Web Site Hosting :: Virtual Servers :: Virtual vs Hosting

:: Virtual Server vs Hosting ::

There are essentially two hosting solutions available on the Internet today: virtual hosting and Virtual Servers. Though the terms seem similar, the underlying functionality of the two solutions is very different. Understanding the differences between virtual hosting and Virtual Servers can have a significant impact on your hosting decision.

Web Hosting solutions consist of two components:

1. the hardware (CPU, memory, disk drives, etc.)
2. the software (web, ftp, and pop servers, email gateway, and any third party applications or CGI scripts)

In a "virtual hosting" environment, both the hardware and software are configured and controlled by the server administrators. Therefore, you are left with little to no control over how your server functions. This kind of inflexible solution simply shares the single set of software applications on the physical server. You in effect have only "subletted" software resources controlled and maintained by someone else!

In a true Virtual Server environment, such as ours, only the hardware is controlled and maintained by our administrators. The software (i.e. the Web, FTP, POP/IMAP services) is completely autonomous and affords the client complete flexibility, control, and power over how his or her Internet services behave.

How is this accomplished? The Virtual Server host server is multiplexed or partitioned into many Virtual Servers (we partition the Operating System, not just the web server). Each Virtual Server can be customized at your discretion.

In addition to the performance and flexibility of our Virtual Servers, our Virtual Servers also offer "virtual hosting" capabilities. In other words, "virtual hosting" is a feature of our Virtual Servers. Our Virtual Servers allow you to create virtual web hosts (each with their own domain name), virtual email, virtual ftp logins, and quota support. Most of our competitors simply offer virtual hosting, which is simply a single feature of our Virtual Servers.

A real Virtual Server is not simply a virtually hosted (VirtualHost) site on a web server we control, rather we give you "virtual root" access. When you telnet to your Virtual Server you will see directories such as "dev", "usr", "bin", "etc". In your "etc" directory you will find your own "passwd", "aliases", and "sendmail.cf" files... this allows you unlimited flexibility to add as many POP accounts, aliases, autoresponders as you would like.

With our Virtual Servers you will also find an entire "usr/local/etc/httpd" directory structure including your own httpd.conf, srm.conf, and access.conf files, your own logs, and cgi-bin. Basically our Virtual Server acts and behaves like a dedicated server, you have complete control of your web, ftp, and email services. The basic differences between a dedicated server and an our Virtual Server is the disk space and the price.