How to Set Up Your First VPS Server

1 Choosing the Right VPS Plan

X-ZoneServers offers two types of VPS hosting, each designed for specific use cases:

2 Ordering Your VPS

Follow these steps to order your VPS:

1. 1

   Visit our VPS pages: Navigate to either Shared VPS or Streaming VPS

2. 2

   Select your plan: Choose the configuration that matches your requirements

3. 3

   Choose your operating system: We recommend Ubuntu 22.04 LTS for beginners

4. 4

   Select location: Choose a datacenter closest to your users for best performance

5. 5

   Complete checkout: Create your account and complete the payment

3 Receiving Your Credentials

After your order is processed (typically within 1 hour), you'll receive an email containing:

4 Connecting via SSH

SSH (Secure Shell) is the primary way to manage your Linux VPS. Here's how to connect:

On Linux/macOS:

ssh root@your_server_ip

On Windows:

Use one of these SSH clients:

• PuTTY - Popular free SSH client for Windows
• Windows Terminal - Built-in SSH support in Windows 10/11
• MobaXterm - Advanced terminal with X11 forwarding

First Login Process:

1. 1. Run the SSH command with your server's IP address
2. 2. Accept the server's fingerprint when prompted (type "yes")
3. 3. Enter your root password from the welcome email
4. 4. You should now see your server's command prompt!

5 Initial Server Configuration

After logging in, perform these essential first steps:

1. Update System Packages

apt update && apt upgrade -y

2. Change Root Password

passwd

Enter a strong password when prompted. Use a mix of letters, numbers, and symbols.

3. Create a New User Account

It's best practice to use a non-root user for daily operations:

# Create new user (replace 'username' with your chosen name)
adduser username

# Add user to sudo group for admin privileges
usermod -aG sudo username

4. Set Your Timezone

# List available timezones
timedatectl list-timezones

# Set timezone (example: Europe/London)
timedatectl set-timezone Europe/London

5. Configure Hostname

# Set a memorable hostname
hostnamectl set-hostname myserver

# Update /etc/hosts file
nano /etc/hosts

Add this line: 127.0.1.1 myserver

6 Basic Security Setup

Secure your server with these essential steps:

1. Configure Firewall (UFW)

# Install UFW
apt install ufw -y

# Allow SSH (IMPORTANT: Do this before enabling!)
ufw allow ssh
ufw allow 22/tcp

# Allow HTTP and HTTPS if running a web server
ufw allow 80/tcp
ufw allow 443/tcp

# Enable firewall
ufw enable

# Check status
ufw status

2. Disable Root SSH Login

After creating a regular user, disable root login:

# Edit SSH config
nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config

# Find and change these lines:
# PermitRootLogin yes → PermitRootLogin no
# PasswordAuthentication yes (keep this for now)

# Restart SSH service
systemctl restart sshd

3. Install Fail2ban

Protect against brute-force attacks:

# Install fail2ban
apt install fail2ban -y

# Start and enable service
systemctl start fail2ban
systemctl enable fail2ban

# Check status
fail2ban-client status

7 Installing Essential Software

Install commonly needed packages:

# Essential utilities
apt install -y \
  curl \
  wget \
  git \
  vim \
  htop \
  net-tools \
  unzip \
  software-properties-common

# Check installed versions
curl --version
git --version

Next Steps

Now that your VPS is configured, here's what you can do next: