Dedicated Server Advanced Services

XLHost Advanced Services (or XAS) are a best-in-breed class of managed services leveraging the best technology and professionals in the industry to deliver you the best service possible. Any combination of XLHost Advanced Services can be combined to deliver the level of service your small business or enterprise requires.

Hardware Load Balancing

While server technology continues to advance at a blistering pace; the growth of the Internet, and the ever growing demands of your customers to deliver always-on applications and services drives the need for highly resilient, reliable, and responsive hosting platforms. Working with Foundry Networks, XLHost can help you achieve your performance/reliability goals while keeping your costs under control.

A hardware load balancer (or Layer 4-7 switch) simply receives requests from the Internet on the VIP (or Virtual IP Address) on behalf of your dedicated servers, then based on the configuration of the load balancer the device makes decisions (in milliseconds) about which dedicated server would be best suited to service the incoming request. The load balancer also maintains health information regarding the services running on your dedicated servers and will avoid sending traffic to unresponsive dedicated servers.

There are 4 main standard load balancing algorithms:

• Round robin: Every connection is sent to a different dedicated server regardless of how many connections/sessions that dedicated server is currently handling. Round robin is the default load balancing mechanism and is overall the safest choice in most instances.
• Least connections: New connections are sent to the dedicated server with the least number of connections.
• Least sessions: New connections are sent to the dedicated server with the least number of sessions.
• Weighted: A weight is specified for each dedicated server, the total of all of the weights divided by the individual weight of the dedicated server controls how many connections that dedicated server will receive.

These are some of the more common protocols which can be load balanced:

• FTP
• SMTP
• DNS
• HTTP
• HTTPS
• SIP/Voice Over IP traffic

The most common use for hardware load balancing at XLHost is to balance/protect database driven dynamic HTTP applications. Many users leverage one or more of the faster multi-processor/multi-core dedicated servers as their database backend and then use low-cost dedicated servers as their http/https front-end dedicated servers. As needs change users can simply add or remove low-cost front-end dedicated servers and or database replica servers.

VPN (Mobile User/Tunnel)

Securing outsourced IT infrastructure can be a challenge, dedicated servers are often times connected directly to the Internet with no firewall between them and the bevy of threats that have surfaced over the last several years. Allowing direct, unencrypted access to services such as SSH, Remote Desktop, Microsoft SQL, FTP, and other brute-force targets gives attackers the opportunity to compromise the security of your dedicated servers by leveraging simple automated techniques. Managed Virtual Private Network services from XLHost provide the ultimate security for your dedicated server(s) and hosted infrastructure.

There are two types of VPN which are commonly used, mobile user VPN and tunneling.

Mobile user VPN is useful when you or your users are often in different places and you need to always be securely connected to your resources. Mobile VPN comes in two types SSL and IPSEC. Both types of Mobile VPN combine ease of use with industry leading security. Data sent from any user connected via Mobile User VPN in the world will be encrypted before reaching your dedicated server's private network interface. Only the services you choose will be available via your dedicated server's public network interface. The Mobile VPN client is easy to use and works with Microsoft Windows and Apple operating systems. Pricing for Mobile VPN is based on a per-user basis.

Some usage examples for Mobile VPN are:

• Secure remote management (SSH, Remote Desktop, VNC)
• Secure extranet access for users.
• Secure corporate E-mail access for users.

IPSEC tunnels are useful when you have one or more fixed physical locations such as branch offices, or retail locations which you wish to securely connect to resources hosted by your dedicated server(s) at XLHost. All data sent between the remote location and the XLHost network is encrypted. Only the services you choose will be available via your dedicated server's public network interface. XLHost's IPSEC solution is compatible with virtually every remote-end solution including: OpenVPN, Cisco ASA/PIX, Watchguard, and more. Pricing for IPSEC tunnels is based on a per tunnel basis.


Half/Full Private Rack

An XLHost private rack offers the ultimate in versatility and functionality for users with multiple servers, resellers, or users who simply wish to employ shared storage across multiple servers.

Some benefits included in the XLHost private rack include:

• A dedicated Cisco Layer 3 Gigabit Ethernet Switch
• Customer or XLHost managed.
• Access List control.
• IP Routing.
• Bandwidth Pool across all servers.
• IP Address Subnet sharing.
• Private LAN.
• (optional) Share a single KVM-IP device on all servers.
• (optional) Share a single Dedicated Firewall across all servers.