Web Hosting Advice

E

EmceeZiploc

New member
Hi all, I'm getting ready to launch a website for the first time and need some serious help in deciding on a web host.

The purpose of this website is to market my skills and have a place for people to view my work. In addition to those basics I would like a web site that allows me the storage space so that I can post works in progress for clients to view and download if they desire. I've read in other forums that a lot of hosts advertising "unlimited disk space" are too good to be true and that you can't use this space for storage. Is this true?

I've been trying to do independent research but my head is swimming with the number of available options as I'm brand new to the world of web development. Right now I'm leaning towards Bluehost. Thoughts?

Any advice in finding a web host to suit my needs and/or recommendations from satisfied users would be much appreciated.

Thank you!
 
There's no such thing as "unlimited bandwidth" or "unlimited space". In fact, I know somebody who was on Bluehost and got mentioned on Digg and got a ton of traffic and Bluehost shut down his site because he was using too much of his "unlimited" bandwidth.

That said, what most of these providers mean is that they don't really measure bandwidth and for 95% of clients, they'll have enough bandwidth for your needs.

The only other issue is that all of the lower cost hosts are sticking your site on a server with anywhere from 200 to 2000 other websites. The better ones manage it well and so your site always resolves decently, but a lot of times, you'll run into s-l-o-w loading and intermittent difficulties if other sites on the server suddenly get hit hard.

I actually own part of a small 'boutique' web hosting company and we host several indy and student filmmakers. If you haven't found something you like and would be interested in talking, PM me and we can discuss further.
 
Yeah calchip is absolutely right.

I have my own dedicated server -- nobody else is hosting with me, but my own sites. I prefer it that way. I pay about $90 a month I guess, and for me that's worth it as I host a lot of Websites, some hobby sites, my business site, a few friends' sites, a business site, etc. I can monitor the server carefully and have complete control over its operation, so that's what I like.
 
I use www.hostgator.com for hosting all of my websites. I register my domains elsewhere and point them to their servers. So far I am very pleased with the mid-level services and live online support. I've never maxed out the unlimited option so all I can say is that I have it but never utilized it.

I have a friend that loves www.dreamhost.com. I have never used this company.

Which ever company you decide on make sure they are well established and have excellent support. Any kid with internet and PayPal can operator a web hosting company. If you think that film makers are a dime a dozen, they don't hold a candle to the amount of fly-by-night hosting companies on the web. They are as plentiful as guitar players and script writers. It's not worth the few nickels saved for the amount of aggravation.
 
PIXELSEED said:
I use www.hostgator.com for hosting all of my websites. I register my domains elsewhere and point them to their servers. So far I am very pleased with the mid-level services and live online support. I've never maxed out the unlimited option so all I can say is that I have it but never utilized it.

I have a friend that loves www.dreamhost.com. I have never used this company.

Which ever company you decide on make sure they are well established and have excellent support. Any kid with internet and PayPal can operator a web hosting company. If you think that film makers are a dime a dozen, they don't hold a candle to the amount of fly-by-night hosting companies on the web. They are as plentiful as guitar players and script writers. It's not worth the few nickels saved for the amount of aggravation.
Click to expand...

Yes listen to him!

For instance, I can easily offer anyone hosting. My server allows me to setup reseller accounts and I can host your site, basically giving you a set amount of space, bandwidth, controlled access, etc. So a lot of people will pay for a dedicated server if they are in some form of Web business, or want to be, and then offer hosting and basically piece-meal their server. I thought of doing this as well at one point, because I had a lot of contacts in the humor Website business, and I actually made a killing one time -- you'd call it exploitation but I call it revenge (LOL) -- on another Webmaster from hosting. Basically he lied to me, he told me that he wanted to host his tiny little humor site on my server for a few months until he turned 18, because his dad wouldn't co-sign on anything for him, and he couldn't get any place to signup without being 18. He was a few months away. He said his site was tiny, it would use maybe 10 gigs of my bandwidth a month. I had 1,000 gigs of transfer monthly. Well imagine my surprise when I logged in after about 21 days of the month (I rarely checked, because I was running around 200 gigs a month, nowhere close) and saw that we had went through like 700 gigs of transfer that month! So I confronted him about it, and found out through a few other sources he was making absolute bank, we're talking like $5,000 to $7,000 profit per month, easy, because my site was making $2,000 to $3,000 profit per month and was much smaller, evidently. So I told him that if he wants me to host for another month it's going to cost him $1,000. He complained, and said it was unfair, and that I was being unreasonable. I told him he lied to me, he was going to cause me to go over my bandwidth quota and cost me extra money, and I also said look buddy you're 17, you are making a crapload of money off this site, and until you are 18, I'm your PARTNER here, because I'm the reason you have a Website online. No hosting, no Website. And I can tell that you are making enough money that the hassle of finding somewhere else to switch to, and switching over, which would take a week at least, would cost you more money than I'm asking. This argument went on for a while, until I had it with him, and said, "Ok, I'm having my friend pull the plug on the site, sorry I gave you a chance." He begged and pleaded and finally said ok, I will pay you, just please don't take the site down. I said ok fine, where's the money, and I got it via PayPal, $1,000, and left his site up for the next 5-6 weeks until he found alternative hosting. That paid my server fees for the entire year. HAHA, it was great, and I don't feel bad about it at all. He made a healthy profit that month, and it was only fair I shared in it. That should teach him not to take unfair advantage of someone's generosity, and tell me that he was running a non-profit site, my butt!

