CPanel is arguably the most powerful control panel on the planet when it comes to dedicated server hosting. This is why it’s also the most popular choice for webmasters these days. If you’re unfamiliar with cPanel’s web hosting technology, you should definitely research this amazing control panel before you add it to your dedicated server. But cPanel works with a variety of really cool programs, not the least of which is the Fantastico Script Library.

What is Fantastico?

Fantastico is a fantastic script library, which is a fancy of way of saying it automates the process of installing really cool software on your server, like blogs, CMS, photo galleries, and more.

Why Fantastico?

Fantastico simplifies the process of installing a blog or other popular software extensions onto your website. Instead of downloading the necessary scripts, then uploading and installing them to your site, then configuring them based on your system, Fantastico allows you to click on a button and the rest is done for you automatically.

What does Fantastico web hosting include?

The better questions is what doesn’t Fantastico web hosting include, because it literally comes with everything you’ll need to get your website up and running in no time. Here’s a brief rundown of what comes with Fantastico by default:

• Blogs – including WordPress!
• Content Management Systems – including Joomla, Mambo, and Post-Nuke!
• Ticketing Systems
• FAQ Systems
• Chatroom Software
• Forum Software – including SMF!
• Ecommerce Software – including osCommerce!
• Image Galleries
• …and more!!

As two of the most popular and powerful control panels for dedicated server hosting on the market, cPanel and Plesk can support a wide variety of scripts, programs, installations, and server requirements. It is almost essential for every new dedicated webmaster that you choose to install some kind of control panel on your dedicated server, because it will help automate the process of installing scripts and deploying them properly. If you choose to work with SSH/Shell access, you will have to memorize and use shell commands. For an advanced webmaster, this is perfectly fine, but if you’re new to the dedicated hosting realm, there are many advantages to using a control panel on your dedicated server.

Automated Configuration

This is the biggest advantage to using a control panel. Within cPanel or Plesk’s administrative interface, you can simply click on a button that says “create email account” and five seconds later, you’re done. If you’re working in the shell of the server, you’ll need to know the specific shell commands that will allow you to do this.

Automated Installation

Another awesome advantage is if you have the Plesk Power Pack or cPanel’s Fantastico Script Library on the server. If you have either of these additions to the control panel, you can install blogs like WordPress, content management systems (CMS) like Joomla, or many other convenient systems like forums, chatrooms, FAQs, and more with the click of a button. Again, this means you don’t have to go through the trouble of installing the systems yourself – simply find the appropriate button, click it, and you’re done.

Affordability

There are so many web hosting tutorials out there that can help you work with cPanel, Plesk, or the control panel of your choice. This makes the learning curve incredibly easy, because it may only take you a day or even a couple hours to learn how to build your site and install the necessary scripts. Compare this to hiring another webmaster or a programming tech who specializes in what you need to do. This can save you hundreds if not thousands of dollars in the long run.

When you purchase your Windows or Linux Dedicated Server, you have the option to add the Plesk Control Panel, one of the most powerful control panels on the planet. And if you do decide to add Plesk as your control panel, you also have the ability to add the Plesk Power Pack, a series of amazing add-on modules similar to cPanel’s Fantastico Script Library.

So what do you get with your dedicated server and the Plesk Power Pack?

• Application Pack – With the Plesk Power Pack’s Application Pack, you can pretty much do everything you need, all from one simple administrative panel. The Application Pack comes complete with the Mambo Content Management System (CMS), a Website Builder Tool to create dynamic websites, support for post-Nuke Web Hosting, osCommerce Ecommerce software for ecommerce web hosting, phpBB software, picture gallery software, phpBook for guestbooks, bbClone for website statistics, and gtChat for chat web hosting.

• Anti-Spam Solutions – Plesk’s Power Pack utilizes SpamAssassin’s Anti-Spam solutions software to eliminate spam forever.

• Tomcat Web Hosting – Tomcat java servlet support allows you to manage and deploy Tomcat web applications and run Tomcat’s JSP web hosting.

• ColdFusion Web Hosting – Administrators can configure and enable/disable ColdFusion right within the hosting panel. Perfect for ColdFusion web hotsing.

