The following are the tips one must keep in mind while choosing a new web host: -

1) One must make sure that the new web host plan offers the storage capabilities to handle all of the current website storage requirements. If the size of the website is 50MB, then one must check for the plan that offers at least that much space or more. In case one is not able to make estimates about the space required then he/she must ask his/her current host. Also this information can be found on control panel.

2) One must also check how does his/her current web host determine the amount of storage used for? It is necessary to check what one?s current and new host includes in the plan’s storage amount also one should check are one?s emails and log files counted towards his/her total storage, or the web files only?

3) Its necessary to know what operating system does one?s current hosting plan use? Windows or Unix? Mostly it makes no difference but in some cases it can make the difference between a working website and a broken website. In case one?s site is currently on a Windows server and the website uses ASP scripting, then its difficult to make things work well on a Unix server, as ASP is a Windows based programming language. So one should check immediately whether his/her hosting plan is on a Unix or Windows server.

4) Also its important to check if one?s your site currently use FrontPage? Before switching to new host one should check if the new host supports FrontPage and the prevailing version.

5) Another important issue to take care is the amount of bandwidth offered by the new host. One should check if the new hosting plan offers the same amount of bandwidth that the current host offers. This should be checked in advance to avoid unexpected high bills afterwards.

6) Make sure if the new web hosting plan gives the same amount of email accounts, auto responders and mail forwards that the current host provides.

7) Its necessary to check if one?s site uses a shopping cart that the current hosting plan provides? It is essential to have a suitable shopping cart replacement in case one desires to move the cart to the new host. So one must check that as well.
If one is using any scripts on his/her website, its important to check if one?s new hosting plan supports all of one?s scripts. One must make sure in advance if there is any need to make any modifications to scripts to get them working on the new server.

9) Don?t forget to set up the existing email accounts on the new server before transferring domain name to the new server.

10) In case user is just a beginner and even don?t know how to upload files, its necessary to check with the provider if he can do that with no extra charges. There are some hosts who offer such facility free of cost yet some don?t offer this facility because of liability issues.

It?s necessary to double check if the site looks and functions properly on the new server after completing the uploading process. Preview facility is provided in the form of preview link to see how the site looks and some hosts provide this facility before the domain name is transferred over. In case this preview facility is not available with the host, still there is a method to preview the site. One can modify his/her host?s file to preview the site. The host file tells the computer where to go to look for sites that are listed in that file and this works with any version of Windows. Here the file location can change but the file name remains the same. Below is the way to modify the host?s file:

The file HOSTS should be in the c: windowssystem32driversetc One can find a file named HOSTS. SAM (as in SAMPLE). That is OK; one can modify the HOSTS. SAM file as well and do a SAVE AS HOSTS.

In both the cases one should double click on the HOSTS file to open it. Thereafter one will be prompted by Windows to select an Application (Program) to use to VIEW the file.

Now scroll the list and select Notepad and then one should click on the OK button. The NOTEPAD program will now open, displaying the file HOSTS.

So, in order to tell computer that www. yourwebsite. com is at the address (replaced with the real IP) 12. 345. 678. 90 one should add the following entry to the bottom of the hosts file:

12. 345. 678. 90 www. yourdomain. com (As in the example).

Now one should click on FILE, slide down and click on SAVE AS. Then in the Save As one should type field, select ALL FILES. After completing that click on save. One warning will come which should be ignored i. e. the file already exists but that?s ok, then just one has to click YES.

Now one should close Notepad, by clicking on FILE, slide down to EXIT, and click.

Now when one will open the web browser, or try to ping the site, the system will go to the IP address one typed in the HOSTS file.

One should not forget to undo this when testing is finished else the computer will always want to go to that IP address whenever one want to go to that site.

After being satisfied with the site looks and functions, one can go to his/her registrar (where the domain name is registered) and modify the nameservers associated with one?s domain name to his/her new web host’s nameservers. In case one does not know his/her new host’s name servers, should confirm with them. However most hosts have that information listed somewhere on their website or in the email one first get after signing up for an account.

After the completion of domain nameserver modification it will take around 24-48 hours and the site will be displayed on the new server.

One must check his/her domain name and should see if the nameservers added are listed. If yes, the website transfer is complete to new web host. And after the confirmation is received one can cancel the old web hosting account.

One of the most important decisions one should make while deciding to put on his/her business on the web is which web hosting provider to use. The web hosting company that hosts one?s personal page may not offer the best plan for one?s business needs. The following are the several things one should take care while selecting a web host for one?s professional web pages.

