subject: Advice On How To Choose Between A Virtual And Dedicated Server For Your Web Site [print this page] Advice On How To Choose Between A Virtual And Dedicated Server For Your Web Site
One of the biggest questions for a webmaster to consider when setting up their hosting environment, is whether to opt for a VPS, or dedicated server. Both have different pricing considerations, as well as technical differences that can benefit different setups. Whereas dedicated servers used to be the main type of server hosting, in recent years virtual servers have become very popular because of their low pricing.
Without going into massive technical detail, a virtual server is a server split up into parts. So on one high powered dedicated box, multiple people will be sharing the same hard disk, CPU, memory and bandwidth. This is controlled by a hypervisor that manages the splitting of resources.
Cost definitely has to be the main advantage of opting for a VPS. As a good example, imagine on a shared web hosting account, it is just that- shared. A virtual server allows you to run Apache and Mysql on your own. A server offers further freedom and isolation, but generally they are anywhere from 3-5 times more expensive than a virtual server.
Going further up the scale, a server does isolate you further. You won't be sharing memory, CPU or bandwidth when you use dedicated servers. Also consider if one VPS is attacked, you can also suffer the effects.
Dedicated enrivonments are usually much more powerful. With a VPS you have to share resources. With a dedicated server, the resources are yours and no-one else. When you run out of RAM or diskspace, you have no-one else to blame.
On the flip side, dedicated servers don't offer the flexibility virtual servers do. You are limited to being able to add extra RAM and another hard disk with a dedicated box. Whereas a VPS can upgrade RAM and CPU at the click of a button! Doing this on a dedicated enrivonment can cause extensive downtime.
Most VPS control panels will let you image os installs. This is not something that is common with dedicated servers. So with a virtual server, for example you could quickly install Centos, and then choose to install Debian.
Finally, while CPU's are getting better all the time on dedicated servers, that is about it. Virtual technology is advancing rapidly. Modern cloud computing offers the advantage of hosting your virtual server across different nodes. And with this you have redundancy that dedicated server simply cannot boast.
However, don't let this totally put you off dedicated servers. When it comes to server hosting, dedicated servers have been around a long time. Hosts such as game server providers still opt for dedicated servers.
