VPS (virtual private server) - service for business

Every person who is connected with IT or planned to create a website for their own needs had to deal with such terms as “hosting” and “VPS”. With the first word "hosting" everything is clear - this is the place where the site will be physically hosted. But VPS raises questions. Given the fact that hosting involves a cheaper option in the form of a tariff plan.

 

A person who is far from IT technologies will ask himself the question - why does he need the intricacies of virtual and physical servers at all. It's all about two factors:

 

1. Financial expenses for the maintenance of the site on the hosting. After all, hosting is paid. Monthly, at least, you need to pay $10 for the tariff plan or $20 for the VPS service. And renting a physical server starts at $100 per month.
2. Site performance. Fast loading pages and available at any time.

 

If these criteria (financial savings and site performance) are not important, the article is not for you. Let's continue with the rest.

Rent a virtual server (VPS) - what is it, features

 

To make it easier to understand, imagine a personal computer or laptop that has some hard disk space. This space can be used to store files for a single site. Photos, documents, program codes - all the files that are used for the operation of the site.

 

It turns out that the computer will act as a hosting for the site. And accordingly, it will use all the resources of a mobile or desktop computer. And this:

 

• CPU.
• RAM
• Permanent memory.
• network throughput.

 

If the site is large (an online store, for example) and it has many visitors per unit of time, then the resource is justified. And if the site is a business card, then all the above resources will be idle. Why not launch several sites at once on such an “unloaded” computer.

Again, we present a computer on which several sites of different structure and load are running. For example, a business card site, a catalog and an online store. In this case, system resources (processor, RAM and network) will be distributed unevenly between sites. An online store, with its payment modules, will take on 95-99% of the resources, and the rest of the sites will “hang” or “slow down”. That is, you need to properly distribute computer resources between sites. And this can be done by creating several virtual environments on a physical server.

 

VPS (virtual private server) is a virtual space that emulates the operation of a separate physical server. VPS is often referred to as a cloud service. Only the history of VPS begins much earlier, before the advent of the "cloud". At the end of the 20th century, developers of Unix/Linux operating systems learned how to create emulations (virtual machines) to run applications independently of each other. The peculiarity of these emulations is that each of them can be assigned its own parts of system resources:

 

• Processor time is a percentage of the total.
• RAM - Specifies the amount of memory.
• Specifies the network bandwidth.
• Allocate space on the hard drive.

If it’s quite simple, imagine a cake that is cut into pieces of different sizes. And these pieces have a different value for the buyer. This is logical. So the physical server is divided into several virtual parts, which are rented by the site owner at different prices, depending on the volume (size, capabilities).

 

What factors are considered decisive when choosing a VPS

 

Price and performance are the main selection criteria for the tenant (buyer of the service). Virtual server rental begins with the selection of resources for hosting an existing site. And this:

 

• Hard disk size. Not only the space for files is taken into account, but also the possibility of expanding the site, for example, by adding new pictures or videos. Plus, one more thing - mail. If you plan to run a mail server on the site's domain, then you need to calculate the free disk space. Approximately 1 GB for 1 mailbox, at least. For example, site files occupy 6 GB and there will be 10 mailboxes - take a disk of at least 30 GB, and preferably 60 GB.
• The amount of RAM. This parameter is specified by the programmer who created the site from scratch. The platform, installed modules and plugins are taken into account. The required amount of RAM can vary from 4 to 32 GB.
• CPU. The more powerful the better. Typically used in Intel Xeon servers. And you need to look at the number of cores. There are 2 cores - already good. If more - everything will fly. This indicator is also voiced by the programmer.
• Network bandwidth - from 1 Gb / s and above. Less desirable.
• Traffic. Some hostings limit the customer's traffic. As a rule, this indicator is more fiction. If it is exceeded, no one will swear much. And the site owner will conclude that the site has more visitors than expected, and it is possible to increase the performance of the leased server. To avoid losing customers.

Which hosting is better to choose for renting a VPS

 

It's one thing when a company offers a hosting service on favorable financial terms. And another thing is when a full service is provided. Renting a VPS server should be accompanied by the following list of features:

 

• The presence of administrators who, for their part, will be able to install and run the site. This is relevant for those tenants who do not have their own administrator. The landlord must have specialists in his staff who are able to quickly and efficiently launch the site. Naturally, if the programmer created a working site and demonstrated its work on another hosting. In general, the transfer of a site to a VPS server should be carried out by the one who created the site. But there are exceptions, for example, when changing hosting.
• The presence of a control panel. It is desirable that there are several options, for example, cPanel, VestaCP, BrainyCP, etc. This is a convenience for managing site resources, and especially the mail server.
• Round the clock service. This is site restoration from BackUp, installation of PHP updates or databases. The trick is that some updates in the site control panel require compliance on the VPS server.
• If this is a VDS server rental, then there must be access to managing the OS kernel and the ability to install special software.

And yet, it is very convenient when the hosting has a service for registering or transferring domains. In the first case, you can immediately pick up a domain, buy and immediately launch the site. Plus, you can pay for the domain and hosting in one payment, for a year, for example. In the second case, if the domain was purchased on another resource, for example, for a promotion, then it is better to transfer it to the same place where the site is located. It is easier to make payments and in general, control everything.