Anyone who’s worked on a website can attest to the fact that it requires a lot of work and dedication. But it’s often a more complicated situation than one might assume. The biggest factor comes from the type of web hosting one uses. But it doesn’t run in the direction that people would usually guess.
It might seem safe to assume that the more powerful and complex systems require more upkeep. But it’s often the exact opposite situation. The more powerful dedicated servers often provide many solutions to common problems.
While the simpler shared server options can limit the choices available when problems come up. This is exemplified by looking at the three most significant reasons to use a dedicated server.
1. Choice of operating systems
One of the great things about having a dedicated server is that one has the ability to choose what to run on it. When people think about web hosting they typically forget about the underlying operating system.
When people start out, the platform is just a means to an end. If a web server can serve up web pages than everything is working as it should. But over time people tend to wonder about pushing the scope of their sites. Cloud services are often the very start of it. However, there’s a wide range of functions out there for a server.
The big limitation is that software still needs to target specific operating systems. It’s as true for servers as it is for phones and laptops. However, a shared server locks one into a specific operating system. It’s true that one can technically run totally different operating systems at the same time within a shared host.
However, it’s not a very effective use of a system’s resources. The only way one is usually going to be able to do so is if the system is under one’s full control. And in those circumstances, a person would already have the ability to simply replace the operating system running on the server. All of this makes having full control of a server’s operating system a huge boost in one’s options.
2. Full control of resources
One of the best and worst things that can happen to a website is a boost in attention. People running a small business are usually wishing that a larger outlet would run a story linking to them. Or that an influencer on social media might be taken by someone’s goods or services. But this can also be the worst thing that can happen if one doesn’t have full control of a dedicated server.
When one has a dedicated server it allows for a choice of infrastructure. For example, a dedicated server hosting Seattle adjacent would allow for a higher level of bandwidth. And being able to allocate resources on that server would allow for greater adaptability to the increased traffic.
Additionally, there’s some benefit from higher bandwidth options. In the previous example of server hosting Seattle adjacent, the other dedicated servers would receive similar attention. This ensures that bandwidth is always increased to meet demands.
And worst case scenario, one would be able to restart any services which went down due to overuse by public quarries. This isn’t the case with a shared server. One would instead be limited to whatever resources were set by default for the server.
3. Ability to create virtualized environments
Virtual machines usually run a server instance within another server. The main kernel process is used by all of the allocated virtual servers. This is an ideal way of having multiple people working on seperate servers within the same general domain.
But there’s one catch. A person needs to have full control of the kernel and base operating system to run a virtual machine under those conditions. And that’s exactly the type of control offered by a dedicated server.
It comes down to versatility and choice
In the end, all of these options come down to one main point. When one has control of a dedicated server one has full control of his or her site. Otherwise, there will always be elements of the site which one wants to change. But without full control, those changes will be impossible.
