Take the 2-minute tour ×  An image server for static images and
possibly other static files (css, js, etc). Are they only used
for large/popular websites? Secondly, are they only really
beneficial when the images undergo some sort of processing (e.g.
resizing)? I'm not a server guy, so this is unfamiliar territory
for me. I'm working with IIS. Are there major differences if
it's done on a subdomain (images.mywebsite.com) on the same
server or on another separate machine.  share|improve this
question  3 Answers 3  up vote 2 down vote accepted  Using an
image server allows you to serve the images from shorter
requests. All the domain specific cookies get dropped. It also
makes it easier to set caching policies. If the static content
is on a separate server, you can set a caching policy for it
without caching your dynamic content.  Securing the static
content is simpler as well. The server can be restricted to
answering only GET requests. Referrer restrictions can be added
as well, although they are easy to bypa