When would I need a dedicated server and what to look for

Many start-ups begin with a shared hosting plan as this is typically the cheapest among services offered by web hosting companies. But as the company progresses, its hosting requirements will also increase – and due to limitations of shared web hosting, the business owner will need to upgrade to a dedicated hosting plan.

What are dedicated servers?
A dedicated server is a server provided by a web hosting company that is not shared with any of its customers. You will have complete control over the server and you can configure it to suit your business requirements including your choice of operating system, hardware and applications.

Before upgrading to a dedicated host however, you need to be sure that the higher fee for this service is worth the price. You need to ask yourself these questions:

• Has your site become busier than usual?
• Do you need to have special features for your site?
• Can you manage a dedicated server?
• Can you afford a dedicated host?

When your product or service becomes well-known, it is inevitable that you will have heavy website traffic. As a result, you will use more resources for your site. If you are using a shared web hosting service, you may have a problem especially if other sites are also using more resources.

If you answered yes to the questions above, you need to upgrade to a dedicated hosting plan. Before making your final decision however, you need to take the following considerations:

• Would you prefer a fully managed hosting plan?
  As stated earlier, you need to manage a dedicated server. With fully managed hosting, the web hosting company will manage the server for you. It will be in charge of server monitoring, ensure server security, create backups for your data and manage all data and storage.
• Where are the data center facilities located?
  The location of the data center is key to the optimum performance of a website. You need to know if the data center has:
  – On-site security
  – Redundant bandwidth
  – Power redundancy
  – Cooling systems
  It is also important to know what tier data center facility it is. Tier 4 Data is considered to be the best since annual downtime is approximately 0.5 hours only.
• A dedicated server should have remote reboot capability
  Having this feature allows you to restart your server from a remote location. You don’t need to call the hosting company to do this. In addition, this capability will allow you to do software updates and server maintenance at your end whenever you want to.
• A dedicated server has a content delivery network (CDN)
  A CDN helps with fast delivery of content over websites. A CDN replicates a website over several different locations in various places throughout Europe and Asia. So, for example, if you are in Australia and somebody from Vietnam tries to access your website, a CDN server in Asia will deliver that request. If somebody in Great Britain wants to visit your site, the CDN server for Europe will serve that user.
• A dedicated server has 24×7 technical support all year round
  When choosing a dedicated host, make sure that the company offers 24×7 technical support through live chat or phone, just in case something goes wrong.
  Tutorials, guides and other documentation should also be made available to you so you can also learn to troubleshoot some errors you may encounter.
  Check if you have an account manager for your server whom you can call and talk to in case you come across major technical issues. Many hosting companies claim they provide 24×7 support but when the need arises nobody is there to help the customer.

Do your own research and ask around. You can also contact Complete Cloud if you want to know more about dedicated hosting. Our team is always on hand to assist you and give you advice on what hosting service will best for your business.

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