The following are the tips one must keep in mind while choosing a new web host: -

1) One must make sure that the new web host plan offers the storage capabilities to handle all of the current website storage requirements. If the size of the website is 50MB, then one must check for the plan that offers at least that much space or more. In case one is not able to make estimates about the space required then he/she must ask his/her current host. Also this information can be found on control panel.

2) One must also check how does his/her current web host determine the amount of storage used for? It is necessary to check what one’s current and new host includes in the plan’s storage amount also one should check are one’s emails and log files counted towards his/her total storage, or the web files only?

3) Its necessary to know what operating system does one’s current hosting plan use? Windows or Unix? Mostly it makes no difference but in some cases it can make the difference between a working website and a broken website. In case one’s site is currently on a Windows server and the website uses ASP scripting, then its difficult to make things work well on a Unix server, as ASP is a Windows based programming language. So one should check immediately whether his/her hosting plan is on a Unix or Windows server.

4) Also its important to check if one’s your site currently use FrontPage? Before switching to new host one should check if the new host supports FrontPage and the prevailing version.

5) Another important issue to take care is the amount of bandwidth offered by the new host. One should check if the new hosting plan offers the same amount of bandwidth that the current host offers. This should be checked in advance to avoid unexpected high bills afterwards.

6) Make sure if the new web hosting plan gives the same amount of email accounts, auto responders and mail forwards that the current host provides.

7) Its necessary to check if one’s site uses a shopping cart that the current hosting plan provides? It is essential to have a suitable shopping cart replacement in case one desires to move the cart to the new host. So one must check that as well.

If one is using any scripts on his/her website, its important to check if one’s new hosting plan supports all of one’s scripts. One must make sure in advance if there is any need to make any modifications to scripts to get them working on the new server.

9) Don’t forget to set up the existing email accounts on the new server before transferring domain name to the new server.

10) In case user is just a beginner and even don’t know how to upload files, its necessary to check with the provider if he can do that with no extra charges. There are some hosts who offer such facility free of cost yet some don’t offer this facility because of liability issues.

It’s necessary to double check if the site looks and functions properly on the new server after completing the uploading process. Preview facility is provided in the form of preview link to see how the site looks and some hosts provide this facility before the domain name is transferred over. In case this preview facility is not available with the host, still there is a method to preview the site. One can modify his/her host’s file to preview the site. The host file tells the computer where to go to look for sites that are listed in that file and this works with any version of Windows. Here the file location can change but the file name remains the same. Below is the way to modify the host’s file:

The file HOSTS should be in the c: windowssystem32driversetc One can find a file named HOSTS.SAM (as in SAMPLE). That is OK; one can modify the HOSTS.SAM file as well and do a SAVE AS HOSTS.

In both the cases one should double click on the HOSTS file to open it. Thereafter one will be prompted by Windows to select an Application (Program) to use to VIEW the file.

Now scroll the list and select Notepad and then one should click on the OK button. The NOTEPAD program will now open, displaying the file HOSTS.

So, in order to tell computer that www.yourwebsite.com is at the address (replaced with the real IP) 12.345.678.90 one should add the following entry to the bottom of the hosts file:

12.345.678.90 www.yourdomain.com (As in the example).

Now one should click on FILE, slide down and click on SAVE AS. Then in the Save As one should type field, select ALL FILES. After completing that click on save. One warning will come which should be ignored i.e. the file already exists but that’s ok, then just one has to click YES.

Now one should close Notepad, by clicking on FILE, slide down to EXIT, and click.

Now when one will open the web browser, or try to ping the site, the system will go to the IP address one typed in the HOSTS file.

One should not forget to undo this when testing is finished else the computer will always want to go to that IP address whenever one want to go to that site.

After being satisfied with the site looks and functions, one can go to his/her registrar (where the domain name is registered) and modify the nameservers associated with one’s domain name to his/her new web host’s nameservers. In case one does not know his/her new host’s name servers, should confirm with them. However most hosts have that information listed somewhere on their website or in the email one first get after signing up for an account.

After the completion of domain nameserver modification it will take around 24-48 hours and the site will be displayed on the new server.

One must check his/her domain name and should see if the nameservers added are listed. If yes, the website transfer is complete to new web host. And after the confirmation is received one can cancel the old web hosting account.

