Make Sure You Choose the
Right
Discount
Web Hosting Packages To Host Your Websites
Discount
Web Hosting Packages can save you lots of money. You should also
buy under 10 dollar domain names. First, before you start
looking for a discount web hosting plan for your
site, you need to determine your requirements for your site. For
the sake of any beginners reading this, I will consider shared and dedicated
hosting only.
Size, scalability and disk space
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Will your website and content
grow from time to time or you just need to publish a set of
content that will expire after some time? For a corporate
site with less than 20 web pages, a disk space of about 40MB
should be enough.
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If you want to start a site
about a certain topic or industry, consider getting a
hosting account with at least 60MB disk space for a start
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If you intend to publish a site
with a lot of pictures or mp3 for users to download or
purchase, consider a 100MB disk space hosting account.
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For personal sites, consider a
30MB MB disk space hosting account.
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If you are in charge of an
enterprise that needs to publish a lot of information and
offer intranet system and public services, consider a
dedicated server instead.
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These days, many hosting
providers offer hosting services that exceed the disk space
requirement standard for any given websites. Although more
is better, it is not always necessary. Disk space can be
purchased from time to time if it is not sufficient. So
choose a hosting account appropriately depending on how much
space you will need.
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Secondly, consider hosting
providers that can support the growth of your website and
business, so that you can scale your website affordably. Ask
about the companies' application, network, disk space cost,
facilities and the solution they can offer as your site
grows.
The
features of a Discount Web Hosting Packages account has a lot to do with what you can
do for your site. It is of utmost importance to find a host that
matches your skills and interest. Let's go step by step!
Platform and hardware requirements.
The most popular web server nowadays runs on Windows 2000,
Apache, Cobalt or Linux®. The design goals of both Unix®/Linux®
and Windows are very similar in nature. These operating systems
offer portability, extensibility, and an ability to run on
various different computers, whether they are desktop PCs or
departmental servers. Your choice of operating system will
classify the service and type of software that you can deploy
and the kind of applications that your site can run on.
Windows NT® or Windows 2000 servers are configured to be
compatible with Microsoft® applications, such as FrontPage,
Access and MS SQL. NT/Windows 2000 servers also offer
programming environments such as Active Server Pages (ASP),
Visual Basic Scripts, MS Index Server and Cold Fusion. So if you
are familiar with Microsoft®'s Internet Technologies, consider
Windows NT® or Windows 2000 hosting services. Also, consider the
speed of the processor and the amount of RAM (memory) that is
installed on the server. Compare and choose the hosting provider
that can offer you high processor speed and bigger amount of RAM
(memory) at a reasonable price.
The Unix® platform offers tried and tested stability and the
speed for enterprise level e-business. Linux® should also be
mentioned when talking about Unix®. Many people do not realize
that Linux® falls under the realm of Unix®. This is because
Linux® is actually a Unix® derivative. Unix® or Linux® hosting
often comes with telnet access, mySQL database, Perl, PHP and
CGI support. If you are familiar with Unix® file naming, PERL or
PHP applications, consider a Unix® or Linux® hosting account.
If you are not familiar with any of these operating systems, and
if you prefer an easy to use platform, consider a Windows 2000
hosting account. If you are looking forward to learning the Perl
programming language or if reliability or stability is a
concern, consider an Unix® or Linux® hosting account.
Whichever platform that you choose, determine your goals for
your site and find out the requirements to run your site. Based
on your needs, determine the compatibility of the application or
programming language that you need to use. Once you have all
these in mind, you can safely and easily decide which platform
is most suitable for your need.
Email Accounts
Look for Discount Web Hosting Packages offering email accounts with web based access as well as POP3.
The best ones are those with administrator control. Generally,
you should have at least 5 email accounts for 3 users. Depending
on the number users that have in your organization, you should
have least 2 to 5 standby email accounts. Some hosting providers
offer unlimited email accounts as well. Features like auto
responders, email aliases and email forwarding is very common
nowadays.
Software and services
Web hosting in the open Internet market today is very
competitive. A good Discount Web Hosting Packages provider will offer speedy internet
connection, proper security measures, featured rich hosting, and
reliable server uptime. There are over a 100 types of features
that a host can offer. Look for only what you need. Some of the
most widely offered features include.
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Database
Determine your requirements and decide if database is
required. If you need to store a lot of records or
transactions, a database can be very helpful. MS Access,
mySQL and MS SQL Server are some of the most widely used
database on the internet. If you are decide a Unix® or
Linux® hosting is your preferred choice, mySQL suits
perfectly for your site. Alternatively, if a Windows 2000
server hosting is your option, you have the choice of either
a MS Access or a MS SQL server.
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Scripting language
If you think Microsoft® Active Server Pages can't be used in
Linux® or Unix®, you are wrong. With more and more new and
advanced technologies coming up to support cross platform,
virtually all popular scripting languages can be used on
either Windows 2000 and Unix®. Nevertheless, it is advisable
that you still stick to the platform and scripting language
that you know best. If Perl, Cgi, Php and mySQL are your
favorite scripting languages and tools, stick to Linux® or
Unix®. Find the host that supports the latest version.
Insist that they inform you so that you maximize the latest
web technologies for the fee that you pay.
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Microsoft® FrontPage Support
This configuration allows you to use Microsoft® FrontPage to
design, create and manage your website.
