A number of shared hosting accounts I have seen allow web sites to be previewed before the domain name fully propogates. So (after propogation) a web site can be reached by either of the following ...
That's the whole point Henry ... I can't use the IP address on the current box. This just brings up the dedicated server's default site. I want to check other new sites on the box too before DNS propogation has taken place (which ... as you probably know ... can take a few hours).
Had a chat with the tech support department, and they have suggested adding symlinks to the default site. I'll check that out this week sometime :)
if the domains are set up, then can't you use your hosts file to direct any request for your url to your server? It should resolve for the correct domain and show you the site before it's generally viewable.