Windows or *nix Web Hosting

When a web hosting provider is talking about an operating system, he/she means the operating system that his/her server uses. There is no need for Windows hosting if one is using a Windows operating system on his/her machine. Windows hosting is not required if one is building his/her pages in Front Page. The main reason for opting Windows web server hosting is that it enables to take advantage of . asp and . net programming capabilities, which can be extremely powerful. If one is not sure, then he/she should check with the person who will be designing his/her pages and ask for their recommendation.

Choice of Web Hosting Services

One must look for a web hosting provider that offers all the services that one needs in order to build the web site of his/her choice. The following are the services that make a good deal even better are:

Reduced price or free domain registration

When one is building a company web site, having his/her own domain name is very important to present a professional image. there are several web hosting providers that registers one?s domain name for free, and take care of all the details of renewing and updating information so that one need not to worry about it.

Secure server transactions on their server

If one is planning to accept payments or exchange personal information over the Internet, access to a secure server is most essential. One must look for a web hosting package that includes SSL in its basic price. PHP and mySQL support

If one chooses a UNIX server, PHP and database support can provide powerful tools for running applications and forums, content management systems and more. Most business and e-commerce plans include them.

Design Services at reduced prices

There are several web hosting providers offering professional web design services to their customers at a discount rate. Thus one should avail these discounts. The main advantage of a professional looking web site is that it inspires confidence in one?s customers.

Web-mail services and POP Email Boxes

One must also look for a business web hosting plan that offers the maximum POP email boxes so as to enable one to assign email addresses to all his/her employees and departments. The advantage of a web-mail interface is that it allows users to access their mail from any computer.

Thus one can find a web hosting provider that offers all the features that one wants and that too at an affordable price. The only thing required is one should do his/her home work properly i. e. he/she should compare all the hosts before selecting the most important one.

The Basics:

If one wants to put his/her web site online, Web hosting offers the opportunity. For making a site go online, no matter it is having large or small content one has to go onto a web server. Thus a web server is simply a larger and much more powerful computer than user?s own computer. On these servers one?s Internet content simply sits for people to access and view the information available. These web servers are stored within data centers; all what is required is simply renting some space on the server.

Why to use a web hosting service?

The first reason to choose is its affordability. The work of the web hosting companies includes looking after and updating all software required to maintain one?s site, adding security patches making sure that one?s content is safe from hackers/viruses and unwanted Spam. The first step after registration of web site?s name is hosting it with the web server. In case there comes any difficulty with the web site, full technical support is supported by the hosting company. In chases one chooses to host by own, it will cost too much on hardware, bandwidth and ongoing software updates.

What is shared web hosting?

While searching for a web host Company one will find that many are offering shared web hosting. Shared web hosting is simply a server that has a number of different web sites sitting on it simultaneously. In case of shared web hosting one will be allocated a certain amount of disk space on the server and this allows user to have a number of web sites hosted on one server. It is a very secure service even though one is sharing the server with many different companies, as no other company will have access to other?s files. There are many people having wrong opinion that using a shared service will make the web site act slowly. In case of shared web hosting the information will be displayed and downloaded equally as fast as if it where on the server on it?s own. The concept used by Web host companies is that they offer shared hosting simply to use up all the space on the server, there is no benefit to user or them having empty hard disk space.

Why good hosting is required?

If one has developed a web site for business opportunity or to sell merchandise online what all is needed is reliability as downtime costs much money. Therefore less downtime means the better chance of making money by the user. One is required to compile a whole list of questions to ask the web host company when it comes to hosting his/her site. It is necessary to have a guaranteed response time if any problem occurs with the site or if it goes offline. One needs to have 24-hour access to his/her files with 24-hour support if the site is in business of selling products online, as most of the sales could be made in the evening or nighttime. Thus it is very important to have support all time for any issues that could arise. Not only that to check the effectiveness of site it is also important to look for Statistics i. e. how many unique hits (people visiting one?s site) one is getting so that one can see the trend of people just visiting to those who are buying. Thus one should check in advance the stats offered by different companies as some web host companies offer very substantial stats while others can be less informative, so one should always ask for a demonstration before finalizing any host.

Mouth publicity is a great way to hear as to who are a good host and a bad host. One should ask his/her colleague or who is already taking the experience of that host. There are several good as well as bad hosts in the market, therefore one should ask the questions and make sure that he/she is confident with the replies before signing up.