One of the most important decisions one should make while deciding to put on his/her business on the web is which web hosting provider to use. The web hosting company that hosts one’s personal page may not offer the best plan for one’s business needs. The following are the several things one should take care while selecting a web host for one’s professional web pages.

Windows or *nix Web Hosting

When a web hosting provider is talking about an operating system, he/she means the operating system that his/her server uses. There is no need for Windows hosting if one is using a Windows operating system on his/her machine. Windows hosting is not required if one is building his/her pages in Front Page. The main reason for opting Windows web server hosting is that it enables to take advantage of .asp and .net programming capabilities, which can be extremely powerful. If one is not sure, then he/she should check with the person who will be designing his/her pages and ask for their recommendation.

Choice of Web Hosting Services

One must look for a web hosting provider that offers all the services that one needs in order to build the web site of his/her choice. The following are the services that make a good deal even better are:

Reduced price or free domain registration

When one is building a company web site, having his/her own domain name is very important to present a professional image. there are several web hosting providers that registers one’s domain name for free, and take care of all the details of renewing and updating information so that one need not to worry about it.

Secure server transactions on their server

If one is planning to accept payments or exchange personal information over the Internet, access to a secure server is most essential. One must look for a web hosting package that includes SSL in its basic price.

PHP and mySQL support

If one chooses a UNIX server, PHP and database support can provide powerful tools for running applications and forums, content management systems and more. Most business and e-commerce plans include them.

Design Services at reduced prices

There are several web hosting providers offering professional web design services to their customers at a discount rate. Thus one should avail these discounts. The main advantage of a professional looking web site is that it inspires confidence in one’s customers.

Web-mail services and POP Email Boxes

One must also look for a business web hosting plan that offers the maximum POP email boxes so as to enable one to assign email addresses to all his/her employees and departments. The advantage of a web-mail interface is that it allows users to access their mail from any computer.

Thus one can find a web hosting provider that offers all the features that one wants and that too at an affordable price. The only thing required is one should do his/her home work properly i.e. he/she should compare all the hosts before selecting the most important one.

The Basics:

If one wants to put his/her web site online, Web hosting offers the opportunity. For making a site go online, no matter it is having large or small content one has to go onto a web server. Thus a web server is simply a larger and much more powerful computer than user’s own computer. On these servers one’s Internet content simply sits for people to access and view the information available. These web servers are stored within data centers; all what is required is simply renting some space on the server.

Why to use a web hosting service?

The first reason to choose is its affordability. The work of the web hosting companies includes looking after and updating all software required to maintain one’s site, adding security patches making sure that one’s content is safe from hackers/viruses and unwanted Spam. The first step after registration of web site’s name is hosting it with the web server. In case there comes any difficulty with the web site, full technical support is supported by the hosting company. In chases one chooses to host by own, it will cost too much on hardware, bandwidth and ongoing software updates.

What is shared web hosting?

While searching for a web host Company one will find that many are offering shared web hosting. Shared web hosting is simply a server that has a number of different web sites sitting on it simultaneously. In case of shared web hosting one will be allocated a certain amount of disk space on the server and this allows user to have a number of web sites hosted on one server. It is a very secure service even though one is sharing the server with many different companies, as no other company will have access to other’s files. There are many people having wrong opinion that using a shared service will make the web site act slowly. In case of shared web hosting the information will be displayed and downloaded equally as fast as if it where on the server on it’s own. The concept used by Web host companies is that they offer shared hosting simply to use up all the space on the server, there is no benefit to user or them having empty hard disk space.

Why good hosting is required?

If one has developed a web site for business opportunity or to sell merchandise online what all is needed is reliability as downtime costs much money. Therefore less downtime means the better chance of making money by the user. One is required to compile a whole list of questions to ask the web host company when it comes to hosting his/her site. It is necessary to have a guaranteed response time if any problem occurs with the site or if it goes offline. One needs to have 24-hour access to his/her files with 24-hour support if the site is in business of selling products online, as most of the sales could be made in the evening or nighttime. Thus it is very important to have support all time for any issues that could arise. Not only that to check the effectiveness of site it is also important to look for Statistics i.e. how many unique hits (people visiting one’s site) one is getting so that one can see the trend of people just visiting to those who are buying. Thus one should check in advance the stats offered by different companies as some web host companies offer very substantial stats while others can be less informative, so one should always ask for a demonstration before finalizing any host.

