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How to choose a Right Web Hosting Service
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Indeed, choosing a right web hosting service for your website is not an easy task especially when
there are thousands of web hosting providers all offering almost identical web hosting packages.
Therefore, it is important to know few major considerations even before you start your web hosting
search. Below are three major criteria for web host seeker:
Web hosting features requirement
This is probably the most important consideration to start finding a host for your site. You need to
decide the technical requirements for your website, this including:
a) Server platform and hardware requirements
If you plan to set up a website that uses programming environments such as Active Server Pages
(ASP), Visual Basic scripts, Cold Fusion or Microsoft Access or Microsoft SQL database, in this
case, you will need to find a web hosting service that supports Windows platform such as
Windows NT or Windows 2000 servers.
Likewise, if you plan to use programming languages such as Perl, CGI, SSI, PHP or mySQL
database, then any web hosting plans that support Unix/Linux platform should be sufficient to
meet your hosting requirements. Once you have these server platform and hardware requirements
in mind, you can decide the best web hosting plans for your need. For more information, you can
read "How to select a web server and server platform?"
b) Disk space & Bandwidth requirement
Here is another technical requirement that you need to consider before selecting a web hosting
plan, i.e. disk space and bandwidth. If you intend to publish a website that does not have a lot of
contents (meaning, web pages), then the disk space requirement may not be a big concern to you.
In general, a disk space with 200MB to 500MB should be enough to meet your hosting
requirement. In contrast, if you plan to host a website with enormous amount of graphic pictures,
mp3 or video files, then you should consider a web hosting plan that provide huge disk space, for
example, 500 MB to 1,000 MB.
Similarly, the bandwidth requirement will depend on your site traffic estimation. Obviously, a
website that expect to attract high traffic will consume the monthly bandwidth allowance very fast.
If so, you will need to find one web hosting service that offer huge bandwidth with 40 GB to 100
GB per month. Depending upon your website requirement, choosing a web hosting service that
provide sufficient amount of disk space and bandwidth is crucial consideration to prevent paying
extra costs in the future should you overuse the monthly disk space and bandwidth allowance.
c) Other hosting features
2. While the above requirements are utmost important, there are other hosting features that you have
to consider too. Can web hosting provider support video clips on your website, if you have? Is the
web hosting service compatible with Dreamweaver or FrontPage web authoring tool? Do you plan
to set up a virtual store online? Can the host support the e-commerce features without adding
extra cost to your monthly payments? On top of that, you may also want to find out the number of
email accounts provided, number of FTP accounts, web statistic software (analyze your web
traffic), type of control panel supported (manage your web hosting account), database and
scripting languages supported and etc.
Reliability and scalability
A first-class web hosting provider offers reliable server uptime and fast Internet connection. You
should only choose a web hosting service that guarantee at least 99% server uptime with high-
speed Internet backbones using at least OC3 (Optical Carrier) lines (155 Megabits per second) or
above instead of T1 or T3 lines. A reliable web hosting provider usually invests heavily on their
data center infrastructure with high performance servers, high speed multiple backbones providers
with fail-over redundancy, backup power generators and firewall software protection in place to
ensure they meet the uptime guarantee specified in the terms of service.
Similarly, you should choose a web hosting service with hardware facilities that designed for
scalability, so that they can grow with your business. For example, if you need to increase more
disk space, bandwidth or number of mySQL databases, you should be able to upgrade as needed
without any problems.
Customer service and support
The last major consideration in choosing a web hosting service is to find a web hosting providers
that offers excellent customer service and support. You should always search for a web hosting
provider that offers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week technical support that fielded with highly
experience technicians, so that any web hosting problems will be resolved within a reasonable
amount of time. You may also want to consider to test how responsive is their customer support by
sending few inquiry emails to the web hosting provider. In general, any response in less than 24
hours is considered acceptable. It is a sign of poor customer support if they take more than one
day to response.
In addition, a web hosting provider with excellent support should also provide multiple support
channels, such as toll-free phone support, 24/7 email support, live chat, online knowledgebase,
Interactive flash tutorials and FAQ.
Above are few major considerations before you choose your web hosting service. In addition, how
long has the web hosting provider in business and the number of customers that they currently
have are also a good indication of the quality of their hosting products as well as the stability of the
company. Even though cost of the web hosting service is also important but it should not be your
major consideration. Because the price of a web hosting service has been declining over the years
due to competition, as a result, the price of most of the web hosting services offering quality
hosting features has been converging to less than US$10 per month. If you can't afford less than
$10 per month, you probably isn't in the online business for the long haul. Therefore, price should
not be a major deciding factor.
3. On the other hand, it is more important to ensure the web hosting service that you choose is able
to meet your website hosting requirements, guarantee your website is always accessible with
satisfying speed, provide scalability to grow and expand your website as well as offer excellent
customer supports. Depending on your web hosting requirement, you can take advantage of our
site, Cheap Web Hosting Review to find the recommended web hosting services that can match
the three major criteria above. Good luck to your search.
Andrew is the owner of Web Hosting Services, a website that provides complete and detail
reviews on web hosting services. You can visit his website at:http://www.lowest-price-web-
hosting.com/
Article Source:
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Andrew_Webb
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For One of the best hosting sites. Check this out:
www.hosting5dollar.com
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