Moving from Shared to VPS Hosting
By admin On March 24th, 2010Shared hosting and Virtual Private Server (VPS) hosting differ significantly considering their purposes and what they offer. Average small business or individual customers often choose shared hosting for their first sites because of its inexpensiveness. Still it cannot be compared as it comes to the level of service and reliability with VPS hosting, even if it is a budget vps server. Particular steps have to be taken in order to upgrade smoothly to VPS hosting. The discussion that follows will explore the steps and tips to make your move from shared to VPS hosting easier.
1. Copying the files from your old website to a backup file is one of the easier steps. Don’t forget to make at least one copy of your website files beforehand. Most individuals will store their files on the web server they are hosted with; however, it makes more sense to have the web server copy and a backup not associated with the host. This way you will have all your files at hand and won’t have to download them from the server when changing host. The files will be sent directly to your computer.
2. Do not terminate your old shared hosting service until you have loaded the files onto the VPS hosting site. If you do, you will automatically lose access to the web server and the files on it. So make sure you have tested your new site before getting rid of the old one
3. The next step in the process is to upload your saved files to the new cheap VPS host. You should look through your files and decide which are really important and which are not. Often times we have old files or old versions of files, so you may not need all the information you copied.
4. Once the files are uploaded to the cheap VPS server you need to check your internal links. It should be the same for any site you launch. For simple navigation, it is important that the internal links work in all browsers. By testing the links you can find and fix any of the links which were broken in the transfer.
5. Update the DNS records for your domain name if you have one. You should wait with it until you have fully checked your new VPS server and made sure that everything is working. It may be as simple as telling the registrar that your site is with a new company. This process can be complicated if you have to change registrars. Even more trouble may be caused by switching from name based systems to dedicated IP systems. It is possible that you will get a new IP address.
If you follow those steps, you should have no problem moving from a shared to a cheap VPS host. You will lose a few of your visitors during the move due to the switch from one host to another, with website testing. The steps above will help you minimize this loss. Still, if everything is done correctly, nobody may even notice a slightest change.