Mouth publicity is a great way to hear as to who are a good host and a bad host. One should ask his/her colleague or who is already taking the experience of that host. There are several good as well as bad hosts in the market, therefore one should ask the questions and make sure that he/she is confident with the replies before signing up.

Will hosting in own country or another, effects the web site?

It is quite interesting to know if the company is providing 24 hour support to allow for time differences, then one should have the same level service as if the web host company was based just down the road. Thus it makes no difference if the host is of same country or of another. There are many people thinking hosting their website outside of their registered country will lead to losing their domain identity, which is totally wrong example if one is based in Ireland and is having a computer website it would be something like www.computerparts.ie The. I.e. is the identity of Ireland but if one wants his site hosted in the US then he/she would still keep the. I.e., and there is no need to change to. Com. Thus the great thing about web hosting is that the world is oyster and one can shop online globally until one is satisfied with the service.

This article is useful for understanding the hosting industry and studies its dynamics to know what to look for before selecting a web host.

Firstly it is good to have a proper introduction of web hosting chain. It is termed as chain because here about 3 upstream providers serve the end consumer. First the web-hosting provider, who is in direct contact, then comes the web host’s upstream company who maintains the servers and sells space to web hosts, and above that, the data center that serves the purpose of providing the connection and houses the servers. There are some web hosts who act as the server administrator and liase with the data centers directly.

The growth of the web hosting industry in at saturation point due to the presence of hundreds of web-hosting providers claiming to provide cheaper and better services to businesses and individuals. The reason for this is the availability of resources in abundance and at cheaper costs with reducing disk space and data-transfer prices. Its easy to enter the web hosting business as there are large resellers of server space providing cheap hosting and reselling plans that provides ground to incomers to join the business.

Due to growing number of suppliers with cheaper reselling plans, more and more web hosting businesses are coming up providing web-hosting solutions to business and individual websites due to lower fixed costs and investment. Not only that this increase in supply is not caused by factors in any particular country. As Internet is not limited to the boundary of any country so the data centers present in any part of the world can easily provide the servers and web space for a local hosting company. Due to Internet it is easy to communicate to each other and providers can easily exchange their services in the global space.

Maintaining a proper balance between supply and demand is quite good for the customers. But imbalance has forced several new web-hosting providers to offer extremely low prices for their web hosting plans or packages in order to make them self stand in the tough market. Now it’s time for customers to choose the hosting providers having lowered prices from the vast number of providers.

However, continuous decrease in prices is quite disadvantageous for both the providers as well as the customers. By reduces prices, companies are able to earn nominal profit and are even not able to cover their support costs. Customers suffer by getting less support with their web-hosting accounts. It’s quite obvious if the profits do not justify the costs, web-hosting companies will easily close down and takes their clients’ sites with them.

The following are the factors to consider while choosing a web-hosting provider: -

The most important factor to consider is Support for any individual or small business looking for a web host for their websites. The Internet web-hosting provider who is unable to provide the facility of responding to emails within 24 hours is probably having problems providing fast and reliable support services. One can’t ignore the validity of these services especially for the beginners who needs guidance with publishing their websites on the web hosting account provided. The success of any web hosting business depends upon the relationships between web host and web hosting customers. To make business success, provider should be able to provide services when and where required also its crucial for customers to know when their site is going offline for sake of maintenance.

After support next important factor is Stability. It refers to how much uptime one can expect from the web-hosting provider, which in turn depends upon the providers’ servers and network. If the providers are not having reliable and stable providers, it would affect their servers and cause problems for the website. It is must to have an uptime of about 99.5% in the industry, as there are other external factors, which may be beyond control of the provider.

Third factor to consider is Cost which depends on the purpose of the website and budget. The budget may be smaller in case of Personal /Individual websites and so they opt to go with a cheaper web hosting provider, possibly in exchange for support and stability. But in case of business sites as they need better stability and support they opt for expensive host providers. It is most often observed that cheap web hosting providers are able to attract customers in the beginning by offering low prices but afterwards fails in providing quality support to their customers thereby creating problems for them. Also the large numbers of client sites cause sustained high server loads which leads to server crash thus hampering stability.

