Adult Site Owners

If your cyber home is becoming a bit crowded today then it may be time to consider what type of hosting service you really need. Typically, you will have four choices:

(1.) FREE SERVICES: This is what many first-time adult webmasters begin with because it is the most basic hosting package, giving you a limited amount of disk space in exchange for displaying an advertisement on their site promoting their service or an affiliate program of their choice. This isn't the most versatile option but it is definitely a good way to learn more about the adult site building and administration.

(2.) SHARED: This is the default option for most hosting companies whenever dedicated or co-located services are not explicitly ordered. Shared hosting means that your site is being stored on the same server as numerous other web sites. This hosting package allows you to have your own domain name and up to 10-15 email addresses and aliases but a limited amount of bandwidth and space.

(3.) DEDICATED: Dedicated servers can be surprisingly affordable, and if properly used they can even be cheaper than virtual website accounts. If you run a site with a large number of images, plan to offer any type of ecommerce or intend to attract large volumes of traffic then you need to choose a dedicated hosting package. This will save your site from sharing a machine with anyone else, thus allowing it to have its own space on the hosting company's racks of servers ("rack space"). Although this is more expensive than a shared package, they do offer the most space and bandwidth. You can share the cost of a dedicated server with another webmaster that you trust. Dedicated servers often have a minimum bandwidth bill that's higher than virtual server accounts. For instance, if your server comes with a minimum bill of $400 per month, which includes a certain allotment of bandwidth and you were already spending $200 on virtual accounts, then it's unlikely that you will go past the allotted bandwidth each month. If you then share your server with two other friends and split the bill evenly, that would be a savings of over $60 per month on a much better machine. ISPrime.com http://www.isprime.com/ has some really good deals on dedicated servers. They allow you to customize your dedicated server to better suit your needs. You can choose your processor, RAM, primary hard drive, secondary hard drive, and bandwidth. Definately worth taking a look at.

(4.) CO-LOCATED: If you're apprehensive about leaving your hosting in the hands of another company, but don't have the funds to physically maintain a server and direct Internet connection out of your home or office, a co-located server is the next best thing. With co-located servers, a hosting company will connect your hardware to the Internet and provide you with rack space, a secure environment to store your server in, and technical support. What you are responsible for providing is the actual server, maintenance and software.

Generally speaking, Dedicated and Colocation plans are very similar. The only difference is with a dedicated plan; the hosting company provides (rents) you the server hardware, whereas with a Colocation plan, you provide the server. In a Dedicated plan when a hardware item fails, the hosting company will replace it but for a Colocation plan, you send the part to the provider, or purchase the hardware from the provider and pay for the installation. So you say that a Dedicated server is what you need, then there are some other considerations to be made...

How much space is enough?

If you are planning to launch a site with 100 to 200 pictures, 50-70 MB of space should be enough. However, you should always try to purchase more room than you think you will need, thereby leaving room for expansion.

What type of Server Operating System (OS) do you need?

While UNIX, Linux and NT are the popular operating systems for web servers, if you decide to maintain the site yourself then you should use the OS that you are most comfortable with. However, if you have a site where tight security is an issue, choose UNIX or Linux. If you plan to run any type of database (SQL, Access, Oracle, DB2), If you plan to do live video streaming NT should be your choice.

What Server Hardware do you require?

Intel, Sun, Mac, Cobalt RaQ... There are so many choices! While Sun is the best hardware platform for reliability and speed, the Pentium processor is quickly catching up. At the same time, a Pentium based system is far cheaper than a Sun system, so for the average site Intel is a good choice. Macintosh servers are not recommended yet. However, there is a new player in the server market: Cobalt's RaQ. This is a slim rack server with a MIPS processor running Apache and Linux. You can purchase these web servers with a variety of hard drives and memory. The RaQ can handle up to 200 individual sites, making it perfect for the web designer/developer who has multiple small to midrange sites. It is not recommended for larger sites, or sites that utilize databases. You can find a RaQ for $1,000-$2,500 depending on it hardware configuration. You also want to make sure your network card (NIC) is made by a well-known brand so that you are sure that it is of high quality (this is your site's life connection to the world), 3Com makes great cards.

The same is true for hard drives (HD). A drive with 7400 RPM or better is suggested for web servers. The higher the speed, the quicker it can access data. In most cases SCSI (Small Computer System Interface, most common in high-end servers and Macintosh Systems) hard drives outperform IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics, common in PCs) hard drive. Thus, for a web server, SCSI is the better choice. For better performance, multiple hard drives can be configured for data integrity. This is called RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks). When hard disks were expensive, someone created a way to utilize older, smaller disks to create one large virtual disk but now that disk drives are inexpensive, RAID is used for data integrity and speed. There are several types of RAID:

(1.) RAID 1 or Mirroring: This involves two drives where one is the primary and the second is a complete mirror of the other. This increases fault tolerance, but you suffer in speed since the computer must write to both drives concurrently. Thus, when a RAID 1 is setup on an IDE controller you need to make sure that each drive is on a different controller in order to increase speed since the computer no longer has to share the port.

