Time for a (Webhost) Change
Most of you have probably read about the troubles I’ve had in the past with web hosting. So, I’ve decided that it is time for a change. This is in no way a slam on my present web host, Dreamhost, but I just think that they are having trouble with my website, largely because it seems to be a bit more atypical than most other sites.
So, the hunt begins and I am turning you, my trusty DCoT readers, for your advice as to whom I should use for a web host. Here are the criteria that I will be needing for the host:
Software:
- PHP 5
- MySQL 5.0.24a or greater
- Wordpress 2.2
- MediaWiki 1.10.0
- activeCollab 0.7.1
- phpMyAdmin (any recent version)
Traffic/Bandwidth:
- About 50 GB / month
- Daily hits about 10,000
Disk Usage:
- Website: 2 GB (includes e-mail)
- MySQL: 250 MB
- Increasing monthly by 5%
E-Mail:
- 200 mailboxes
- Autoresponders
- Mail forwards
Miscellaneous:
- Easy to transfer site a bonus
- Support should be available by e-mail and phone
- Reasonably priced
- Host should be in North America
- A web host who is willing to sponsor DCoT would be awesome (but I’m not holding my breath, I’m just putting it out there)
- Web based control panel
- SSH account
- FTP access
- Reasonably priced (I am, after all, essentially an online beggar)
I would love to hear from anyone who has had a really good experience with a web host and who can point me in the right direction. Let the web host spam begin!
P.S. I made the graphic using a cool online graphic generator!
If you found this post useful, why don't you buy me a cup of coffee to show your gratitude?
25 Responses to “Time for a (Webhost) Change”
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iladelf Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 12:39 pmAin’t no doubt; your site can be VERRRYY slow to load, so I could see why you’d wanna switch. Unfortunately, I think that’s the way having a webpage goes; your host is great for a year or two, then because everyone’s switched over to them, they get too big, and can’t handle your site (esp. bandwidth!) any more. Ergo, you begin looking again.
I switch from olm.net (good once, but now, blech!) to lunarpages. I’ve been pretty satisfied overall; customer service is pretty responsive, and is in the States last I checked.
An interesting choice would be nearlyfreespeech.net, but they can’t (currently) handle your requirements. But, it’s a “pay as you go” host, which I like.
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michael sherlock Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 3:07 pmI suggest A Small Orange. I currently use them and they are great. For your requirements, you could either get a VPS plan or you could get a shared hosting account. For your site though I would probably recommended a VPS.
Sorry however as the links I gave you are my referrer links. You could remove the last /?refer=http://mwyn.org but it would really help me if when you purchase from them, you use my links.
-Michael Sherlock -
Light & Dark Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 3:07 pmWith the proliferation of web hosting availability and the resulting competition, you won’t likely have much problem meeting your listed specs. Of vastly greater importance to you though should be the actual processing resources available. Many hosts are now throttling application processes through ‘reapers’ which kill processes if they last too long. This can be the kiss of death for large blogs.
Make sure you take this into account in your shopping, as many hosts barely mention it, if at all. I’ve found you usually have to inspect the fine print in the Terms of Service to really get a handle on what you’ll be allowed to do. Personally, I found reseller accounts tended to have higher processing resources available - even if you don’t intend to resell, that can worth the few extra dollars premium.
What amount can you justify budgeting for hosting per month? And how critical is uptime to you compared to cost?
Paul
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The Geek Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 3:12 pmI’m running on a dedicated virtual from MediaTemple and could not be more happy…
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Jake Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 3:23 pm1&1 has been great in my experience and meets most of what you need. Unfortunately one thing I do notice that you won’t have is SSH access… I’ve always wanted that from them. Otherwise I have had great luck with 1&1.
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Adam Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 4:11 pmI’ve been with ipower for several years and have two sites with them. The uptime has been great, good customer service, lots of space, etc. Then again I have very low traffic sites so I don’t know how they respond to larger bandwidth sites.
If you wanted to use my referrer link it’s at http://www.adamsnetworking.com/
Adam
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Zac Garrett Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 4:52 pmI have been in the web hosting arena for a long time now and finding a very good host is a pain. If you are looking for a good shared hosted I would suggest looking at GeekStroage (affiliate link). The two guys running it, Jay and Matt used to have a web hosting company that they sold off to go to college. Now they are back with all of their glory.
If you are looking for a very stable and reliable VPS host I suggest going with ServInt. I have used their VPS hosting for 2 years now and it is by far the best VPS host I have ever used.
I would stay far away from ipowerweb/startlogic. They are really the same company (same owner) and are ran very poorly. I worked sales for startlogic when it was first starting and quit after a month. I was told to lie to customers, personally I can not do that.
If you need help with anything I would be more than happy to help out.
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Alfered Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 5:02 pmHave you heard of www.hostingfest.com Though their primary business is windows hosting i am with them on the windows shared plan and they are good at what they do. They also offer linux which is your requirement.