Will hosting in own country or another, effects the web site?

It is quite interesting to know if the company is providing 24 hour support to allow for time differences, then one should have the same level service as if the web host company was based just down the road. Thus it makes no difference if the host is of same country or of another. There are many people thinking hosting their website outside of their registered country will lead to losing their domain identity, which is totally wrong example if one is based in Ireland and is having a computer website it would be something like www. computerparts. ie The. I. e. is the identity of Ireland but if one wants his site hosted in the US then he/she would still keep the. I. e. , and there is no need to change to. Com. Thus the great thing about web hosting is that the world is oyster and one can shop online globally until one is satisfied with the service.

This article is useful for understanding the hosting industry and studies its dynamics to know what to look for before selecting a web host.

Firstly it is good to have a proper introduction of web hosting chain. It is termed as chain because here about 3 upstream providers serve the end consumer. First the web-hosting provider, who is in direct contact, then comes the web host?s upstream company who maintains the servers and sells space to web hosts, and above that, the data center that serves the purpose of providing the connection and houses the servers. There are some web hosts who act as the server administrator and liase with the data centers directly.

The growth of the web hosting industry in at saturation point due to the presence of hundreds of web-hosting providers claiming to provide cheaper and better services to businesses and individuals. The reason for this is the availability of resources in abundance and at cheaper costs with reducing disk space and data-transfer prices. Its easy to enter the web hosting business as there are large resellers of server space providing cheap hosting and reselling plans that provides ground to incomers to join the business.

Due to growing number of suppliers with cheaper reselling plans, more and more web hosting businesses are coming up providing web-hosting solutions to business and individual websites due to lower fixed costs and investment. Not only that this increase in supply is not caused by factors in any particular country. As Internet is not limited to the boundary of any country so the data centers present in any part of the world can easily provide the servers and web space for a local hosting company. Due to Internet it is easy to communicate to each other and providers can easily exchange their services in the global space.

Maintaining a proper balance between supply and demand is quite good for the customers. But imbalance has forced several new web-hosting providers to offer extremely low prices for their web hosting plans or packages in order to make them self stand in the tough market. Now it?s time for customers to choose the hosting providers having lowered prices from the vast number of providers.

However, continuous decrease in prices is quite disadvantageous for both the providers as well as the customers. By reduces prices, companies are able to earn nominal profit and are even not able to cover their support costs. Customers suffer by getting less support with their web-hosting accounts. It?s quite obvious if the profits do not justify the costs, web-hosting companies will easily close down and takes their clients’ sites with them.

The following are the factors to consider while choosing a web-hosting provider: -

The most important factor to consider is Support for any individual or small business looking for a web host for their websites. The Internet web-hosting provider who is unable to provide the facility of responding to emails within 24 hours is probably having problems providing fast and reliable support services. One can?t ignore the validity of these services especially for the beginners who needs guidance with publishing their websites on the web hosting account provided. The success of any web hosting business depends upon the relationships between web host and web hosting customers. To make business success, provider should be able to provide services when and where required also its crucial for customers to know when their site is going offline for sake of maintenance.

After support next important factor is Stability. It refers to how much uptime one can expect from the web-hosting provider, which in turn depends upon the providers’ servers and network. If the providers are not having reliable and stable providers, it would affect their servers and cause problems for the website. It is must to have an uptime of about 99. 5% in the industry, as there are other external factors, which may be beyond control of the provider.

Third factor to consider is Cost which depends on the purpose of the website and budget. The budget may be smaller in case of Personal /Individual websites and so they opt to go with a cheaper web hosting provider, possibly in exchange for support and stability. But in case of business sites as they need better stability and support they opt for expensive host providers. It is most often observed that cheap web hosting providers are able to attract customers in the beginning by offering low prices but afterwards fails in providing quality support to their customers thereby creating problems for them. Also the large numbers of client sites cause sustained high server loads which leads to server crash thus hampering stability.

Another factor, which is not so important, is Location of the server. It is not considered important as it depends upon a user?s ISP/country’s connection to the data center where the server is located. Pings to the server normally tells the network latency to expect when people can access to one?s site. Lower ping rates leads to loading of site faster.

Last but not least one should take time to identify and contact a web host to check their service. This helps in providing an idea of the kind of support that one might receive and helps in deciding the reliability of the provider.