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FTP Accounts
This is by default the standard method of uploading and
downloading files from your computer to your site.
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Raw Log Access
Often you don't need raw log. Each log size is very big and
it is very hard to interpret it into useful information.
Instead insist the host provider offer web statistics
software for your site so that you can harness the detailed
analytics buried deep within gigabytes of raw log and
provide you the insights you need to market your site
successfully.
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Control Panel
Control Panel is a service provided by the host to help
manage your web hosting account efficiently. This a is very
useful tool that you need when you want things to be done
quickly and dynamically. Check out this feature when you are
looking for a host to sign up with
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Ecommerce Options
If you want to sell a service or product online, you need to
find a hosting provider that offers a selection of ecommerce
features and payment processing services. Shopping cart, SSL
security certificate and credit card merchant providers are
some of the options you need to consider. Currently, the
easiest and most widely used ecommerce system is Miva®
Merchant. Look for a host that supports this. Other shopping
cart systems are also available and some hosting providers
offer this feature for free as part of the hosting plan.
Components
Many scripting languages require third party extensions or
additional extension to develop cutting-edge web technologies.
Some of these components are available at an additional cost.
View carefully and ask if required whether the hosting company
provides the components that you need.
For example, if want to develop a site using Microsoft® Active
Server Pages, you may want to know if the host provides
additional third party components like SAFileup, ASPMail, and
BrowserHawk.
Speed
Web users do not tolerate slow websites, and to a certain
extent, you can avoid the problem by choosing a Discount Web
Hosting Packages provider
that is committed to supply high speed connection and redundant
lines to ensure your site remains responsive and that your data
moves quickly even if your primary Internet connections are
temporarily unavailable.
Although the speed of a site can be caused by various and
complicated problem areas, ranging from routing, web server set
up, and local area networks, the main and major concern of how
fast your site is depends very much on the types of network
connections. The general types of network connections that a
hosting provider often provides are given below.
Many Discount Web Hosting Packages providers still connect to the Internet through T1,
or T3 connections, although there has been an increase of
hosting services using OC (Optical Carrier) lines.
A T1 line will offer data transfer rate of 1.5 Mbps (megabits
per second), while a T3 line can supply data transfer rates of
43Mbps. Ultra-High Speed OC3 and OC12 lines offers 155Mbps and
622Mbps respectively. Some hosting providers have connections to
major internet backbones at the speed of OC48 (2488Mbps).
Thus, consider finding Discount Web Hosting Packages that provide reasonable internet
connections. You can do a speed test to determine the average
response time from a hosting provider's site to your computer.
Ping displays a report that includes the time it takes to
receive a control packet from the remote host. High values of
packet loss and response time indicate low connection
performances, while low response time often means more reliable
and faster connection. Please take note that the user's
experience of response time is not limited to server's
connection, but the throughput of the web server, the Internet
itself, and user's connection.
Bandwidth
Bandwidth is the amount of files and data that you can transfer
per month. The standard allowance you get is 1 gigabyte of
bandwidth per month. Every time a visitor views your site they
are downloading files from your site, this uses your bandwidth.
If you have a page that is 30kb in size including images and 10
people view that page you would have used 300kilobytes of
bandwidth.(1 gigabyte = approximately 1,000,000 kilobytes) When
choosing a hosting provider, the amount of bandwidth you have
can be crucial to the success of your site. Generally speaking,
the more bandwidth you have, the more traffic your site will be
able to handle at one time. Consider finding Discount Web
Hosting Packages that
provides at least 2.5GB of monthly bandwidth allowance. If your
site acts as a portal for web users to find information,
consider 6GB of monthly bandwidth allowance for a start. Some
hosting providers offer unlimited bandwidth. We suggest that you
read its Terms of Use before signing up.
Reliability and Scalability
Choose a Discount Web Hosting Packages provider offering a guarantee that your Website will be
open for business at least 99% of the time. Excellent Web
hosting providers can offer this guarantee because they have
invested in the best automatic monitoring equipment, hired
experienced engineers who can anticipate problems and
emergencies, and installed redundant back-up systems to take
over the moment anything goes wrong.
Support
Maintaining and running a web hosting company is not easy. In
fact, finding highly experienced web technicians to respond and
support inquiries 24 hours and 7 days a week is even harder.
Because successful implementation of a web hosting company often
depends on how the management team executes its plan, policies,
and goals, you can easily test if the web hosting company will
respond to you quickly by asking them questions through email a
few times.
There are a few things you can do to find Discount Web Hosting
Plans with good
technical support.
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Find out if the company provides
online knowledgebase and FAQ support. Check if the system is
frequently updated and used. Online knowledgebase and FAQ
are very handy tools when you have trouble with your website
at anytime.
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Find out if a control panel is
available for your site. Control Panel allows you to change
and manage your hosting account remotely at anytime without
any support intervention.
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Find out the company's current
status and how many years the company has been operating.
Hosting providers that do not determine the needs of their
customers have ceased or will eventually cease operations in
this industry, leaving only the best-of-breed hosting
providers to progress and move ahead.
Find out if the company has any
technical certification in supporting and providing the service
you purchase
Cost
Check the cost of the hosting plans carefully. Some hosting
features are optional. You can also save some cost if you prepay
a yearly payment. The cost of shared hosting plans and dedicated
hosting plans varies a lot.
Good luck in your search reliable Discount Web Hosting Packages! |