(2.) RAID 3 and 5: Information is written across multiple drives with parity (An error detection technique that tests the integrity of digital data within the computer system). A failed drive can be hot swapped with a new one, and the RAID controller automatically rebuilds the lost data. This type of RAID increases performance because the drives can be read independently.

How much RAM memory is required?

128MB of RAM memory (RAM memory is much faster than a hard drive) is a must for any web server since most web server software will cache, or store, web pages in RAM memory so the more memory you have, the more pages can be cached. While there are many types of memory: DRAM, DRAM and ECC (Error-Correcting Code memory) which is the most logical choice for servers since EEC memory tests for and corrects errors on the fly.

What type of connection should the host have to the Internet?

The hosting company should have multiple high-capacity connections to the Internet that are configured for fault tolerance. Better companies have their connections set up for load balancing which means that traffic is balanced over all connections at once, so that if one should fail, or even slow down, the others will pick up the slack. For this reason, a "switched" network is far better than a "routed" network, in the areas of network speed and reliability. You will also want to know how their connection(s) are brought into their facility; where their connections enter; and if the city works department was repairing a water line and their back-hoe severed their connection the Internet, do they have connection entering from another location.

How much bandwidth is allotted?

First of all, it is important to understand that bandwidth is the amount of traffic and content your site will deliver. So, when a visitor requests a page, your site will return your page along with the graphics. A good analogy for bandwidth is that it is like the amount of water flowing from a pipe. While some hosting providers offer "Unlimited Bandwidth" it is still important that you ask them for their definition of this phrase. If they answer "Unlimited Bandwidth is Unlimited Hits," then you are not really being given unlimited bandwidth since hits are actual requests for content (pages, graphics, files, etc.) from your site, not actual content. It is the request for content, or bandwidth. The phrase, "You have access to Unlimited Bandwidth," is not true unlimited bandwidth either. This statement simply means that you have the ability to use as much bandwidth as you need, but there is a set amount allotted to your site so you will have to pay for any additional bandwidth.

What type of customer support do they offer?

Hosting companies should offer phone, e-mail, frequently asked (FAQ) pages, etc. You may wish to conduct your own test by calling their phone number to see if a real person answers. Hopefully they have a toll free number, so you do not incur any long distance charges. Once you have them on the phone, find out their technical support hours. You may also wish to ask them where their FAQ pages are located and look through them.

What type of back up do they provide with your plan? How often is the back up done? Do they rotate tapes? What is the fee if you need information off of a backup?

Ask for referrals from their customers then e-mail them and ask what type of service they have received from the hosting provider. You may be surprised at what their customers will freely tell you.

Contracts

Read all contracts very carefully! Some things that you need to look for include: (1.) Can they shut your site down for any reason? (2.) Do you have to stay with them for a set amount of time? Of course, a contract is a risk, but if you feel good about the company which is offering it then it might be a risk worth taking. You should also keep an eye out for special offers. Hosting companies often recruit new webmasters by offering special deals on dedicated servers. It's not unheard of for a hosting company to waive all setup fees in exchange for the signing of a long-term contract. Before signing this type of contract you must weigh your options carefully! Remember, a contract limits your ability to jump ship immediately if you find yourself unhappy with the service you receive. Nevertheless, you really can't expect a hosting company to serve up a free dedicated server only to see you bolt after one month. So, while a contract is a risk, if you feel good about the company which is offering it then it is a risk worth taking. If the company you're interested in using isn't advertising any special promotional offers then ask them for a deal, after all, the worst they can do is say no, and more often than not you'll find that they will be quite eager to work with you.

Understanding all of these points helps you to see that there are a wide variety of reasons why a Dedicated server might be a good fit for your business. Whether you have several hundred domain names and don't want to have several hundred separate accounts; you're sick of waiting for someone to get back to you whenever you want to activate a new domain name; you want the freedom to change the WWW in your URL to a more descriptive keyword; you have special CGI scripting needs that are difficult to achieve on a virtual host; you're just sick of sharing bandwidth with fifty other webmasters; or you need a lot of hard disk space, there are a lot of possible reasons why you may wish to look into a dedicated server. Just make sure to use your own common sense! If something sounds too good to be true, then it probably is. Just use your best judgment and do research before you make any decisions, remember that Dedicated servers aren't the answer for everyone. If you only own one or two websites, then it's doubtful that you would find value in your own server. So, if you are not sure if you could benefit from a dedicated server, check your monthly hosting bill to see if you spend more than $200. If so, then it may be time to move to a Dedicated server. Of course there are still hundreds of companies out there hosting adult sites so you won't want to simply settle for one that "sort of" suits your needs, nor do you want to choose the first host you see. As a hosting consumer in a particularly competitive industry, you have the advantage of being able to pick and choose precisely what you want and need, so use this to your advantage, and get the exact hosting package you want and need. A good place to start looking is ISPrime.com http://www.isprime.com/ they have some of the best prices in the industry whether you are looking for virtual, co-located, or dedicated hosting. Their customer support is outstanding. Highly recommended.

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Sassy is a writer over at AdultStrategy (Progressive Webmaster Resources). It is a fresh new resource site with quality articles, and an updated version coming soon!! Look forward to AdultStrategy Version 2.0!
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