While choosing ones Web hosting provider one has to confront with thousands of companies, tens of thousands of different plans as out of these thousands of companies and plans only few are suitable for the website and online needs.

In today?s world Webhosting has become a part of the informational revolution brought by the Internet and it has become compulsory for both business and also individuals.

Here we are just going to point on few things related to choosing an adequate web host for a web site as there is no need explaining why a website is a must on World Wide Web. This business might seem very complicated but once one knows what to look for it is easy to find out. Stick to ones requirements after analyzing it properly.

Many inexperienced web owners often buy more than required while evaluating their needs in terms of space and bandwidth. Thus many web-hosting providers size their web servers taking this into account as this is exceptionally common and in fact over sell the space and bandwidth assuming that customers will never make full use of it.

Ask ones web host provider per server ration to avoid web hosts that result to just that or crowed their web servers to get an extra profit per customer. To become a clever buyer one should do this with all the other companies one finds interesting to do business with and are eligible to host web site. Never buy a web-hosting plan that fits just perfectly instead always leave some space as website is like a living creature which always grows so buy a little extra space so that when website is expanded one have resources available. Always leave margin for error too as supposing the initial bandwidth evaluation proves itself insufficient then one might not be able to use its website because of exceeded bandwidth. For both knowledgeable and less knowledgeable web owners most web hosting plans come packed with features and some even offer pre-installed scripts and programs that might come handy.

Do not forget things actually required like the OS (Operating System) or the PHP support, as one could consider any extra feature a plus. Do not allow the provider to tell something not required or is less than expected so one should decide of its own what is needed.

Importance of Support: – One might overlook Support facility when one finds an offer which is suitable both in terms of space, bandwidth and has all other facilities which one needs but remember all the good features will go in vein if one does not have good support. If the web-hosting provider is too careless then any technical problem, which arises, will take long hours to be solved even after making many support help calls thus curtailing the work.

If one wants to test the quality and how responsive the support personnel is then one should fire many pre-sales questions through email. Check if the response fact is enough. Now supposing that a conference has to be attended and the site is down and many clicks are expected, check if the website is online to get them and also whether the response one is getting from the support is thorough or is just scratching the surface and is the response understandable.

Look for these qualities when looking for good support: -

-Online support staff, help desk, message boards etc.

-Try to find on forums or discussion boards Information on the reputation of a web-

hosting provider.

-Would one like to be among one those discontented customers there?

Another aspect of the problem is reliability. Company?s web server?s uptime should be asked. Usually 99. 9% of uptime is guaranteed by Most of the hosts, as 100% is not a realistic figure in the computer world. This guarantee means that, the money will be refunded for that month or free webhosting will be given for a month as compensation for web site being unavailable if the web site was not available 99. 9% of the time.

Our sincere advice to everyone looking for web host provider is don?t try too hard to find the cheapest possible web host though it is true that one has to pay for paid web hosting. Still if one goes for cheaper one then within two weeks from the date of purchase one will stumble upon a better deal and thus will most likely end-up wasting an incredible amount of time. On the other hand paying extra amount to get what one could have got for less is also not a good deal. Getting 200 MB of space with 2 GB of bandwidth for $60 one is getting cheated and at the same time getting same service for $6 or $10 can be a good deal. A thin line between Nightmare of getting slow server response, unreachable support and irritating server downtime and Profitable and enjoyable web presence is drawn by individuals? themselves.

So we conclude saying one should always choose ones web-hosting provider vigilantly who can live up the promises and can deliver good quality web hosting!

After the registration of domain name selection of web host is another rational step a user need to consider. Though, finding an ideal host is a daunting task. One can find several companies offering web-hosting services to the clients. While locating keyword web hosting in the search engines one will find more than 100 million outputs!

One cannot deny the fact, for a successful online presence a dependable web hosting is must. Online presence and accessibility of a web site is must. If not, one should remain ready to loose clients and prospects. For an instance, if one compare this with a traditional business.

CATEGORIES OF WEB HOSTING:

One should select a web hosting deal according to his/her site. One cannot fulfill his/her requirements from same hosting deal for a personal web site, web site meant for email newsletter subscription and archives, e-commerce site or web forum. Web hosting can be divided into four prime categories:

1. Virtual (shared) hosting,

2. Dedicated server,

3. Collocation server and

4. Reseller hosting.

Two most applicable hosting are virtual (shared) hosting and dedicated server.

