The Truth about VPS Hosting

VPS hosting has become a popular offering on the web hosting market. The allure behind this solution is that it creates a common ground between shared and dedicated hosting. Despite its power and all the benefits, a VPS is not suited for everyone. This type of arrangement will cost you a few hundred dollars per year on service, but there are more glaring disadvantages that need to be considered as well.

Technical Challenges

With the typical shared hosting service, you lease a plan on a monthly or annual basis. What you sign up for is an outsourced, fully managed solution. The hosting company provides the hardware and internet connectivity, administers the server, and takes care of all the technical aspects behind the scenes. With a VPS hosting plan, however, you move up in status and virtually have complete control of your private environment.

While this can be a major advantage, it can also present challenges for the simple fact that you are responsible for managing the server, installing software, applying updates and monitoring security. This isn't much of a problem for the more technically inclined user, but could be a terribly frustrating ordeal for the less experienced. If you do not have firsthand knowledge of server administration or OS commands, you could end up out of your league with a VPS hosting solution you simply are not equipped to handle. The power of a virtual platform is sometimes too much for the needs and experience level of many individuals.

Hardware Limitations

VPS hosting can provide you with a much greater degree of control and better performance, as critical system resources are more adequately allotted. However, even though you get the benefit of guaranteed resources, there are some limitations that might be cause for concern.

Due to the similarities of a VPS and dedicated server, some have the misconception that you have all the resources to yourself. This is not the case. You are still required to share hardware assets with the other virtual servers partitioned on the machine. While this is not an issue for most, it could be for you, depending on the nature of your business. This essentially means that you are not guaranteed access to the memory you require at any given time due to an instance such as a log jam. Though very rare, an error like this can occur on a virtual platform. If these are disadvantages your business cannot afford, you might be best suited for a dedicated server in order to have all the hardware resources at your disposal.

Making a Decision on VPS Hosting

There are a few telling signs that indicate it is time to upgrade to a VPS hosting package. Maybe you are not longer satisfied with the performance of your current shared hosting arrangement. Slow response times are impacting the end-user experience, and you just can't afford to sacrifice quality any longer. Perhaps you are concerned about all the lingering potential security issues that can become a reality at any time and compromise the sensitive data on your website.

These are perfect indicators that the shared hosting environment is no longer sufficient for your needs and the time for change has come. When a shared server is no longer an option and a dedicated server is out of financial reach, VPS hosting is the rock that can provide a happy medium. And although virtualization will cost you a little more than the standard hosting arrangement, the competitiveness on the market makes it easy to find a plan for a very reasonable price.

Selecting a Host

Just like most web hosting solutions, the level of success you get from a VPS hosting plan largely depends on the company providing the service. When signing up with an unreliable host, you are guaranteed nothing but heartache and a failed investment. This is one quality that means everything when your business and web presence are on the line. Virtualization is becoming a commonplace on the market, and finding a service provider shouldn't be much of a challenge. What we recommend is being very selective in the decision process and comparing the services of as many qualified providers as you can.