• MS SQL Hosting – Need the world’s most popular and powerful relational database manage system? You got it with Plesk Power Pack’s support for MS SQL web hosting. You can deploy and manage MS SQL databases on local and remote instances. Your Windows Web Hosting solution is complete. Also perfect for Windows Server 2008 Hosting!

• Multi-Level Helpdesk – Now you can run your own HelpDesk solution for answering tickets and support inquiries via a powerful integration system within Plesk’s Power Pack.

You’re thinking of ordering a brand new, shiny dedicated server. You’ve got your domain name, you’ve chosen a reliable dedicated hosting provider like Lunarpages, and you’ve found the best dedicated hosting coupon available. So…now what?

Have you decided what kind of dedicated server you are going to be running? Look over these fun options to find the best solution for your dedicated server hosting plan!

Media Server Hosting

This is becoming a very popular choice for dedicated server hosting, as media websites like YouTube.com or social network sites like MySpace.com utilize media in incredible ways. With media server hosting, you are running a website primarily to serve streaming or live media content to your audience. You can store music and video files to stream on the web using Flash Media, Windows Media, or even Microsoft Silverlight, the hottest technology for media server hosting.

Make sure you choose a dedicated web hosting provider who allows media server hosting and can offer competitive amounts of storage space and data transfer bandwidth. This way, you’ll never have to worry.

Game Server Hosting

Do you like multiplayer games? Need to host your game for players around the world to be able to join in? You can create a whole world and community on your dedicated server by running it as a game server. Depending on the popularity of your game or games, you may need to cluster or join many servers together to create a network of interlocked dedicated servers. These servers provide the massive amounts of bandwidth necessary to have game players from all over the world connecting to your website! Game server hosting is extremely popular and you can make a ton of money through advertising and player upgrades.

Social Network Server Hosting

If you like MySpace or Facebook, you can create a website of your own to match them or even make a better site. Imagine creating something as popular as Myspace…right on your own server!! This means you have control over membership payments, you can deploy advertisements and sell ad space, and you can collect the revenue from partnering with other companies, etc.

Hosting a social networking website means an incredibly heavy load on your web server, so make sure you choose a reliable dedicated hosting provider who can handle the CPU resources, bandwidth, storage space, and even features necessary for these massive web hosting accounts. You should choose a dedicated server hosting company who can allow you to grow as your website does and who won’t limit you to ordering 10 servers if and when you need them.

Other Dedicated Hosting Options

Chat server hosting, forum server hosting, blog web hosting, personal web hosting, and even adult web hosting are all options for your dedicated server. Remember, you can also run your dedicated server as a web or database server as well, so if your aim is just a simple, clean, dedicated server hosting solution for your business or ecommerce website, you can’t go wrong.

Windows Dedicated Hosting plans don’t automatically come with a control panel, as you can access the server via SSH/Shell Commands if necessary. However, having a control panel allows you to do all the things you can do via Shell access but in an intuitive, often automated manner. This means that you don’t have to memorize shell commands or scripts but can deploy then with the click of a mouse.

The most adaptive and secure control panel for Windows Web Hosting is Plesk, a powerful control panel with many advantages over the competition.

So what are the advantages of Plesk for Windows Web Hosting?

In the Dedicated server or shared server sphere, Plesk has the same kinds of advantages, which include:

• Innovative & Easy Icon-Based Control Panel – this mean no fumbling for the proper commands; simply find the icon that describes what you want to do (create an email, deploy a script, add a subdomain) and click it

• Secure & Stable Interface – Plesk has the ability and has proven itself handling over 5 million domains around the world on thousands of accounts per server and contains some of the most powerful security measures in the industry

• Support for Multiple Platforms – That’s right, Plesk works on Windows and Linux! This is a huge deal in case you’re not sure which platform you need and takes away the fear of having to change the operating system later while your website is already running on a secure dedicated server

• Multilingual Support – Plesk is available in most languages, including English, German, Japanese, Spanish, French, Chinese, and Russian, so you should be able to make sure the control panel speaks your language

• Microsoft Server 2008 & Silverlight Support - With Plesk, you can use Microsoft Server 2008 Web Hosting and Microsoft Silverlight Web Hosting as well, as both are 100% compatible with this intuitive and affordable control panel

While most potential Dedicated Server customers just jump right into dedicated server hosting, a lot of our readers here are also interested in shared web hosting and will upgrade to a dedicated server later as their site grows and matures or as their business expands.

