evolution of hosting – VPS and dedicated server
Ah, so you’re not a good fit for the shared hosting environment? That means you did not meet one of the requirements: low traffic, only one or two sites, small amount of static content, no need to have much control, low budget, no special programming environment requirements, standardized software is fine, etc.
If you winced when you read one or two of these then VPS is for you. As the name implies, this is a virtual server. Depending on your host and plan you may have a control panel software that makes life easy. Some things may not be allowed or enabled, but in theory you should be able to restart the server, serve up many sites, install common apps for multiple sites to use and more.
The next step is not a virtual but an actual server. A dedicated server is a box that you pay for. Sometimes it’s completely managed for a monthly fee, and sometimes you bring your box to a colocation facility to use only their bandwidth, environmentally sheltered room, backup power, massive connectivity? Well there’s typically an attentive guy watching over the boxes waiting for a chance to do something, like put a CD-ROM into one of the machines. This is part of the service, as should be physical security.
The beauty of this obviously, is that it is totally yours, install and run whatever you want!