Which features does my Self Managed/Managed/Fully Managed server offer?
Our servers (both VPS and dedicated) come in three flavors, depending on the support and features you need:
Self Managed Servers are for the pros among us who want as much control as possible. These are great if you're comfortable with shell prompts and are a seasoned administrator.
Managed Servers were created with most customers in mind. They offer the power of a server, as well as the ease of managing your server through a control panel. However, it's still significantly more complicated than something like a WYSIWYG program
Fully Managed Servers give GoDaddy the responsibility of managing and maintaining your server. You're still responsible for the sites you want to host on the server, but we take care of pretty much everything else.
Comparing Plans
Here's a break down of what the above information translates to in terms of this and that.
| Feature | Self Managed | Managed | Fully Managed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Automatic Patching | - | ✓ | ✓ |
| Root Access | ✓ | Configurable | Configurable |
| Control Panels | - | ✓ | ✓ |
| Backups: Disaster Recovery | - | ✓ | ✓ |
| SSH | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Application Manager | - | ✓ | ✓ |
| Dedicated IPs | 1 | 3 | 3 |
| Migrations from Shared Hosting | - | ✓ | ✓ |
| Expert Services (ES) | $ | $ | ✓ |
| Monitoring | Good | Better | Best |
| Seamless upgrades | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Support: Chat | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Support: Dedicated Team | - | - | ✓ |
| Legend | |
|---|---|
| ✓ | Supported |
| $ | Available as paid support |
| - | Not supported/available |
Feature Definitions
Get hip to our lingo...(that's what the kids say these days, right?)
Patching
When security vulnerabilities are patched, it's important to get them on your server as soon as possible. Using automatic patching, your server leverages the patching tools available through its operating system or control panel to update potentially problematic elements quickly.
Root Access
To install software on your server through the command line or other administrator-level tasks, you'll probably need root access. Unless you're familiar with controlling your server via command line, we don't recommend using it though; it's much easier to break your server using the power root access gives you than it is to use the same privileges to fix it.
Enable root or admin access to my Gen 3 Managed or Fully Managed server
Control Panels
Manging your server can much more straightforward with a control panel, which creates a user interface to complete administrator-level tasks like creating FTP users and adding websites to your server. Without a control panel, you can only manage your server via command line.
Backups: Disaster Recovery
If your server suffers severe breakage, we often have a backup of your server. These restores are available for a fee by contacting a GoDaddy Guide.
We do not guarantee that we will have a Disaster Recovery backup of your server. We make a best effort to keep these available, but you cannot rely on this backup's availability.
SSH Access
Pros who use servers often find that rather than dealing with a GUI, it's quicker and easier for them to just issue commands to the server themselves; SSH is the means by which they can do that.
Connect to my server with SSH (Secure Shell)
Application Manager
Installing applications like WordPress or Drupal grows increasingly tedious the more often you do it. With an application manager, you'll have a vast library of apps from which to choose, as well as the tools for features like automatic updates and relocating the application on your server.
Migrations from Shared Hosting
Upgrading from shared hosting to a server has a lot of benefits, but if you were apprehensive about moving your site, our migration tool makes it really easy. With nothing more than a few clicks, we sweep your old shared hosting account up into your server and set everything up for you.
Right now, this feature is available only for cPanel/Linux accounts, but we will add the features for Plesk soon.
Expert Services (ES)
Much like contracting out your home remodeling efforts, our server admins are available to spruce up/patch/overhaul components of your server. We have the entire list available in our Hosting Services Menu.
Monitoring
There are two primary elements we monitor:
- Our network, to ensure it stays healthy and happy, successfully routing your server's visitors to it.
- Your server's container, which uses NodePing and other technologies to make sure your server's successfully responding to requests.
Each of our server support tiers offers a different monitoring system:
Self Managed/Good only includes network monitoring to make sure you're not getting DDoSed.
Managed/Better includes network and container monitoring so you'll know if your server ever went down.
Fully Managed/Best includes network and container monitoring, as well as a team of server professionals that will address any issues your monitoring reports.
Seamless Upgrades
If you find that you need a more powerful server, we offer in-place upgrades that require no work on your end.
Support: Chat
You're stuck and want a quick answer. Check out what we support in
Support: Dedicated Team
Our Fully Managed Servers include the kind of white-glove service you expect, including dedicated teams of server admins you can reach out to if you need anything done on your server.
