Host Features

What to look for in a web host

[rahmuss]

I've posted this on a different thread; but no one answered it. It is a little overwhelming; but could anyone answer any of these questions for me:?

I still hav a couple of questions... ok... a LOT of questions, to be answered for two different situations: A) If I'm just building a page for myself. Or B) If I'm building a page for a business

1 - What's a good Platform? ( VDS, VPS ...etc... )
2 - How much Bandwidth transfer should I look for?
3 - Dedicated IP, Yes or No?
4 - FTP accounts, how many and what are they for?
5 - Are web based control panels what I want?
6 - What does the "Hits/Month" supposed to mean?
7 - What is "Domain Forwarding"?
8 - POP3 Mail vs. Web Mail... or both?
9 - Host software ... Frontpage... Linux... what and why?
10 - Server Side Includes (SSI), and what are they?
11 - MySQL Database?
12 - Cronjobs? And what are they?
13 - Access to raw log files? Why?
14 - Real/Audio Video...? Does that mean I can't do flash or other things if the host does not support this?
15 - Secure Server Layer (SSL). Why would this be important?
16 - PHP vs. ASP vs. etc...
17 - TCL ... What is this and should I have it?
18 - What's a postgres database?
19 - What do they mean by "Instant Setup"? Does that just mean I can dig right in after I sign up instead of waiting?
20 - What does the full redundancy do?
21 - Should I make sure I have Forums, or Auctions, or Merchant software, or Training, or Guestbook, or Bulletin Board or any other software in particular?

Anything else I'm missing?

[TGecho]

The answer to most of your questions is: depends on what you're doing (big site, little site, lots of sites, db driven site, etc...)

In a word? Google.

[rahmuss]

I would start out making a small personal site... so let's just look at that for now. I will get into bigger and better later. Thanks.