Whats up guys.. New to the forum

Hey guys. I am currently in the process of starting a website/business with my buddy. (under construction).. Anyways we have purchased our domain and hosting but I have a few ?'s. Eventually and hopefully we will outgrow our hosting plan and want a ded server. I have done so much homework on this and I still need a few answers.. Say If i transfer my domain to lets say network solutions or register.com. Do you they offer free DNS servers? I am very new to DNS but I have learned quite a bit. By this summer I plan on building a server on a static IP that I already have. How would I make this happen if they supply free DNS servers. Just simple modify their records to my IP.. Which records would need to be changed to MY IP.. Just web server and FTP? Is running your own server/domain from home difficult. I have done so much research and I still feel a little stupid lol-- Thanks guys

Your post is a little confusing, but maybe this answer will help. I use Netsol at work. There is no "extra" charge for the DNS servers. I have found them a little complicated to use at times, but not much worse than others. To clarify that, they made one change once in their DNS servers that caused me a two day downtime, because I wan't aware they made the change and I caused the problem by trying to change something in DNS, but now they host the servers themselves so there should be no more issues. Basically our webserver is inhouse. Our Domain registrar is Netsol and we use their DNS servers to resolve to our static IP for our server.

In regards to this question:

You need to check with your ISP. Some ISP's aren't very keen on having you host a server unless you've paid for a business or premium-type account. You need to check into their requirements for hosting from your home account so you don't run into future probs with your ISP.

hmm never thought about the ISP situation. What does the ISP have to do with running my own servers? Ok so from what i know... this is what id have to do

1. Change Registrars
2. Use their DNS servers primary and secondary
3. Modify their records to have them point to my IP address.

Is that it? Is that all i have to do? Do i need to do anything to my machine? I will be using a router.. I already run web and FTP servers just fine right now using my static IP.. If i can do this what else do I have to do to host my own domain? Also, I downloaded a program called simple DNS. This is JUST for use if you plan on running your OWN DNS server correct. Choosing a registrar that offers free DNS would make this unneccessary right?

I quoted your post so I could use it for reference while I thought about this.

What does the ISP have to do with this? If I tried to run a server with Comcast without getting a plan that allows it, I'd be in deep dudu...

OK...You have a static IP? So I'll assume that you already have things set up with your ISP so you can (which I'll assume means you're OK for hosting). Step one, may not be necessary. But if your current registrar doesn't let you point your domain name to your existing server IP then you probably will. I'm a little iffy on that...just not entirely clear on how you are set up.

Points 2 and 3. Whomever your registrar is, yes, the DNS servers have to point to your static IP.

let me just say this. If you "outgrow" your hosting plan, you do not want to move to a home server, that is crazy.

Well.. I currently am having my site hosted by the same company that registered my domain for me.. Once i outgrow this hosting I plan on transfering my domain to either register.com or networksolutions and running my own server out of my house. At this point what would I have to do to set up my home server to make it function with my domain. Do i need to make my OWN DNS server on my server machine? Or will register.com or network solutions make one for me and just have it point to my IP. How do you set this up? I planned on using windows 2003 server on my server. And running apache web server and bulletproof FTP. Do i need to do any Tc/ip changes to make my server work with my domain. or what?

Let me ask you this, what is your uplink bandwidth?

For my server I was gona build. Duel p4's 2 gigs ram. 2 100 gig ATA133 HDDS on RAID mode 1 for speed. and use an external hdd for backing it up.. Im gona be starting off with a static cable line. I have a really good cable provider here. Eventuall id go t1 (later on of course).. I dont wana argue this. I just wana know how to set an at home domain up. Which registrars do you guys recommend. How about godaddy.com?

You can choose what you want to point to your IP for a domain. I'm just trying to figure out what's best for you. I'm not trying to argue. I hope you realize how expensive T1 is and how much more sense it would make to go for something other than your own server at your house. But, if you have money to burn, the server sounds quite nice at least.

Ohh ok.. well. what are my other options. I need about 200 gigs of space. Ideally an IDE RAID or a SCSI set up. Id be interested in a relatively new server atleast 2+ghz and atleas2 gigs of ram.. How would would this cost to host?

here's one place to look http://servers.aplus.net/ They're not cheap. I don't know if you've looked into T1 yet but, at least as far as I can tell, that's going to set one back about 1k a month... which, at least for me isn't and most likely never will be an option. There are many options... do a search on google for dedicated server if you're set on having a dedicated server. Sounds like with such requirements you must be planning to need one. Remember too, if you have a dedicated server, you can upgrade to another dedicated without having to purchase a whole new server, that's always a major plus for me.

Hey guys.. you prolyl think im lame but i wana learn as much as i can bout this... I got a few questions i cant find answers to.. Ok say I got a ded server running out of my house behind a router. II only have 1 ip... 1 computer is running my web server and FTP server. (im usiing somone elses DNS servers and am having them pointed to my IP).. OK since i only have 1 ip. What would happen if i added another computer to the router.. and opened a web server on it. So 2 web servers on one IP.. what would happen? Is this the principal behind server expension? Because I have seen networks and data centers. Why do they have SO many computers for maybe just 1 site and FTP server

Would this just make 1 big web server or will it just not even work? Because say if you have a server. and you wana expand your network. What would you do?

My understanding is this. Your connection to your domain comes through your server. If you choose to add more servers. They need to conect to the same server that your domain connects to.

Example:
serverA(DNS)
serverB(initial home server)
serverC(additional home servers)

A -> B -> C

Whereby B can access files on C and distribute them back to A. So on & so forth.