What is Virtual (shared) hosting? It is a condition in which several web sites share one server. It is a low cost hosting because price is divided between several users. One can locate a standard virtual hosting at a rate of $100 a year.

In a Dedicated server hosting company lease the whole web server from a particular web hosting company. The site of web server is the web hosting company. One can opt dedicated server as a suitable option who does not wish to share a server with other web masters. One can find a dedicated server in two forms managed and un-managed. If one talk about managed server, company will take care of all the setups of user?s server. However, in unmanaged server user needs to take care of all these by him/her self. The benefit of this sort of hosting is that one can fully lodge web hosting as per his/her requirements. Moreover, for a site with ample amount of visitors a dedicated server is the only rational choice. Due to higher cost, starting from $100 per month, those companies that know the worth of Internet business generally use it.

One can say that Collocation server is quite identical to dedicated server. Disparity lies in the fact that company doesn?t take the web server on lease. Their own web server is placed in the web hosting company. In addition to it, company has material access to their web server, which is not available while talking about a dedicated server.

If one mention about Reseller hosting it is aimed to those companies only wishes to begin their own web hosting business.

ASPECTS, WHICH ONE NEEDS TO CONSIDER:

There are many factors which a user needs to consider to prevent any future miss happens:

Web space:

Requirement of Web space vary from site to site. Off course, if user requirement is only a web site containing basic information about him/her and his/her work excluding the use of web applications, then space of 50 MB is quite sufficient. However, a complex e-commerce site along with numerous products in one?s database demands a capacity of 1 GB.

Bandwidth:

The term Bandwidth refers to data transferred from user?s web site and that comprise of graphic details, images, banners and files for download. One should have accurate knowledge of Content before going for an amount of bandwidth. When one talks about the majority of sites, bandwidth of 10 GB a month is quite sufficient, though for few other sites like sites related to desktop wallpapers can frequently consumes even hundreds of GB a month.

Up time or visibility:

It symbolizes time articulated in percents displaying the period a site remained online. One should not be cheerful because someone assured him/her to provide say for 98% up time because it is not going to fulfill his/her requirement. One should get at least 99. 7% uptime. Believe it or not, it definitely matters.

Email accounts:

Email accounts are an integrated and crucial part of web hosting package. It is quite interesting to know for how much will one get only a so called catch ?all forwarding which means that all emails sent to somewhere@mydomain. com will arrive to one?s email address or one can set-up email accounts for several users? Also the thing is for how much? Is it intended for 5, 10, 100 or limitless email accounts? In addition to it, there is no harm to verify whether user get a so-called POP3 email address (?real? email address), web mail or rather both? If one has a POP3 email address then he/she can check his/her emails via favorite email client and web mail facilitate the user to inquire his/her emails at any place demanding just a computer and Internet connection.

Form of Server, tools and control panel:

When one mention the two generally utilized hosting then the name of Unix-based or Windows platform comes first. It matters for the result program languages, databases and scripts that one can apply. When one talks about Unix-based platform, general selection is relayed to PHP language along with MySQL, however, when it comes to Windows platform ASP or ASP. NET language will be along with SQL Server. One should enquire that is database is available with package or not, if yes, then how many? Nowadays, contemporary web site must be database-driven.

Too, one should have full knowledge related to tools coming along with web hosting package, if there is only applications for web statistics, file manager and things it is not an concern issue.

Technical support:

A crucial aspect while selecting a web hosting particularly for a user without having adequate technical skills is technical support. A proper technical support does not take a responsive time more then a day. This is not liable only to selection of web hosting company, but, crucial to any of the company selling products and services, Software Company can be one of the examples.

The coordination of few of the companies is so well thought-out that it takes only 1 hour to give response to user?s queries! Through their source of contact one can predict about the future response. Do the concern company has only email support or also have phone support? Does they provide a toll-free number? Do they offer the facility of trouble-ticket system? Working time is another crucial aspect. What is their strategy of providing technical support is it during working hours only i. e. 9 to 17 or does they provide the facility of 24×7 technical support? An ideal way to detect their professionalism one can create a list of fake queries, drop a line to them and hang around to know their reply time.

Testimonials:

Several web hosting and software companies have this smart way to increase their customer strength. Testimonials section contains the approval of satisfied customers, attracting more people to their service. This section is not completely reliable. Several hosting companies offer their clients to analyze their portfolio, instead of doing that one should contact webmasters who are taking the service of concern host and register their opinions. One can take help of several sites for further information regarding best web hosting deals and suggestions.