Another factor, which is not so important, is Location of the server. It is not considered important as it depends upon a user’s ISP/country’s connection to the data center where the server is located. Pings to the server normally tells the network latency to expect when people can access to one’s site. Lower ping rates leads to loading of site faster.

Last but not least one should take time to identify and contact a web host to check their service. This helps in providing an idea of the kind of support that one might receive and helps in deciding the reliability of the provider.

Choosing for the right web-hosting provider can be a very tough job for web masters, designers, marketers, and many of the online dependent people. We have gathered a few of the important things to remember when choosing for the right web-hosting provider. Hope that this will serve as your helpful and easy to follow tips, and will make your web-hosting provider search a little more esasier.

One of the most important things to consider when choosing a webhosting provider is the uptime statistics. It is important that the uptime statistics for webhosting providers must be displayed as this will help you make up your mind and eventually come up with the right decision.

Another thing you should know is the availability of virtual hosting. If your prospect provider has this offer, you will be able to put numbers of web domain on a single machine.

You must also see to it that all of your websites’ data are archive or back-up for future references in case of emergency and make sure as well that your chosen provider will support SFTP and SSH, as it will provide additional security to your website. Know as well is you soon to be selected webhosting provider will guarantee a maximum amount of downtime.

Before you choose your webhosting provider, you must also consider knowing their level of support for CGI scripts and the operating system your host’s server is running, as this will be your tool in determining the type of scripts that you can run and the right database you can access.

Monetary aspect can be the most important thing that you should consider in choosing for your webhosting provider. In this regard, make sure that you will not be surprise of your provider’s excess charges for extra bandwidth, which is why, it is important to check their bandwidth charges.

If you are a web marketer, then you must make sure that your provider allows you to have access to server logs or statistical tools, as this data will help you in your marketing efforts.

Another thing that you must know about your provider for finally choosing them is it E-mail policy and the amount of storage needed in order to plan the web space needed on your webhost accordingly.

Though not all of the providers offer it, it is also helpful if you will know if your prospect provider will perform basic SEM or search engine marketing, for this will be of big help.

The customer service is another important thing to consider, thus make sure you have someone to contact if problems arise. Make sure as well that when contacting customer service, you have someone to talk to about Perl, C++, or Java.

Your website must be online anytime all the time, therefore, make sure that your selected provider runs reliable servers.

E-mail addresses are also an important thing to consider when choosing a webhosting provider as it is in this way your visitors can contact you. Know if you will one E-mail address or a multiple E-mail addresses.

Accessing you website’s log files is also important, thus, make sure that your webhosting provider offers this.

Before choosing the right Web Hosting Company, You need to determine your hosting needs. How to do that? Rest assured as I am going to reveal to you 14 solid tips that can keep you save and stick with the best web hosting company.

They are:

1. Do you need to pay for the potential host setup? Setting up your account is definitely free of charge.

2. Are you allowed to sign up for month to month basis services or do you need to sign up for the entire year? By signing up a long term, you may get a better deal, however, you are also stuck paying the host for that contract period if you are unhappy.

3. Do select a host that offers enough server space (typically in megabytes) for as many as your pages and images required so your site can grow.

4. You need to calculate how much traffic/bandwidth usage you expect to have to your site. Bandwidth or data transfer rate is the measurement of the amount of data transmitted over an internet connection in a given time. Some hosts charge a lot if you exceed your transfer limit. Even if you don’t expect a lot of traffic, keep in mind that images on a page use more bandwidth than plain XHTML pages.

5. What kind of technical support does the host offer? Read the hosts support pages; are they comprehensive and easy to understand? Do they provide setup help to new users? Will the hosting company send out notifications when they are performing system maintenance and upgrades?

