The Rise of VPS Hosting – The Next Milestone of Web Hosting?
Take a look at the Google Insights chart above comparing the search trends for Dedicated Hosting and VPS Hosting (Virtual Private Server). From the last 12 months, the search volume for dedicated server hosting has been tapering and evening out with VPS hosting during the last 3 months.
Over the last 2 years, server virtualization technology had improved by leaps and bounds, making it possible to squeeze every drop of the server processing power and optimize it to run virtually as a number of servers. Advancement in hardware technology fuel this concept even further; it is now possible to have several blade servers (i.e. plug-and-play, hot swappable server units) clustered as a single entity and virtualized as multiple servers running a variety of applications. This concept was first adopted by major corporate data centers as a cost saving and effective measure for servers’ management, and soon became a viable infrastructure option for web hosting companies. To further simplify: it is like taking a powerful standalone, multi-CPU server and partition it into multiple, independent servers.
VPS Hosting vs Dedicated Hosting
The line between a truly dedicated server and a virtual server is further blurred by the many similar features and traits common in both hosting modes:
- A virtual server operates in total isolation like a dedicated server. Each virtual server is completely independent of the other and can be configured with different operating systems, loaded with different software. In short, each is totally autonomous.
- Each VPS is assigned a fixed IP address and is totally unique
- Each VPS is allotted a fixed guaranteed amount operating memory. In some cases, the Virtualization Manager software allows temporary burst of memory utilization.
- Network bandwidth allocation is guaranteed and defined according to the purchased package.
Many still considered VPS hosting as a “middle tier” hosting option between dedicated hosting and shared hosing. Dedicated hosting is still considered the “top notch” of web hosting. The main argument is the “sharing” concept that is till prevalent in VPS hosting. This is a perfectly valid argument as the performance a VPS hosting is dependent on the number of “virtual servers” configured within a physical server. A good web hosting provider will limit the number of virtual servers to enforce performance standards.
However, the advancement of technology has led to the emergence of a concept known as “Cloud VPS” which could eventually narrow the differences and perhaps even outperform a dedicated server.
Cloud VPS – The Future of VPS Hosting and Hosting Platform?
Conceptually, Cloud VPS hosting operates similarly as a VPS Hosting, except that it could reside in multiple physical servers spread over different locations. These physical servers can be clustered together as a logical entity and hence form a “cloud” of servers.
Main advantages:
- It minimizes the single point of failure associated with a dedicated server. For example, a main motherboard failure in the dedicated server could cripple the entire server. With cloud VPS, the risk is spread over many different servers (yes – performance might dip but never out of action) with intelligence software monitoring and failing over to the surviving servers. To implement such High Availability Fail-Over system in a dedicated server would shoot the hosting costs to the roof!
- Cost reducing by sharing resources. VPS hosting costs is considerable lower than that of a dedicated hosting as more resources are shared while overall reliability is increased. The cost savings allow web hosting companies to include in their package a more robust data storage using RAID10 (Mirroring + Striping). The costs for having data redundancy feature in a dedicated server would cost more.
- Easy scaling to meet traffic demands. Scaling the web performance in a VPS hosted environment is as easy as clicking a few buttons – by adding more nodes (computing power) to your cloud and the scale out is almost immediate. With a dedicated server, you can at most perform a vertical scaling i.e. adding more memory, more CPU or replacing slower hard disks which can be quite costly.
If you are interested to find out more about Cloud VPS, I suggest you check out VPS.net. Their VPS hosting plan is based on the number of nodes (computing power) which starts at $20 per month per node. VPS.net operates 2 VPS cloud, one in US and the other in UK. Both clouds are synchronized and work seamlessly to deliver your web content globally. Similarly you can also prioritize and configure either cloud with added computing power for regional customers. Note: VPS.net is a Linux based hosting platform.
Conclusion – VPS or Dedicated Hosting?
If you ask me, I would consider VPS hosting a hybrid model of dedicated hosting and would highly recommend it for small to medium size organizations which may not have the budget for a dedicated server hosting. VPS hosting offers the best value in terms of server autonomy, flexibility/control and win hands down for reliability and redundancy. Dedicated hosting still remains the top choice for robust hosting that offers the most flexibility and control but you would have to pay a lot more to match the reliability offered by VPS Hosting. But with the advancement in virtual server technology and Cloud VPS, it will not be long before VPS hosting becomes the choice of web hosting.
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