What are Server Resources?

View Comments / April 17, 2007 - All Posts, Beginner Help, Segments

One sticking point in Web hosting that is hard for some people to wrap their heads around is server resources. Now this usually stand for the amount of CPU and RAM your Web site can use on the server that you are on.

So why is this such a confusing topic, and why do so many hosts not want to talk about it? Well, it might not be as taboo ask you might think.

Now as an example of what server resources means to you and me, think of it like your computer. Lets say you have ten programs open and running. You are browsing the Web, checking your E-mail, running a chat client, burning a DVD and more. Now running all those programs at once can be a little taxing to your machine if it is not powerful enough. Power for a computer (and for a server) is often measured by the CPU and RAM it has access to.

Now lets say your DVD burning program starts to go wild, it is using up so many resources that it slows the rest of your programs down to a crawl. What would you do? You’d shut down the DVD burning so your other programs could come back from a near death experience.

Now if you have a Web site that is using too many server resources, you could experience the same effect. On one server you have many Web sites hosted. Each one would be like a program, using it’s share of the server’s resources. If one uses too much, it is usually “turned off” so the other ones are not effected. A Web host can much easily deal with one mad customer. When you have an entire server filled with pissed off people, well – lets just say that is no fun at all.

Now how can you fix this? Well moving up in plan type can often give you more resources to work with (if you can not bring your resource use back down). Going from a shared hosting environment to a dedicated one can give you a fighting chance because a dedicated plan has a smaller amount of Web sites on it. What does that mean for you? It means you have more server resources to work with.

So why don’t Web hosts tell you how many of the server’s resources are available to you? It is because the number in most cases is very low. It isn’t exactly a good selling point, so they are not going to share that information with you.

Also many servers are setup differently.

Server number one might be able to take a little more punishment than server number two. So that makes it really hard for a Web host to give you an exact number. Most scripts and services you would install on a Web hosting account these days are really good at managing your resources for you so they do not get out of hand. Every so often though, you might run into an issue like this – so it is good to know before hand what your situation is so your not yelling at your host saying “Where did my Web site go?”.

Related Podcast Link: Listen to Episode 103!