6. What type of control panel does the hosting company use? Many hosting companies now use CPanel. CPanel is an interface that allows users to control their domains. Through CPanel you can configure and check email (using multiple web interfaces), check site statistical information (visitors, referrals, etc.), manage databases, set directory permissions, edit .htaccess files, add hotlink protection, create and manage FTP accounts, upload and manage files, perform site backups, submit sites to search engines, and perform one click installation of CGI and other scripts. Many sites that offer CPanel will also offer Fantastico, an auto installer. Fantastico will allow you to install numerous content management systems like WordPress, Xoops, Mambo, pMachine, shopping carts, help desk systems, wikis, and loads of other scripts with a click of a button. Even though my current hosting company does not have CPanel or Fantastico available, if I was to move to a new hosting company I would make sure that both of these services were available.

FTP should be offered. You do not want to have to use a control panel, web interface, to upload files all the time.

7. What kind of scripting host will your site need now and in the future? Do you want to add database interactivity in the future?PHP/MySGL and/or ASP should be a part of the package. CGI should be available. If you plan to use FrontPage then FrontPage Server Extensions should be installed and supported. Is SSI offered? Does the host have a plan that would allow you to implement e-commerce?

8. What kind of statistical information does the host provide? You will want to track your site usage, make sure that traffic reports is offered by the host.

9. Does the host have a reseller plan? You may want to offer hosting to your clients when you get your business off the ground, check to see if your host has a reseller plan.

10. How is domain name registration handled? Do you have to register your domain name with the host? How much does it cost to register your domain name. Can your register your domain and have the name transferred for free or do you have to pay a fee?

11. How many mailboxes does the host offer, is there POP3 access or is the e-mail forwarded?

12. When you are compiling this information, be sure to plan for future growth. Be sure that the host that you select has other plans available if your needs change.

13. What is the hosts backup plan, how often do they backup client sites? This should be daily.

Once you have a list of potential hosts, use Google or another search engine to search for those hosts. Read comments about the host’s support, down time, etc. Read forums like WebHosting Talk to find out more information about the hosts. Avoid top 10 lists of host, these are frequently nothing more than paid advertising. Look for reviews by real people on their web sites or in message forums.

14. Some hosts will handle the Domain Name Registration, but at a cost. Find out if your host will transfer your domain and if there is a cost.

Best 10 must tips before selecting a webhost

After being in the webmaster world for more than 5 years and having good and bad experiences with the webhosts I have concluded that money is the not the only thing you need to see while selecting a webhost.

There are many ways by which you can determine what host you need and all. Some of them are listed here. Have a look over there and I am sure you will know some facts.

1. First thing to see on is what you need. If you are a new website with some blog or a simple few page website then be sure not be take a huge power of dedicated webhost. Dedicated webhosts are needed by the webhosts that have proxy or video script running on the site. Even streaming causes lots of usage of bandwidth. So first decide what you need.

2. Search on the internet for the best web hosts that meet your requirements. There are some good directories like Bestnewhosts.com directory and more. Use them to compare webhosts.

3. Read reviews regarding webhosts. See no host is perfect but some bad reviews don’t make the host bad. So see why the bad reviews are due to. Sometimes people are not a bit patient and make a review as bad but see whether their problem was solved soon or not.

4. Avoid taking unlimited thing. Always guess what you need and then take the plan. See even if the webhost provide unlimited then it does means that this is soon gone end up as the some limit. Even if the host say unlimited but the server has a limit.

5. Try to ask the host some questions and see the response time. A ideal host must have a quick response or live chat. Many times this shows how many staff they have and sometimes you can even test the experience of the web host admin and others.

6. Have a look at the payment structure. Better pay monthly than yearly so that if some problem occurs then you would not need to regret. But sometimes when the host says that they need yearly payment then make a host that provide money back guarantee.

7. Ask about Backup schedule. Many times you need to ask about automatic backups by the webhosts.

I am sure this features comes handy sometimes. Many times the old servers tend to crash so need to be with them on that one.

8. Uptime guaranty by the host should be taken. Many host tell that they have 99.9% uptime but better make a tracker for a host available online for free to get the updates.

9. Ask friends. Asking friends who have websites hosted is a best way to get hosting. Experience is best than anything else. See what they have got. Many times such asking can prevent you from your money loss.

10.Last but not the least. Never think that money is the best measure. I have seen some cheap host providing best service while customers of hosts with 7$ per month for shared hosting making complains.

Want to know what questions should be asked to a webhosts before taking a webhosting then visit my Webhosts Blog(www.bestnewhosts.com). Visit my personal blog for any queries and all my articles.