your hand, because it tends to get messy.

So if you are having trouble with your check list to make sure your dedicated host is delivering you the goods, think of it as a sandwich or some other multi-parted feast that you can relate it to to make sure you are getting your money’s worth.

Switching from a shared web host to a dedicated server hosting provider is not always a step webmasters are willing to take, but it is more often than not a required step in the growth of your website. While you are thinking of making the switch, look over the following 3 advantages to dedicated server hosting, and they should help ease your worries about this large step.

1. Optimal, Enhanced Server Performance.
   Imagine trying to carry 500 pounds in a box that only holds 10 pounds. Not only are you likely not able to lift this weight but the bottom of the box is likely going to give out from under the enhanced weight. Applying that same logic to the server that hosts your website, imagine the strain on the server when 400 websites are accessed 100x/day. And then think about the relief on that machine when you’re hosting on a dedicated server, where you are the only website there!
2. SSH/Shell/Root Access.
   This can be especially helpful if you need to install applications on your dedicated server or need to access the shell for command prompts, Ruby on Rails programming, or even to run your dedicated machine.
3. Customization!
   With dedicated server hosting, you do not have to worry about not having enough RAM, bandwidth, disk space, processor speed, or really anything you’d like to add to it. This is your machine, so create it how you need it! The best dedicated hosts like Lunarpages Dedicated Server Hosting will offer to help you get a customized quote going and to set up your server in less than 48 hours, an amazing feat for any web host.

There are 7 Standard RAID levels, which make up the basis of the RAID configurations, which you can use to get larger hard drive storage space for your dedicated server hosting plan. These RAID configurations employ the three main concepts of RAID: mirroring, striping, and error correcting. Just make sure the level of RAID you choose is the best one for your needs. Any reliable dedicated hosting provider can assist you in making the proper decision.

RAID 0 offers a completely even split of data across two or more hard drives. Though RAID 0 wasn’t one of the original levels of RAID integration and doesn’t provide any redundancy, it’s more or less used to help boost the servers’ performances across multiple platforms. RAID 0 is interesting because the hard drives do not have to be the exact same size.

RAID 1 works a bit differently, copying exactly one of the data disks and producing a mirrored copy. RAID 1 configuration is best where reliability of the servers in question is a major concern

RAID 2 synchronizes (through the controller) to offer incredible data transfer rates, though this level of RAID is not normally used as it utilizes a hammering code to assist with error correction.

RAID 3 is also an extremely rare RAID configuration on dedicated server hosting. A large downside and partial reason for this is because RAID 3 generally cannot assist in duplicate requests at the same time.

RAID 4 is quite a bit more popular and allows and compensates for what RAID 3 doesn’t – it allows multiple simultaneous requests and can read them as well.

RAID 5 is possibly the most popular RAID configuration, mostly due to the fact that doesn’t require many drives to achieve its greatest results in redundancy and reliability.

RAID 6 is more or less an extension of RAID 5 and allows for the most efficient use of space, though only when utilizing a smaller number of drives.

When you are involved with Dedicated Server Hosting, there are many considerations that need to be made. There’s the cost, certainly, which needs to be looked at, as well as the operating system you’re going to use, applications you’ll need to install, whether or not to use a control panel (and if so, which one?), and one of the most important for incredibly large websites is the addition of load balancing.

So what is load balancing? Load balancing your dedicated server hosting allows you to evenly distribute your traffic and reduce the load on one single server by serving it up between two (or more) separate servers. You link your multiple servers together using a load balancer, which takes the request from your customers or the user who is accessing your website and forwards it to the appropriate server.

So why is load balancing useful? Think about this – you have an ecommerce web hosting website where it is imperative you are online 24/7 and you must schedule downtime for a software upgrade, you can divert your traffic to your other server(s) so that your traffic never experiences any downtime at all as you do your upgrades. Or, if for some reason your web server crashes, you will have a means of backup so that your website can continue to provide 24/7 support.