How Can I Find a Good Web Host?

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Summary: Where to host your website depends on what kind of a website it is. Options range from free to expensive based on your needs.

You've got a web site, and you're looking for a good web host. But there are so many web hosts that it's almost impossible to tell one from the other, much less understand if they'll be what you need. There are a number of factors to consider when selecting a web host, and we'll cover several of them here.

We'll start with the practical reality: how much can you afford to spend on a web host?

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If the answer is "nothing" then you're not completely out of luck, but you will have to live with some restrictions. Depending on your needs there's a good chance you may not care about the restrictions. Here are some of options for free web hosting:

Your ISP: Chances are that you have some amount of "personal web space" available to you as part of your account with your Internet Service Provider. You're already paying for your account so the incremental cost is free. Limitations might include:

• a fixed amount of storage (usually from 5 to 25 megabytes - good for a small to medium sized site)
• an inflexible URL (usually http://yourISPname/~youraccount)
• limitations on any server-side components and almost certainly a restriction on any server-side custom scripting.
• possible bandwidth constraints which are either a limit to the amount of data that visitors are allowed to view from your site over a period of time, or simply poor effective bandwidth as you share it with other sites on the same server or hosted by the same ISP.

A common them among ISPs is that many of these restrictions can be adjusted or lifted - for an additional fee, of course.

Free Web Hosting Sites: There are several services out there that will host your website for free. The most common one I see is Yahoo! GeoCities. Limitations are similar to those I listed above for many ISPs with the addition that for ads will appear as part of, or over a portion of, your website.

And also as before, many of the restrictions including the ad requirement can be adjusted or lifted for an additional fee.

Your Own Machine: if your expected bandwidth needs are low and you're connected to the internet via some type of broadband connection and you can leave a machine on all the time and your ISP allows it and you're a bit technical to begin with, then you might just be able to host your own web site on your own machine in your own home. This really does take a little bit of education about setting up servers and dealing with things like the DNS system if you have a dynamic IP address but is actually quite doable.

The biggest roadblock to this approach is typically ISPs who allocate their resources assuming your connection is that of a simple client and not a web server. Their policies will often specify that you may not run a web server on your connection. Though, you guessed it, this restriction can often be lifted - for an additional fee.

If you have a little money to spend there are more options:

Shared Server Web Hosting: shared web hosting is a lot like the service you might get from your ISP. For a relatively low monthly fee you get some amount of space and bandwidth. Many ecommerce and commercial web sites are in fact shared hosting sites. Shared hosting companies often provide better service since it's all they do, and they offer assistance in doing things like getting and setting up your own domain name or other features.

Managed Hosting: If you want a dedicated server all to yourself but you don't want to worry about the details of managing the machine, the operating system, and the software on it; you just want to host your site (or sites), then managed web hosting might be for you. It's the most expensive alternative (pricing varies on machine and bandwidth specifics) but the hosting company takes care of "managing" your server for you - including software updates, hardware issues, downtime, and often backups as well. Ask-Leo! is hosted on a managed server at Rackspace.

UNManaged Hosting: This is exactly what it implies, the web hosting service provides a server, power, and a network connection. Everything else is up to you. This requires the most expertise but can also be surprisingly cost effective. Typically you get full remote access capability to the server that is dedicated only to you. With great power comes great responsibility though, and you'll be responsible for any and all software on your box as well as backup.

Article C1885 - January 23, 2004