Is it Feasible to Host Your Website Off Your Home Internet Connection and Web Server?

By Daniel Brock

When I was first interested in starting a website and a hosting service, I thought that the only way to do it was to setup my own little web server off my home equipment and internet connection. However, I soon learned that it is not as easy as it sounds. While it was definitely a great learning experience for me, it didn't produce any results that I was proud of. My sites loaded so slow from the outside and there was very little functionality. In fact, after about a year of experience with Linux, I still had only the most basic web services functional - Apache and PHP.

So do I recommend hosting your website off your home computer? No. Here's why:

• Can't compete with a dedicated server - Your home equipment and connection can not compete with systems in a sophisticated datacenter
• It takes a lot of time - Be prepared to spend 100+ hours learning and fooling around with your setup. This includes only the most basic of functions - web server, dynamic DNS, etc. A fully functional server will take much much longer.
• It costs more - it costs way more to leave your computer running 24/7 than it would to simply signup for a cheap web hosting plan. Not to mention the amount of your own time you have to invest in it. Time = money

What should I do to get my website online than? What I recommend is that you read up on why you need a web hosting provider and what all they can do for you. Going with an established web host will not only save you a lot of money and time, it will also save you a lot of headache. I can't count the amount of times I wanted to pick my webserver up off my floor and throw it out my window for not working the way I wanted it to. It really can drive you crazy...I'm not joking!

If you are generally interested in setting it up all off your own equipment, than fine, good for you. You will learn a lot I have no doubt about that. I suggest you find a spare computer, install a copy of FreeBSD or a Linux distro and go from there. However, if all you want to do is get your website online, than just make it easy on yourself and go with an established web host. This is the easiest option by far.

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