Be Your Own Web Host?

[br3nt]

I know this is possible but I don't know how. Would someone please explain?

[bathurst_guy]

You need a broadband internet account with a static IP address (preferred although you can have a client run on your computer to update the DNS) then install a webserver, I recommend WAMPP if you have a windows computer. There are plenty of tutorials online if you Google them.

[felgall]

A Synchronous broadband connection would be preferable for hosting your own site because asynchronous connectiona such as Adsl have upload speeds limited to a small fraction of download speeds and for web hosting you really need it the other way around or you will need a superfast connection just to get a moderate upload speed.

You will also want an uninterruptable power supply to make sure that your site stays up even if thhe power goes off. Some form of site monitoring that will notify you when the site goes down will also be useful so that you can get things going again quickly rather than having your site down for hours.

[EricG1793]

I have a question:

If I wanted to do this myself, and I had the site loaded on to my laptop, would my laptop be able to handle taking the place of a server? And would I be able to use my laptop while the site was going? If I had my laptop on and I was connected to a different router, would the website be able to operate, because of IP address issues?

[mdoigny]

you can use a webserver on any type of computer. My home server runs on an old PIII 600MHz. A webserver is just some sort of file server; The bottleneck is not the server, but the upload connection.
The upload speed can't never be lower than 1/28 of the download speed, so if you get a faster internet connection (higher downloads), automatically the upload speed will also increase.
If you use a router you will need to tell the router to direct the request to the webserver, basically to forward all port 80 requests to your webserver.
Check also that your provider isn't blocking port 80 to disallow running webservers). I, this case, you will need to use another port above 1023

[the fonejacker]

You can get away with a 486DX100 as a bottom baseline, although I wouldnt recomend running an Apache server on it, theirs lots of servers on the market, so research a few first and look into how each one puts demand on your system. Most people instantly anounce Apache as the bee all, it isnt, theirs lots of server on the market and most are free or have free versions of the commercial server.

If you have a router and its fairly new, lots of routers support IP address updates to places like DynDNS and TZO which means that you dont need a static IP as the router upon issue of new IP address updates the remote DNS, this DNS account can be linked to a full Domain name.

The only issue you will have is uptime, if your running one machine and your not running a raid with regular backups then becareful about offering up webspace and services.

Serving from a home account can lead you quickly into paying more bills, your ISP cutting your account off for breach of AUP and charge you per megabyte over the cap limit you go.

You would be better off paying for professional hosting which doesnt cost the earth, a few $'s per month will give you access to a domain name and hosting with all the things you need already to use.

[the fonejacker]

The upload speed can't never be lower than 1/28 of the download speed, so if you get a faster internet connection (higher downloads), automatically the upload speed will also increase.
Not with some providers who offer a T1 but only have 128kbps upstream... of several ISP's I have tried, I have had the misfortune to deal with some of the worst, including pipex, tiscalli and Ntl, I didnt go anywhere near AOL because of my freinds experience with them and all of those ISP's capped upstream to less than 128kbps, so uploading images and files to servers was slow.

It is not a written rule that your upstream limit rises in proportion to the download speed, remember these people control the network dynamics.