What is a server?

Definition: A server is primarily a program that runs on a machine, providing a particular and specific service to other machines connected to the machine on which it is found. Nowadays, server functionality has become so rich, complex and varied in nature that there are whole very powerful computers dedicated to being exclusively servers. This has led many non-technical people to denote servers as being machines that run services. Generally speaking, a server is a machine with a specific set of programs that offer different types of service, which other machines (then called clients) request to do certain tasks. For example, a file server is a machine which keeps files, and allows clients to upload and download them from it. A web server is a machine that hosts web sites and allows Internet users (clients) to access these web sites. The page you are reading now comes from the about.com web server. A mail server is a machine which, along with the storage and management of email messages, provides service to email users who can read, retrieve, and manage these emails messages.

A server can be a bunch of powerful computers grouped together in order to serve other computers on a network. They generally contain a lot of hard drives which provide a lot of processing power. They also tend to have the most powerful and up to date of processors which the everyday user rarely uses. You have these huge computer rooms which are cold and they contain huge servers which may serve all the computers in a building. Servers are very useful but obviously not for the everyday user unless you have some kind of basic network at home and then you might have one computer acting as a server for your other computers in the home. Andrew

Basically, it is a CPU which has more capacity than a normal computer. It serves a certain service, that's why its called a server. There are many types of server, depending to its purpose. A FTP server provides client with access to FTP sites, a web server may host a website and email services, a DHCP server gives IP addresses to clients or computers connected to it.

Servers are mostly used to store stuuf on, do we can see evrything. Games have servers, website have servers, there are even free servers!