So for those of you who are looking for a reliable web hosting partner, we recommend Lunarpages Web Hosting, a company that is currently offering an amazing promotion on their shared windows web hosting plans.

Get 3 Free Months of Windows Web Hosting by signing up with Lunarpages Windows Web Hosting plan. With this windows hosting plan, you get:

• Free Domain Name for Life
• Unlimited Email Addresses
• 5,000MB storage space
• 400GB bandwidth/month
• Secure Email through SmarterMail
• Support for ASP and ASP.NET standard

Take advantage of this awesome deal for Windows Web Hosting or try Lunarpages Dedicated Windows Hosting.

VPS or Virtual Private Server hosting is often known as training wheels for dedicated hosting and a dedicated server setup. 

A VPS hosting plan is like a mixture of the shared resources of a shared hosting plan and a little more of the freedom of a dedicated hosting plan due to the fact that you are put on a server with a less amount of people on it.

Many will often use a VPS plan as a testing ground to see if it is enough for them to keep their site stable (after moving up from shared hosting) and later on find it much easier to move into the dedicated hosting environment.

If you need more server resources, but you want to learn more about managing a dedicated server before jumping in with both feet a VPS hosting setup might be right for you.

Ruby on Rails Web Hosting is possibly one of the most popular search terms right now in the industry because of the kind of applications it can power and the simplicity for which the development code is written. Ruby on Rails is essentially a framework that runs on the Ruby language. It supports AJAX web hosting applications among many other things and offers website developers the chance to really outshine their competition. Ruby on Rails is famous for the phrase “convention over configuration” because the code that Ruby on Rails produces is not bogged down with useless code but is known for its simple and effective language and for being accessible for the new webmasters and guru alike.

With Ruby on Rails web hosting, you can create and host applications that perform incredibly and do not overwhelm your dedicated server or its resources.

Especially when you’re hosting on a dedicated server, you should learn and adapt to the new and attractive technologies emerging in the world of website and application design. Utilizing these new technologies for dedicated server hosting could help you not only boost your traffic but allow your website to be viewed and understood by website developers who may never have found it previously.

So what is Ajax web hosting and why is Ajax web hosting so popular?

AJAX stands for “asynchronous Javascript And XML” and is more of an approach to website development than a true scripting language. It utilizes XML, Javascript, and HTML and combines them all to produce added functionality, faster page loads, and amazing new techniques to running applications on the web.

For hosting on a dedicated server, this means reliable dedicated hosting through the use of AJAX as a technology. Because traditional websites display pages as they reload or as users click on links or pictures, page load times can be atrocious if you have a massive hosted application on your dedicated server. AJAX approaches hosting in a different view and chooses NOT to reload the entire page but instead only the relevant parts of it. Javascript is the key here, as it is able to mimic actually trolling through the page and accessing data.

Using AJAX for your dedicated server hosting website can help minimize customer wait times by refreshing and reloading the pages quicker, as well as cutting down on monthly web hosting bandwidth usage.

Can you resell services to make back a little ‘bit of your money on your dedicated hosting server costs?  Well the terms and conditions may vary from web host to web host, but most will not have a problem with this.  Often, once reseller account clients outgrow their current setups or want to give their own customers more bang for their buck - this is the route they will take.

As long as it is not hurting them and it is not illegal, many web hosts are fine with whatever you need to do on your dedicated server so dividing it up might not be that bad of an idea.  Before doing so, I would make sure that you can get things backed up on your current end before canceling your old web hosting.  You might even wait till after you have everything moved in before flipping the light off with the old web host too.

One concern that might come into play is who is paying the bill?  Make sure only one person is listed as the contact as far as the web host goes, and they are a reliable person who will be paying on time.  Having a confusing paper trail to follow to find out who is actually hosting the account will make many web hosts just a little nervous. 

So is reselling services on a dedicated server ok?  Sure is, you are the one paying for it right?