Dedicated server or shared? Understand the differences before choosing!

shared-vs-dedicatedOver the years, to have a web presence has become increasingly simple. With all the technology available, it is currently possible to put your business on the web in a matter of days. But before you put your site up, you need to make some decisions. One of the first choices you have to do is choose to hire a shared server or a dedicated server.

This choice will directly affect the performance of your site, so it’s important to know how these services works. Before understanding the key differences between them, you must answer the following question:

What is the need of your website?

As you surely noticed, there are many different types of sites. Portals, blogs, personal websites, institutional, hot sites, social networks, business websites and many other services with specific features. Each of them requires an appropriate hosting package.

When you design your site, you need to observe what is the profile that it will have. Is a content portal with thousands of simultaneous accesses? The site will require a lot of processing and server memory? You will need much disk space to store files? Your site is a service that cannot get out?

These questions are important to you to define the profile of your site and thus hire the right kind of hosting for it. When starting the project, be aware of the size that your site will get and what are the key points of it.

Features of shared server

The main advantage of shared server is the reduced cost. This type of server is characterized by thin hardware costs between several clients. this means that, on the same server can be dozens or hundreds of sites at once.

When we talk about cost, this feature is an advantage. Only if we take performance into account, shared server loses compared to dedicated server. This is because each site within the server has a memory quota, disk space and processing.

By using a shared server, however it is idle, your website may exceed those quotas. It is necessary to guarantee the resources to other sites when they are requested.

The shared server is suitable for small businesses or individuals. If you need to put a portfolio on the internet, have a web space to display the services of your company to potential customers or just keep a blog, shared hosting service can be the best solution. That is why, this type of plan is one of the most popular solution available in the market.

Features of dedicated servers

Dedicated servers are for companies that need different hardware configurations. Some types of sites require more processing for servers, especially when we talk in terms of simultaneous accesses. The more people are connected to the site at the same time, more hardware resources will be needed to keep the site running smoothly. You need a good machine to “hold” such a site.

By contrast, maintaining a server itself requires a greater investment from the company in the IT department: building infrastructure, hardware, qualified professionals and the list continues with hundreds of essential items. Often this type of investment becomes unviable. Therefore, the best option is to hire a dedicated server, allocated in a completely structured data center to offer this type of service.

With its own machine, your site will have 100% of server resources. For services that need stability, this is the ideal solution. Another important aspect of dedicated servers is security. Hosting a site on a server such means being less vulnerable to unavailability of hardware and security breaches.

By hiring a dedicated server or vps hosting, you can still choose whether the server hardware management will be made by the company providing the service or on its own staff. That’s because some sites require a high level of customization of services, as well as strict safety requirements that can only be met by professionals dedicated to your business.

So if your site requires a high number of simultaneous accesses and also high levels of availability and security, the dedicated server is the best option. Despite having a higher cost in relation to the shared server, a dedicated machine can offer a great return on investment.

The moment of choice

Now that you know the main differences between servers, define which are the most necessary features to your site and what support you need. If guiding through the capabilities and drawbacks of each server, you can choose one that fits you best.

What type of server do you use?

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