What is VPS? | ISPserver Skip to main content

Knowledge base

What is VPS?

VPS, or Virtual Private Server – works off part a physical dedicated server and can emulate it completely.

Usually, when talking about VPS we understand it as a service the client is a full administrator of, having the right to install any software and operating system. Each physical server can accommodate a few virtual ones operating simultaneously, each of them being independent and owned by separate clients.

How does a VPS work?
VPS or dedicated server?
KVM virtualization

 

How does a VPS work?

For a user, a virtual server will operate like any dedicated server would. Managing a VPS and a real dedicated server is exactly the same: working with a file system and applications, running sever-based software and operating systems is done the just like on a physical server.

On a VPS you can start up unlimited number of web-projects, data bases, users' mail boxes, any financial and accounting software products, development frameworks, CRM, and etc.

The difference between VPS and real server operation is that a physical server can be used to run multiple virtual servers, all in one time, but itself it is always a separate physical PC. However, virtual servers never interfere with each other, so no issues with one of the VPS can affect the operation of its neighbor.

 

VPS or dedicated server?

The choice between VPS and dedicated servers depends on the scale of the challenges they are going to meet. A dedicated server is a separate physical server which is installed at our data center and fully managed by you. Its main functional difference from a virtual solution is that it uses a separate disk system and a dedicated network connection. This guarantees you that users of neighbor servers will not share these resources. For virtual servers, we employ automatic monitoring to restrain such instances; excessive use may lead to a temporary suspension of the VPS upon warning.

The main advantages of a VPS over a dedicated server consist in its affordable cost and flexible scalability. The latter means that if necessary you can easily increase the computational performance of your VPS by adding more memory and processor cores. You can also expand your disk space, but this will require ordering a new virtual server and copying your data to it.

 

KVM virtualization

With KVM virtualization a virtual server is created with its own operating system (you can install it from our OS images or upload your own ISO), network interface, disk space, and a dedicated area of RAM memory. The default operating systems available are as follows: CentOS 7, CentOS 8, Debian 7, Debian 9, Debian 10, Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, FreeBSD 12. Windows Server 2016 and Windows Server 2019 operating systems only available for a recurring subscription fee.

This type of virtualization brings more stability and reliability to server operation, but its resources, if needed, cannot all be freely scaled at a later time. If you do have to give some boost to your KVM virtual server, then you actually need to order a new one and transfer all your data onto it.

The KVM virtualization can suit any needs. Very often, this virtualization is applied on servers dedicated for subsequent hosting of game servers and other resource-intensive projects, major web sites, development frameworks and accounting platforms.

Return to category