An Operating System is the software that communicates with the hardware of a PC and serves as the intermediary between all the applications and the hardware, which includes peripherals such as a printer, a mouse or a keyboard. When you run software, it transfers requests to the OS through an API (Application Program Interface) and the interaction is done through a command line or a Graphical User Interface (GUI). Similar to a personal computer, web servers also use an Operating System which serves as a host for all the software installed on them, which includes script apps or server-side software such as a flash server, a VOIP server, etcetera. A virtual machine can be set up on a physical one, so it is possible to install a guest OS on it and have a different system environment compared to the physical server host OS.
Multiple OS in VPS Servers
In case you select one of our VPS server solutions, you will have as many as 3 different Operating Systems to select from - CentOS, Debian and Ubuntu. They are all Linux distributions and we offer them rather than offering just one OS, because the apps that you may want to run on the server may have specific requirements for the software environment. Each one of the three has some advantages with regard to the available packages that you can later on install, but what's common between them is the fact that they are really secure and dependable and have large communities which support them. The hosting Control Panel options for the VPS accounts depend on your Operating System choice, in order to provide you with more flexibility. When you order the virtual server with one OS and you need a different one later, our tech support team can easily reinstall the VPS with the new one in a matter of minutes. We also offer the option to maintain the Operating System on your server up-to-date on a weekly basis.
Multiple OS in Dedicated Servers
We offer three Operating Systems with our dedicated server packages - CentOS, Ubuntu and Debian. They are all different Linux distributions and we offer them not only because they are freely available and they won't increase the cost of your new web server, but also because they are really stable and secure. Each one of them is backed up by a big community of developers, so you will be able to choose from thousands of software packages that you can install on your server if the application that you would like to use has certain requirements. The Operating System will also determine what internet hosting Control Panel you can use as the Control Panels that we offer run on particular OSs only and since we would like to give you as much versatility as possible, we offer a couple of OSs and multiple Control Panels. In case you get a server with a given OS, we could change it upon request in case it turns out that you'll need a different one. We will also keep your OS updated weekly as a part of the useful Managed Services upgrade.