Pros and cons of physiccal and virtual servers and ways to monitor them

To maintain the effective operation of your own website on the Internet, you will need to choose a reliable server, which today can take various forms. The server can be bought and installed physically, or it can be rented. Many website owners use dedicated servers, which are ideal for running complex and demanding projects. In this case, the server will be physically located in the data center, and you will get remote access to it.

Main difference between physical and virtual servers

In fact, working with a server that is in your office and a server that is located in the data center is no different. In addition, your own dedicated server allows you to configure any necessary software without restrictions. And this is very important for the operation of most Internet resources.

Physical server pros and cons

It would seem that it is much easier to have your own server, having paid for it once, but not to depend on anyone. This is a fundamentally wrong opinion, since the purchase is associated with large initial costs. You will need to spend quite a lot of money to purchase a license, an uninterruptible power supply, network storage and maintenance from a manufacturer or seller. In addition, the device requires certain conditions of maintenance and transportation. So simply installing it in your office or apartment will not work.

Virtual server pros and cons

Renting a virtual server at a remote data center is the best for all small and medium scale websites. At least because in such situations it is not advisable to buy your own server for a lot of money, not having confidence in the existence of the website in the future. And if the rental device ceases to cope with the growing needs of the website, you can always rent a more powerful server.

The rental price is several orders of magnitude lower than the purchase price. At the same time, it includes maintenance, repair and diagnostics of all problems. By renting a server, the website owner gets rid of all possible risks and problems associated with his work. Because its hosting provider is responsible for everything.

Server monitoring importance and useful tools

Servers, both physical and virtual, need constant monitoring to keep them running for as long as possible. And most webmasters use sophisticated tools, such as the HostTracker service, to ensure a high level of monitoring efficiency. This website monitoring platform offers many simple but effective tools to keep your website and its server running smoothly. From basic availability checks to statistics collection and, of course, server equipment monitoring. This cloud-based service allows the WebWizard to immediately understand CPU, memory, and disk usage issues. As well as improve physical or virtual server performance.

Thanks to many useful features of the HostTracker platform, all information about server performance and settings is two steps away from the webmaster. Each required sequence of actions must be defined and executed only once by the responsible webmaster. And then the system will perform these procedures automatically. And the system will notify the webmaster in case of any problems and provide detailed information about the problem. The system will indicate what happened, when and why. Thus, the webmaster will only need to quickly respond and fix all problems.

Probably every notable web project or just every large organization sooner or later is faced with a choice between buying a physical or leasing a virtual server. And this is far from the easiest task. This question could be a technical one, or it can be a matter of personal preference, but in any case, the answer should be found. And, preferably, the correct one. Moreover, everything depends not only on current needs, but also on plans for the future. For example, choice will depend on how stable the server is now and how much the company will need to upgrade its hardware later.