Dedicated Virtual Servers (also known as Virtual Dedicated Servers or VDS) are a cost-effective compromise between the excellent value of a shared hosting package and the flexibility and control of a dedicated server.
- What is virtualised hosting?
- What are the advantages of a Dedicated Virtual Server?
- What hardware do the virtualised servers run on?
- What virtualisation solution do you use?
- What happens if I need more disk space?
- Do you take regular backups?
What is virtualised hosting?
Half-way between a shared server and a dedicated server, virtualised hosting bridges the gap between having a dedicated (and costly) rack-mounted server and the relative restrictions of shared hosting.
A virtual host consists of one physical machine that is split into one or more virtual instances that run their own operating systems. This cuts down on capital investment in a rack-mounted server while allowing the freedom to have complete access to the virtual host itself.
What are the advantages of a Dedicated Virtual Server?
Virtualised servers can be rebooted more quickly than normal servers, and rebooting a virtual server can be undertaken in isolation from other virtual hosts running on the same hardware. This means that if you have problems with your web server that would normally require a server reboot, or wish to reboot for any number of maintenance reasons, you have the power to do so yourself quickly, easily and without impact on the server's other users.
From a server administration point of view, Dedicated Virtual Servers are also easier to upgrade and manage.
Due to the method of virtualisation that we employ here at iWeb Hosting, a virtual server can be copied across a network with no loss of availability, meaning that a single website or an entire virtual machine can be migrated to new hardware with very little, if any, downtime. In the case of a system hardware failure, the ability to move one virtual host to another server is invaluable for preserving your website's availability.
What hardware do the virtualised servers run on?
Our virtualised servers run on high-performance Dell Quad-core servers. These machines have proven themselves to be reliable and fast and are ideally suited to life as virtualised servers. Server storage is served from a pair of mirrored 16tb SAN arrays (RAID 51).
What virtualisation solution do you use?
The most popular virtualisation software packages available are Xen, HyperVM, Virtuozzo, OpenVZ and Vserver. Of these, we have carefully selected Xen for its fast performance, its customisability and the ongoing development of the software that helps to keep it stable, secure and feature-laden.
What happens if I need more disk space?
Big databases, lots of media files... whatever the reason for your storage space problems, we can help. If you want more space right now or in the future, that's no problem at all. Just give us a quick call or contact our support staff online and we will arrange the rest for you.
Do you take regular backups?
At iWeb Hosting, we provide an excellent backup service that can be selected as part of the virtualised server package. Selecting this option will pass the burden of regular backups to us, leaving you with one less thing to worry about.
To facilitate the backup process, our server rack contains a Dell P124T L03 auto-loading tape system that will backup your data at regular intervals, should you choose to opt for tape backups.