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Money saving is probably the primary concern by most people for hosting plan choice. Hosting is a matured business nowadays and many companies be able to reduce price in order to get customer purcharse. Because of this, the price range is big from different providers.

For most web hosting providers, there're multiple class hosting plans to choose from, such as starter, advance and business class etc. They come with different tech parameters and support features. How should we select even if the lowest plan seems to be working with our requirements? Following article will describe the real difference among different class plans side by side and guide you to select the most suitable plan by expert experience.

Compare Feature

When there're multiple class hosting choice (normally three), we must compare carefully about what we can get and how much to pay for extra service. Things like amount of disk storage, number of supported websites and databases etc can be seen directly. What you should evaluate is your potential needs such as if you're going to use a dedicated IP or ssl certificate or install a server side component etc.

Take SSL for example, if we purchase a 256 bit certificate seperately from ssl company, the price might be $100/yr. Plus, we will have to purchase a dedicated IP for installation. But for some cases, it's include for free with some plans at very affordable cost and hosting provider will handle installation too at zero fee!

Another concern is about the website usage, maybe you start with a small application but it grows fast because you want to make it popular. For such situation, you should not choose the very basic solution.

Hosting Server Consideration

We have been working as hosting support before in hosting company. What we found is they put different class plan accounts on different servers. I'm not saying server hardware configuration but the resource usage. For instance, normally they put 100 customer accounts on medium class plan server, but they host more than 200 accounts for basic account server. So you know the result..

You get what you pay, it's not only refering to available technical features but the actual performance and the problem rate in hosting web site. For so many sites on a single server, even a small problem might bring down all other sites.

How about the highest class plan? Well, besides some extra offer, there's no difference with medium class solution. They hosting company simply put them together as most technical features are the same. So unless you really need that much features from highest class plan, you don't have to pay the extra money at all.

Should You Upgrade?

Upgrade is a must when your current plan can not meet the website growth needs. If you just want extra server resource, probably the hosting supplier can offer it directly at exatra pay. But if you want to upgrade performance, We would suggest sign up a new account directly? Why? Because most upgrades are only to allocate more support features to hosting account and there's no change of hosting server!

For this case, if you're previously hosted at basic server environment, upgrade will not transfer your account to a new less crowd platform. Unless it's clearly stated by hosting company that upgrade means server migration, you should never do upgrade directly for better performance.

Is Hosting Service Really Cheap?

Yes, it's cheap but not so cheap. There're indeed lots of cheap hosting services with unbeatable prices, but it's the same story of "starter plan" where your account server is shared by tens and hundreds of other clients. That's the only way for hosting providers to be profitable.

Enterprise grade hardware, Bandwidth and data center services plus daily maintenance, hosting is not cheap at all. Thus if you need good performance, you must pay a reasonable price.

Pay by Use Choice – Cloud

For people who need extremely high performance server but do not use it every day, cloud hosting is perfect choice. Cloud hosting is featured for its pay by use advantage. When you don't want to use for some time, you can temperarily stop the service then re-enable it when you need to use again.

XEN is open sourced vertualization platform and management system, it's also the only available opensource type-1 program for the moment. Administrators be able to run multiple operation systems concurrently, thus it's used in lots of commercial or open source projects such as: Server virtualization, Infrastructure as a Service, Desktop virtualization, Security applications, Embedded and hardware appliances etc. Xen is powering the biggest cloud computing market.

Xen support two kinds of virtualization: PV & HVM, both virtualization can be running on same XEN server. Moreover, PV can be used within HVM virtual server which is popularly named "PV on HVM". What would be the difference between PV and HVM for XEN virtualization?

Xen Paravirtualization (PV)

High efficient and light weight virtualization technology by XEN. Physical CPU doesn't need virtual extension to support PV. However, PV requires Xen-PV-enabled kernel and PV driver in order to power a high performance virtual server. The good thing is most linux destributions already support this including NetBSD, FreeBSD, OpenSolaris etc since from linux kernel version 2.6.24.

Xen Full Virtualization (HVM)

It's also called hardware assist virtualization. HVM makes use of CPU virtual extension from physical machine. HVM requires Intel VT or AMD-V hardware extension. Xen uses Qemu for Simulation of PC hardware including BIOS, IDE, VGA, Network card and USB etc. HVM doesn't need any kernel support, it means windows OS can be used on XENHUM. Because of simulation technologies, HVM performance is not so good as PV machine.

PV on HVM

To improve performance, HVM can also use some special PV drivers (PVHVM or PV-on-HVM). These PV drivers optimize HVM environment and do balance to hard disk & network IO. In this way you get similar or better virtual server than PV. Because of this, you can optimize operation system that only support full virtualization technology, such as windows.

Xen paravirtualization uses PV drivers automatically and no need to provide these drivers seperately, only Xen full virtualization requires PVHUM drivers seperately.

