The terminology used in web hosting can often be confusing for the person not conversant with the current buzzwords. What follows is a basic breakdown of types of hosting types and the differences between them. No type is essentially better than any other type but each fits different needs and levels of growth.

While almost every type of hosting package will usually fit some business, the exception might be the free hosted sites. The primary feature to these is that they are free and they usually have very simple tools that will allow an individual to get a website up and running quickly. However businesses may find that free hosting may not have the tools they need for ecommerce and with many of them the site owner can not even use their own domain name.

The free hosting plans are normally not a good choice for a business. The owner will usually find they can’t use their own domain name on many free hosting sites and that when it is time to upgrade they will end up having to build a new site because it is difficult or impossible to move the old one. While they might work for a very short time for a business just starting out, they are not a good long term alternative for most.

The most basic hosting choice is usually the shared server plan. One site will share a web server with many other sites. They will have their own control panel and they can have their own domain names. Often extras to make commerce easier are included such as shopping carts, file transfer via FTP, and email servers.

While the shared hosting plan is an excellent way to begin many online businesses most will begin to outgrow this plan soon and begin to require more server resources and space to continue growing. Some hosts may offer to help the site owner move their site to a larger package such as a virtual dedicated or dedicated server.

A virtual dedicated server is very like the shared hosting services except that fewer users share a machine and the website owner controls many more aspects of the server. These packages permit the business more room to expand, more bandwidth and a larger share of server resources as well. The virtual packages will also come with a control panel and even with many the ability to add their own domains from their panel.

However, the bad portion is that these virtual dedicated servers may feel like a dedicated but still has several users drawing from the same machine resources. What the means is an overload in traffic by one user, can bring the server down for others. Though this is a much better than other alternatives for more trafficked sites it is still not ideal for the busier sites.

A dedicated server is the largest and most configurable of web hosting choices. The entire server is dedicated to one business owner though this person may have many websites. Every aspect of the server is controlled by the site owner and if they choose to use all the server resources then they need not worry about depriving others or having their account suspended. However, the least expensive options in dedicated servers are the unmanaged servers. With the unmanaged types the website owner will be required to do all the routine server tasks. A better choice if at all possible is the fully managed dedicated server. The fully managed server allows the site owner to focus on building the site, and leaves the maintenance to the hosting company.

Locating cheap web hosting is not hard when you understand where to look. The characteristics of HostMonster make it an effective and economical choice for your Internet business.