Do i need to have 2 physical DNS servers?

I am planning on using Dedicated servers to setup in whihc case do i need 2 DNS servers from the start?

or is there another service i can use?

Most dedicated server companies will help you setup the DNS entries for this. It doesn't need to be 2 separate servers (though it would be better if you could, as that is the point of having 2 available NS entries for domains).

DNS entries on their own DNS servers or my own that i have purchased?

A "DNS Server" is the same as a "mail server". It's just a piece of software running on a machine. Many small companies start off by having their "DNS Servers" on the same server as their file and web servers.

It is advisable to eventually move the DNS to 2 separate boxes, preferably located (at least one of them anyways) in separate locations, for redundancy.

i knew a DNS server is software...but can i actually load 2 servers up on 1 machine...or can i just use the 1 but have 2 NS adresses... e.g NS1.digitalfields.co.uk, and NS2.digitalfields.co.uk but they are actually the same.

also...is it expected these days for hosts to have a control panel...?

Yes you can, in the same way that you could run the DNS for multiple hosts off the same computer.

I would say it's mandatory for hosts to have a control panel. Not all do, but all should. The ones who don't generally don't (with some exceptions) grow very large at all.

i was planning to get 1...HELM looks good but not out yet! need another for win 2k...prolly use Cpanel for linux sys.

I am hoping to setup fully this week...so keep an eye out!

cheers jeremy

Hmm... What company are you getting your server with... Most of this stuff should already be setup on your system. I'd personally recommend H-Sphere for a control panel, as it allows you to manage accoutns across separate servers and OS's :)

what company would u recommend? i am looking at a few

Really depends on your budget and how you want to start. RackSpace is by far the "best", but you pay for it. Ventures Online is pretty good. RackShack is the cheapest.

There is the whole gammut in between. You can pay anywhere from 99$ up to 500$ for the same server depending on what you want with it. How much bandwidth and the quality of the bandwidth you want. If you want your server managed or unmanaged. What control panel you want on it...

All of these are things you will want to decide before you really start looking at servers :)

i would check out rackspace for a dedicated server.... http://www.rackspace.net

Having separate DNS servers on separate machines (even on separate networks) is only useful if you can still run the site if one of the machines goes down.

For example. If you have a web server that your customers' sites are on, and it is dns1, and you have another machine dns2, if dns1 goes down, dns2 will still be able to answer queries but it will be useless since the site is down anyway.

It is only useful if you keep offsite backup, and you have the know-how and ability to easily point the site to a different IP address where you can activate the website.

Originally posted by sloop
Having separate DNS servers on separate machines (even on separate networks) is only useful if you can still run the site if one of the machines goes down.

For example. If you have a web server that your customers' sites are on, and it is dns1, and you have another machine dns2, if dns1 goes down, dns2 will still be able to answer queries but it will be useless since the site is down anyway.

It is only useful if you keep offsite backup, and you have the know-how and ability to easily point the site to a different IP address where you can activate the website.
:agree: Agree.
It's only useful if you have more than one server

I would recommand verisigndns.com if you guys want to control your own DNS.

No worries about software and DNS server downtime.

Originally posted by Jeremy W.
I would say it's mandatory for hosts to have a control panel. Not all do, but all should. The ones who don't generally don't (with some exceptions) grow very large at all.

Huh?

What? You think all hosts have CP's? Or was my english just atrocious? *L*

Having separate DNS servers on separate machines (even on separate networks) is only useful if you can still run the site if one of the machines goes down.

No, that's not correct. If you have both your DNS servers running on the one server and the server goes down:

1. Any email sent to you will fail because the MX record lookup will fail - if you have separate DNS servers the lookup will succeed and, generally, mail sent to you will be queued and resent when your mail server comes back.

2. Anyone browsing your site will will get the equivalent of "this domain does not exist" rather than a timeout which leads people to believe that your site is gone for good rather than momentarily unavailable.

3. I believe that some ccTLD's require them to be on different physical servers for you to have the name servers listed

If none of these are an issue for you, then go ahead.