PV in an HVM Container (PVH) – New in Xen 4.4

Xen 4.4 provides a new virtualization mode named PVH. It provides a half virtualization choice for bootup and I/O. Comparing to HVM, PVH uses hardware virtualization extension but no need simulation. PVH be able to balance all virtualization advantages and simplify Xen structure.

More resources

• Xen PV on HVM drivers
• PV on HVM wiki

Best VPS Hosting

For high quality vps server, virtualization platform is only one concern among many features like maintenance plan, server hardware specifications, network capability and support availability etc.. Hosting provider be able to setup the worst server system even on best virtualization platform. Thus, we have to review side by side and choose the best to fulfill our needs. For quick guidance, here's a handful of reputable providers to review on vps hosting page.

Finally we have setup a website and made it online after hard working. We keep working hard to promote it to get more business opportunities. But one day, the website is suddenly down because of attacking. No need to mention how terrible it is because our daily work is all about it. Here we concluded following ways of attacking with according solutions based our editorial experience.

NO.1 Injection

Hackers scan our website files then insert trojan codes from backend. The entire site might be revised. Especially when our website is created from those CMS softwares and we don't apply hot fixes in time after official announcement.

Result: Website content is changed which brings no trusts to visitors. Search engines and other security platform will detect the trojans and put notice from search result. Navigation to website will be blocked.

Solution: After learnt the real problem we can apply following fixes

1. Restore from latest backup.
2. Apply official hot fixes or switch to another website platform.
3. Apply strict file permissions.

NO.2 Bandwidth Attack

Like CC or DDOS, attackers send out numorous requests to website and overload the router, firewall and server.

Result: Such attacking will simply bring down the entire hosting server. Because of this, website can not be opened, search engine spider can not get in either. If the problem persists for some time, data will be cleared from search results.

Solution:

1. Choose a reputable hosting service with good firewall protection.
2. Monitor website via third party services to detect any doubtable visits.
3. Use CDN, CDN can greatly filter those attacks based their powerful hardware setup.

NO. 3 Database attack

SQL injection is another popular name for this attack. Attackers insert harmful sql commands by web forms.

Result: Database is compromised for data leaking. Nowadays over 99% websites are database powered, thus hackers got all web data access and be able to change everything on site.

Solution:

1. Add authentication to web forms on website, such as captcha.
2. Add database firewall
3. Switch to a more secure hosting provider

NO. 4 Deliberate scanning

Hackers use scanning tools to scan website bugs for attacking

Result: preparition of next attack

Solution:

1. Use a secure hosting provider.
2. Close dangerous ports and change some default ports.

NO. 5 Domain attack

There will be following cases for domain attacking

• Domain stealing – Domain ownership is changed and transfered to another registrar.
• DNS hajack – Use spoof DNS server and forward domain to this address.
• Wildcard domain DNS – Create lots of sub domains to point to hackers' website.

Result: Domain control is lost, sub domains are forwarded to hacker sites and domain authority is downgraded. Search engine will not trust our site and remove from search results.

Solution

1. Choose a reputable domain registrar with real contact information, lock domain and prohibit domain transfer.
2. Ensure the safety of contact email account.
3. Use a good and reliable DNS service and lock our settings.

Once a new wordpress theme installed, there're always some sections we want to edit to fulfill our needs. Especially front page layouts, we always have to work with code behind or pay some professionals for assistance. But not anymore! In this article we introduce two great wordpress plugins to help design your wordpress page layout in few minutes, no coding skills required!

Plugin: Page Builder by SiteOrigin

Page Builder completely changed our mind of website design by wordpress. Instead to change code behind, we can easily manage site layout by drag & drop options which is exact the same way of sitebuilder wizard. The best thing is page builder is compatible with any theme and it will not change anything to existing theme design! It makes it easy to create responsive column based content, using the widgets you know and love. Your content will accurately adapt to all mobile devices, ensuring your site is mobile-ready.

See this official video to learn more

All page builder advantages could be concluded to following

• Compatible to any theme and makes no change to theme files
• No coding skill required, sitebuilder like operation
• Live editing, see changes at real time
• History browser, can roll back to old changes with no content breaking
• FREE! 100% open sourced with active development & support

Download plugin at https://wordpress.org/plugins/siteorigin-panels/

Plugin: Visual Composer

A commercial wordpress plugin coded by CodeCanyon. Recognized a premium rrontend and backend page builder plugin, visual composer lets you build any layout with drag and drop page builder plugin – no programming knowledge required.

Visual Composer unbeatable features include

• Build your content on the go, no need admin panel, what you see is what you get!
• Work with any wordpress theme, and actually you don't need to purchase extra theme because you can already make changes as you like.
• 40+ content elements available to build any complex layout
• Built in skin builder to create your personal theme style.
• Responsive Design, Mobile Ready Layouts.
• Professional and dedicated support team.

