Definition of Dedicated Server Web Hosting

When we talk about hosting web servers, there are 3 main types - shared hosting servers, VPS (virtual private web servers) and dedicated web hosting servers. Shared servers host a lot of clients and thus the system resources per hosting account are restricted, virtual private server plans offer more server configuration autonomy, but also influence other virtual private web servers on the hardware node if used rashly, and dedicated servers give you the independence to do everything you like without intervening with anyone else.

Why would you require a dedicated web hosting server?

Dedicated servers are traditionally much more expensive than shared hosting web servers or virtual private web servers. Why would anyone, then, want to use them? The answer is very simple. If your company has a resource-swallowing online portal, or simply has very precise server configuration requirements, the most sensible choice would be a dedicated server. For someone who is ready to invest in security and reliability, the bigger price is not a concern. You acquire root access and can utilize 100% of the server's system resources without anyone else sharing these system resources and interfering with your websites.

Hardware configurations

Most shared web hosting companies, including us at MindMeld Networks, LLC, offer several different hardware architectures you can pick from depending on your needs. The configurations offer different varieties of processors, a different number of cores, different RAM and hard drive sizes and different bandwidth quotas. You can pick a web hosting Control Panel, which is a convenient graphical user interface if you wish to use the dedicated web hosting server for website hosting purposes only and prefer not to use a Secure Shell console for all the modifications you will be making. We offer three types of hosting CP software - Hepsia, DirectAdmin and cPanel.

The hosting Control Panel of your choosing

If you are a self-reliant Linux user (our web hosting servers are powered by Linux or other Unix-based OSs), you could administer your dedicated server via an SSH tunnel exclusively. That, however, could be inconvenient, even more so if you choose to grant root privileges to somebody else who has less technical proficiency than yourself. That is why having hosting Control Panel software activated is a clever idea. The Hepsia hosting CP user interface that we provide does not include full server root privileges and is chiefly suitable for someone who maintains plenty of sites that absorb a lot of system resources, but desires to manage the sites, databases and email boxes using a user-friendly hosting Control Panel. The DirectAdmin and cPanel hosting CPs, on the other hand, give you full root access and include 3 access levels - root, reseller and user. If you intend to resell hosting accounts instead of using the server just for yourself, you should select one of these two.

Server monitoring and backup services

Last but not least, there is the issue of monitoring the dedicated web hosting server and of backing it up. In the event of a problem with your dedicated web hosting server, such as an unresponsive Apache or a network downtime, it is good to have some sort of monitoring platform activated. Here at MindMeld Networks, LLC the system administrators monitor all dedicated servers for ping timeouts, and, if you have a Managed Services package, they monitor the individual services on the dedicated web hosting server as well. Backups are also an extra option - the company offers you data backups on our own backup web servers. You could pick a kind of RAID that would allow you to store the very same data on 2 disk drives as a protective measure in case of a hard disk drive failure, or in case someone whom you have ranted access deletes something accidentally.