What does Myspace do for hosting?

If my hosting (shared) offers unlimited disk space and bandwidth, how do I know when I need to upgrade things?

I can see how much disk space Im using and bandwidth, but dont know when its time to upgrade or step things up (maybe to dedicated hosting or whatever comes next after this). I pay about $15 a month now. I assume people like Myspace pay thousands a month in hosting, but whats the next step up and how do I know when it's time to step things up?

 Your hosting company will let you know... when you start using up too many resources and violate their TOS.  BTW... there's no such thing as unlimited BW  and disk space.... that's just a sales gimmick hosting providers use to get your business. 

I agree with houstonlively. There is no such thing as unlimited. They will let you know. However be aware that some hosting providers do not provide advanced warning. Some will just shut off your site until you uprade.

If you actually get as big as myspace, you would not do normal hosting. Myspace most likely has their own data centers and people to run it and bring in their own bandwidth via DS3's or more. MySpaces size requires a farm of clustered servers. Its better if it's handeled internally at that point.

I was actually reading something online the otherday about this, it it came from a host manager. He was saying something about all hosts who offer unlimited disc space and or bandwidth arent really being dishonest about it, he says they do offer it. The real problem is the limits they put on ( i think he said) CPU usage or ram usage or something, which means you could never use unlimited anything without using too much server CPU or Ram and so breaking the rules of the TOS which is where they tell you to upgrade or something.

I find it all a bit dishonest really, this is one of those things that you can never tell if the host is ok until youve been with them for a bit, im on my third host in 6 months, each one not holding up to what they advertise or say they offer, the worst one being hostpapa so far. Seems to be getting harder to find one you can trust now. hostgator and joombyte are the best ive used upto now, but on the whole this buisness seems to be full of cowboys, false advertising, and shoddy services.

Regards

Tyke

Those who offer 'unlimited bandwidth' and 'unlimited disk space', know that actually providing those two things is impossible.  They usually put some ridiculous constraints on what type of programs you can run on their server.  They won't alllow photo or video hosting, email hosting, chat, or anything else that is server intensive.  If you read Hostgators TOS, they don't allow very much on their so-called 'unlimited' plans.  I especially like the part about not being able to run photo hosting scripts.

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Here's my favorite part of Hostgators TOS:

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7. Resource Usage

User may not:
a) Use 25% or more of system resources for longer then 90 seconds. There are numerous activities that could cause such problems; these include: CGI scripts, FTP, PHP, HTTP, etc.

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So folks...... as long as your site doesn't make use of HTTP, you won't violate their TOS.

I should mention, dont use hostgator for your dolphin, they are no good for that, i host a MYBB forum from them and they are fine for that. As houston rightly says, start sticking anything too resource intensive on hostgator (like a dolphin) as with most of these shared hosts, and the server will melt and they will send the death squad out after your butt for daring to use what any of them advertise...

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I wish this industry would sort itself out, get some regulatory board to check on them, then we might stand a chance of getting what we pay for. (but im not going to hold my breath on that one

I've never heard of "unlimited disk space" but I think the "unlimited traffic" is a throw-back to when there weren't streaming videos, image intensive sites, etc and it was a marketing thing sort of like "all you can eat" resturants- it wasn't too likely anyone could impact their over-capacity resources.  I like my low cost shared host http://www.alterhosting.com/

but they really should stop saying that (in fact I just looked and think they have).    This was a good question CJ, I have wondered myself when it will be time to go.

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Rob

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Interesting comments Houston.  How are you holding up "waiting for Godot" (i.e. waiting for Dolphin 7).    If the schedule slips again in June will you still be with us?  I know your plans require features that are not offered in 6.1.