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Curtis Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 5:20 pmI do most of my own hosting however a good web developer friend of mine suggests http://www.contrasthost.com. You can view his page at http://www.dulceinc.com to verify speed and delivery. Hope all works out for you.
Curtis
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Phil Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 6:08 pmAnother vote for lunarpages. I settled on them several years ago after trying about 6 other hosts. I now have 6 sites hosted with them. Good services, responsive help desk, and competitive prices.
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Rob Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 6:46 pmI agree with Jake, 1&1 has been great for me. I have used them for 5 years without issue. Even changed plans once and backed up all the sites. ordered the change of plan and they moved everything for me. Can’t beat that!
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Kurt Nelson Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 8:27 pmI use Zernebok hosting. It is a smaller company, but he could definitely meet your needs. (Runs cPanel, and DOES offer SSH) One thing is he is not based in the US, but in England. That does not effect the quality of service as you can always IM him if you need anything done.
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deryl Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 9:13 pmdear, tim
lets be frank i use netfirms now everyone says that netfirms is not the besat out there well they are wrong very wrong!
they have been great i could not be more happier with them then anyone esle but they have everything you want and need plus more that you may want to use so keep them in mind and if you get to there site at the right time they have real good deals on websites!!!!
your tech friend,
deryl
crowebar93@dtccom.net
deryl@derylsplace.com -
Andrés M. Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 9:24 pmHi,
I’d recommend Bluehost. The fact that mentions “Light & Dark” is true. Most web hostings restrict scripts to a % CPU time, but mostly for shared hostings… you must look carefully the TOS.
I DO NOT recommend 1&1. Is NOT a serious company, I have now an issue with them (bought a plan with them, no e-mail contact at all, but of course the charge to my credit card was done).
Good luck!
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Ronnie Says:
May 31st, 2007 at 9:42 pmHi Tim, we are here for you!
We would be glad to sponsor your site, and can offer all the features you require (PHP5, MySQL, Host in USA, plenty of disk space & bandwidth, FTP, SSH, etc.), in addition to moving your site over FOR YOU so you don’t even have to lift a finger. Please contact me via:
http://www.AlwaysWebHosting.com/
and we’d be glad to get the ball rolling on this!
(Remember us, we helped donate to the USB Drive Menu system
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adam dj Says:
June 1st, 2007 at 1:41 amI am going to toss my hat in for an ipower VPS, or with the 1and1 business package. I have been using ipower VPS to host a site with double your specs for several years and have had excellent support and have only had 2 outages and those were for less than 2 hours and were separated by 2 years. I have a site with 1and1 presently on the business package with specs less than yours for a non-profit and it is truly wonderful and works well though there are quite a few accounts hosted on that box. I have also had excellent sucess with an art studio that was hosted on nearlyfreespeech.net and found it to be roubust enough for their traffic, blog and forum. I cannot attest to it at any higher level’s than that though
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Christoph Says:
June 1st, 2007 at 8:21 amI’ll throw in a couple more companies.
HostMySite is very reliable for uptime and they host a number of large corporate sites (I interviewed with them).
Host Monster provides all the bell and whistles (including SSH access) in addition to 300 GB of space and 3,000 GB / month of transfer.
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K-IntheHouse Says:
June 1st, 2007 at 8:50 amI second or third A Small Orange plan. That’s what I use and I haven’t had to make a single support call yet or visit their forums for a fix!! **knock on wood**
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Eric Says:
June 1st, 2007 at 9:13 amThere are many hosting sites available. I do fine with IPower for my family’s business, but plenty of people hate them. I’ve searched for a good listing and review site and have found many sites. See my del.icio.us tag for hosting. None of them are very detailed. If anyone knows of a good review site, I would like to hear about it.
If you are new to web hosting, you may want to look at InsideWH - A Web Hosting Insider. This blog is new, but he is building good content.
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adam Says:
June 1st, 2007 at 10:24 amMediaTemple no doubt, if your serious about your website there is no other choice.
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jeremiah Says:
June 1st, 2007 at 10:25 aminexpensive, has everything you want, and great reviews.
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Jay Says:
June 1st, 2007 at 6:15 pmIf you’d like, you can contact me and we’ll discuss your needs. We are always looking for a few good websites to support.
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Kat Says:
June 1st, 2007 at 8:32 pmAnother vote for Bluehost.
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Mark Says:
June 25th, 2007 at 9:36 pmAlthough we’ve been with MediaTemple for years, their GridServer is still flaky…and our clients have noticed!
FTP and MySQL troubles continue to plague us, even though it’s been about nine months since they rolled this plan out. Frankly, we’re fed up and migrating elsewhere.
Looking at a reseller plan with A2webhosting right now, which we’ve used for smaller sites in the recent months.
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Jami Says:
June 19th, 2008 at 5:39 pmI host a few servers with Server Intellect and have never had a any issues. With your site so large you should be running your own server, at some point a hosting account just doesn’t cut the mustard. You need more robust solutions and most hosting companies are all about a bottom line. Get your own server and you wont have to worry about the host coming to turn you off because your site is moving to much traffic or infringing on the server resources.
