Setting up custom hostnames.

If your like me at one point or another your going to start wondering how to create professional looking Minecraft IP connection address, for example "Play.BobCraft.Com". The process you need to go through is called "setting up custom host names" but don't worry thats just a fancy title for whats a fairly simple process.
To kick things off you will need to buy a domain, a domain is just the website address for example "nitrous-networks.com", unfortunately these aren't free and can vary in price but don't worry you only have to pay for your domain once a year. In this guide I will take you through every step from buying the domain and setting up the host names I will buy my domain (website address) from GoDaddy.

If you buy your domain from GoDaddy you can get 35% off your order with the promo code - "WOWNN2014".

The first step and often the hardest part is deciding on a name for your server, once you buy the domain you are unable to change it, your stuck with that name unless you buy a new one.



Blocky-Craft is the name I have chosen to go with in this example, if the domain is avalible meaning none else owns it you will be able to add it to your cart and proceed to checkout, if its not avalible it means someone else owns it and you will have to come up with another name or a different way of spelling it. Once you have paid for your domain remembering to use our promo code, you should end up with a confirmation screen as seen below -




Now you have your domain GoDaddy will need to set this up for you depending on how busy they are it could take up to 24 hours, in this instance mine only took an hour. You can check your account page to see if your domain has been setup once it has it should look a lot like this but of course with the name you have chosen -



Once your domain is visible click the big green launch button to get started setting up the host name, you should see a section labeled "Host names" -


Click Manage then add host name, you will next be asked to fill out a form, the hostname is what will appear before your domain e.g. "play.website.com", "mc.website.com" are both very common. You are then asked to enter an IP address this is the IP of your minecraft server do not add the port the part after the " : ". for example your minecraft IP might be 192.168.0.1 just enter that. Hit add then save and your done!


You have successfully setup custom host names for your minecraft server, you can now play using your new address in my case "Play.Blocky-Craft.com".

br>NOTE :: It can take 24 - 48 hours for the host names to be setup so don't panic when you finish this process and try to connect to the server using the new address for 99.9% of you it won't work right away.