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Dedicated Server Options

Dedicated server hosting gives you complete control of the server hosting your web site. You choose what runs on the server and how secure it is. The two main types of dedicated servers you will find upon looking is a server running either Linux or Windows as the operating system.

Linux Dedicated Server Hosting

These servers come with the free Operating System Linux installed on them. The main configuration setup of software on a cheap linux dedicated server is to use Apache as the web server, in addition to PHP and mySQL. With these servers, you will be given root access for control of aspects including domain and web site configuration and the conf file if running Apache web server. Since Linux is a free operating system, there is no overhead cost for licensing and this results in the Linux Dedicated Servers being a cheaper option.

Windows Dedicated Server Hosting

Windows servers are normally running a version of the Windows Server operating system. You will normally see the newest version of Microsoft Windows Server 2008 running on these servers. Unlike the Linux server, these are typically running IIS as the web server and SQL server for the database side. The option to run Apache on the dedicated web server is available on Windows by running a WAMP (Windows, Apache, mySql, PHP) configuration setup. On average most servers running Windows do have a higher monthly cost due to the licensing fees the service provider needs to pay for the operating system.

The owner of the server will ultimately need to decide if they would like Linux or Window on their dedicated server, as it depends on their server needs. With different needs comes different choices. From a price standpoint Linux dedicated server plans will be more inexpensive than a Windows server. Linux servers will also be the first choice for those running PHP applications requiring a mySql database. Windows server is the only way to run .Net applications that are built to use a SQL Server database. In the end, the choice of what server you pick will be based on your own web site hosting requirements.

You will need to decide if you want a managed or unmanaged dedicated server after selecting a server operating system. If you want to handle everything including patches and configuration, you will want to go with an unmanaged server leaving all the responsibility with you, while a managed server will take care of this for you, including server backups for a lot of them.

Tags: dedicated server hosting, linux dedicated server hosting, windows dedicated server hosting