Static IP is better, but.

Basic?'s on Static IP.

[gemini181]

Hi All,

This looks like a great forum. Thanks, for being here :)

I've heard "use a host which provides static IP addresses". I'm looking at a hosting site and seeing this phrase:

"Point your domain names to any static IP address or hostname."

I'm willing to learn the whole DNS subject, but here is exactly why I'm posting:

-Is "Point your domain names to any static IP address" the same as "we are a host which provides static IP addresses?" It's a bit confusing.
-When a host offers the option for multiple domains in the same account, combined with static IP's, am I "getting" a seperate, static IP for each domain, or are all domains on the same IP?

Thank you very much.

[mack]

I think when a host says point your domain to any static ip address what they really mean is you can point your domain to any web server that has a static ip address.

To host a server online a web host must have a static ip address. If an ip address where to change then all domains that are pointing to that server would be pointing to nothing.

One thing that many do offer is a unique ip for your site. This means that no other sites will be using your IP address. Today web hosts typically host hundreds maybe even thousands of sites on a single IP address. This is what is known as virtual hosting. The server it's self will display content based on the referring domain name. If you nave a dedicated IP then only your site will be available on that domain.

The main benefit of having a dedicated IP address is you are unlikely to get penalised in a search engine because of something another site did. If a site does something to get banned it is possible Google or another search engine may ban the entire IP address, as opposed to the offending site.

Mack.

[gemini181]

Thanks.

[mhhfive]

Depending on what you do, dynamic IPs can work. If you want to start cheap and you don't have a lot of traffic to begin with, you might be able to get away with pointing to a dynamic IP web host. As your site grows, you can switch to a static IP. But this really depends on what you plan to do.

If you want your site to be as professional as possible from the get-go, then you really should use a static IP.

Just two more cents.

[encyclo]

Just to clarify the terminology here as words tend to get misused in this case, when talking about dynamic and static IP addresses, we are talking about the IP address assigned to an internet connection by an ISP, ot in other words, the IP address you use to connect to the internet from your own machine.

When talking about servers, there are shared IP addresses and dedicated IP addresses - shared IP addresses are when the same (unchanging) IP address is used by more than one site on a particular server. A dedicated IP address is one unchanging IP address used for one particular site.

For the question of hosting, most companies offer shared IP hosting as standard, with hosting with a dedicated IP address available for small extra fee. If you have your own server, you can use one IP address to host many sites or you can request an IP address for each of your sites.