Adult Web Hosting: The All You Need To Know

By Rodel Garcia

What sort of web hosting options should you go for if you want to host an adult website? You need to remember that this is the most critical aspect of your adult website. Facts like shared or dedicated adult web hosting, the maximum allowed bandwidth, the average uptime of the server and the server space should be critically taken into consideration while researching for your adult web host.

Now let us visit some points in detail to make sure that you choose the right adult web host to host your adult website.

SHARED OR DEDICATED ADULT WEB HOSTING?

Most web hosts provide shared web hosting by default. By 'shared web hosting' we mean that your website is being hosted on a server that hosts other websites too. For a basic website with limited bandwidth requirement and server space this is a preferred option to go for.

For an adult website, on the other hand, one should go for dedicated web hosting because if you host an adult website, then you'll obviously be storing hundreds of images there. The traffic will be huge (at least compared to non-adult websites) and hundreds of visitors will be downloading/loading the images, consuming lots of bandwidth in the process. Besides, if you host an e-commerce adult website where your visitors have to pay a subscription fee to download images and movie flicks, you'll need a dedicated server to avail the secure server facilities.

CO-LOCATED ADULT WEB HOSTING

You may feel apprehensive about leaving your crucial data (images, movies, credit cards, email addresses) on some one else's web host. One option is to maintain your own server data center, which can be very costly and most adult webmasters cannot afford it. Besides, it is not even sensible to incur so high a cost unless you are running a mega e-commerce website.

Such a requirement can be solved by having a co-located server. With co-located servers, your hosting company connects your hardware to the Internet and provides you with rack space, a secure environment to store your server in, and technical support. On your part, you need to provide the company with the actual server, maintenance and software in order to host your adult website on your co-located server. Co-located servers generally give you more control over your hardware without having to worry about vandalism, hacking, theft or connectivity outages.

LEGAL CONCERNS:

There are some web hosting companies that have issues with hosting adult content. Prior to booking the server space and uploading your website, you should make it clear to your web host that you're planning to host an adult website on their server.

SPACE REQUIREMENT

Adult websites naturally take up lots of server space because you'll be keeping high-resolution images (.jpg) and movies (.mpg, .wmv, .avi, etc). On an average 200 image files will need anywhere between 50-80 MB of disk space. You should always get much more space than your current requirement because before you know it, you'll be running out of space.

TECHNICAL SUPPORT:

Before you choose your adult web host, make sure you are aware of their technical support standard. It's not enough to just have a website and quality adult content. In case there is some problem, your adult web hosting company should be able to address the issue as promptly as possible.

HIDDEN COST:

Hidden adult web hosting costs can throw your budget in a disarray if you're not prepared for them. Make sure you're aware of all the costs involved with hosting your adult website because you'll obviously be requiring more than the standard package.

ADMINISTRATION TOOLS:

Various tools like form handling CGI scripts, shopping carts, control panel, email management, file management, etc. are provided by the web hosting company without extra charge. Before you host your adult website, find out what all tools that are available.

PARALLEL SERVER:

Downage can always be expected, but established companies run a few parallel servers so that in case one server collapses, the rest take over. If you charge your viewers for accessing "members only" content, they'd like to access your adult website as and when they feel like. Your website should always be functioning and if it is often "down", this may get you lots of irate customers.