Buy plugin at official site codecanyon.net

A good and stable server is crucial for web service. When we choose server space, there're multiple suggestions from hosting provider: VPS, Colocation, Dedicated or Cloud hosting server. Because of so many available choice, customers are not always so clear about different terms like colocation, dedicated bandwidth, virtual server and cloud etc.

If we are crazy on quality and purchase high cost plan but we actually don't use that much, it's a kind of waste. The vice versa. In following, we're brief explain the different plans with comparison & reviews.

VPS Hosting

VPS(Virtual Private Server). It's created on dedicated server by virtualization technologies. This virtualization technology devides haredware and system OS then setup multiple server systems. Each VPS got its own OS, space, RAM and dedicated CPU resource etc just like a common server. We can handle OS installation, software installation, reboot and everything the same as dedicated server operation. Logically, as long as the dedicated server resource is big enough, we can create unlimited VPS on it. It's a scalable solution for enterprise and IDC hardware usage efficiency.

At the time being, there're 5 popular virtualization technolgies used by different VPS providers – Xen, OpenVZ, Virtuozzo, Hyper-V & Vmware. Different VPS technologies come with different performance on different hardware configurations. Especially when deal with selling policy in this competitive market. That's why clients have different experience from different VPS hosting providers.

Hyper-V is provided by Microsoft group and only for Windows server at the moment. Actually hyper-v is almost standard choice for windows vps since they both are microsoft products. It's reasonable to think the two are most compatible.

Vmware, leading enterprise solution especially on cloud computing field. We can run almost any OS together on vmware platform. But as we know, the less service on host server, the more secure. So not too many vps providers use it, and it's expensive.

OpenVZ, probably the most popular solution used by all cheap vps providers. This technology provides OS level virtualization and each OS will work independantly. Because it's only on OS level and has very low hardware requirement, we can create more vps servers on same dedicated server. That's why VPS created on OpenVZ is cheaper than other solutions.

Xen, similar with OpenVZ but provides more advanced features. VPS created from Xen platform comes with swap and dedicated RAM/CPU etc. That means if there's no more resource available on host server, we can not create extra vps server. Because of this, VPS on XEN is more reliable than OpenVZ.

Virtuozzo is commercial software from swsoft company(Parallels now) who is leading in lots of hosting software products like sitebuilder wizard. It provides OS level virtualization as well like OpenVZ. However, the number of VPS instance is strictly limited by the license we purchase. At the meanwhile, virtuozzo vps provides very similar performance to host server.

The biggest advantage over VPS is cheap when we want to get system control. Weakness is we have to find a good vps provider because in case one node causes problem on host server then our server is in danger.

Dedicated Server Hosting

Dedicated server hosting is renting from IDC, we just need to provide our configuration then hosting provider will setup everything in their data center. Because of this, we reduced the cost of purchasing all hardware products. We get full remote control over hosting server.

The only weakness of this product is we don't know how the server is configured(structures and actual setup). Those honest hosting provider always tell us the truth such as spare parts brand, model etc. However, some providers do use their own setup to reduce investment and just provide customer the basic configuration such as amount of cpu/ram/space. We can only learn details after received remote login information.

Colocation Hosting

Probably the most reliable server service. We setup the server by our own then send to IDC server rack, service provider will connect the server based our contract. Mostly, we will have to be responsible for hardware problems. The biggest advantage is we have full control of this server especially when it's not so expensive to purchase those hardwares. We can apply our custom setup inside server for specific purpose. Especially when we need to copy lots of data to hard disk, remote uploading is definitely not good choice. We can prepare everything locally then send to data center.

For colocation, we have to get an IT professional to maintain the server while dedicated server hosting is maintained by hosting company. We have to evaluate carefully in choosing the service.

Cloud Hosting

Also called cloud computing where capability is elastic. Cloud computing is highly scalable and more efficient in handling web services. It's integrated with data calculating, storing and IaaS service. Cloud hosting can be provided and paid upon usage on real time. Because of this, we can control the costs efficiently.

Cloud server provides two core services: Advanced cloud hosting & scalable cloud computing for medium to large size enterprises.

All servers are deployed in backbone datacenters and each server be able to work independentely for computer service like storage, backup and other internet services.

Cloud server is designed for clients who have high requirement of system availability with quick recovery. Cloud hosting platform comes with storage sharing and smart backup, be able to make automatic recovery which is centrally managed. Cloud hosting provides the best price value comparing to any other available hosting plan.

Cloud hosting is hot at the time being and it's actually being developped the same way of traditional web hosting service. It's cheap but provides more features than dedicated server.

Conclusion

Based above explanation/comparison, here're some suggestions in choosing different hosting solutions:

• VPS: Suitable for small to medium size dynamic website with relatively high visits. To be more specific, it's only for small size company if you run a business.
• Dedicated Server: Suitable for small to medium size company, ecommerce or big forum with high daily traffic.
• Colocation: Only good for big groups and you must choose a good & profesional data center space.
• Cloud Hosting: Suitable for development companies who have frequent need changes.