The point is support is extremely important. If you hosted with me, well for one I don't offer that except to clients I do video work for or have a maintenance contract with (fulfilled by third parties, like my friend and programmer Erik), then you'd have constant monitoring because Erik monitors the server at all times and we make sure everything is up to date and online. But that's because we have a big client on the server, we host their media (the videos I shot for them), and we are paid monthly for maintenance. A lot of other smaller hosts don't have the type of support needed to handle matters quickly. That's one reason I decided against a hosting company, which I had for a while started to launch (I had 4 clients, mostly friends in the humor community, and was making a bit of money per month) -- too much work. My dedicated server, however, has 24/7 support via phone and online, and is one of the largest hosts in the world. It used to be Rackshack, which was huge, and they were purchased by EV1.NET, which has since been purchased by an investment group that also purchased a controlling interest in The Planet, and yet when it was Rackshack it was still one of the largest hosts in the world. Now, The Planet and EV1.net's operations have been combined, both Texas-based hosts, and they a behemoth.

I don't know about the million little tiny hosting companies everyone mentions. I just stick with what I know, and that's a company with 99.99% uptime since I've been online doing business in about 2001.
 
I used a few hosts, then switched to godaddy... I have had nothing but great reliability, plenty of space and bandwith, GREAT SUPPORT, cost effective and everything is self-manageable.
 
Godaddy is fine as long as you do not register your domain AND host at the same place. I do not recommend doing that.
 
I had GoDaddy for all of 3 days, but I can't remember what the issue was, likely a bait and switch on space/price. I was also using StartLogic. For about a year, they were at least average, but no worse than my free host DotEasy. What blew it with StartLogic was at the end of the first year, it was coming up on renwal time. My site wasn't getting enough interaction to pay $25 for another year of Domain Registration and $90 or so for another year of hosting. I got the emails that they were going to expire, and I was fine with that. StartLogic decided they were going to take my card number on file and renew it themselves... which came at a really bad time, causing other more important stuff to bounce.

DotEasy is really good, it's free with no banners or ads, but they only give me 100mb storage.
 
PIXELSEED said:
Godaddy is fine as long as you do not register your domain AND host at the same place. I do not recommend doing that.
Click to expand...

I don't see why not, I can easily register and point domains where i want in the hosting. Its very fast... always up... cheap...

I think I'm at 70+ domains, 20+ with websites, couple hosting accounts...

Most places you have to pay for extra SQL accounts and Domain Pointers... this would have increased my costs significantly.
 
The reason is, GoDaddy is one of those places that will take the name you are interested in registering, register it themselves, then charge you way more for the Domain. There have been several places that have been doing this.
 
MadHMC150 said:
I don't see why not, I can easily register and point domains where i want in the hosting.
Click to expand...

I find it best to keep the registrar and the hosting companies separate. If the hosting company's quality and customer service produces less than positive results, you can easily switch to a new hosting company without your domains ever being held hostage. This has happened to me in the past. I think Godaddy is great for registering domains names and I easily point the names to another hosting company at no fee. A domain name is very important to a business so I practice not having all of my eggs in one basket. Your mileage may vary.
 
PIXELSEED said:
I find it best to keep the registrar and the hosting companies separate. If the hosting company's quality and customer service produces less than positive results, you can easily switch to a new hosting company without your domains ever being held hostage. This has happened to me in the past. I think Godaddy is great for registering domains names and I easily point the names to another hosting company at no fee. A domain name is very important to a business so I practice not having all of my eggs in one basket. Your mileage may vary.
Click to expand...

Your domain was held 'hostage'... We have terrorist web servers now?! Like I said, godaddy will 'support' any issues you have correcting the problems... No need to take helpless .coms hostage. Also that just seems like a bunch more work and logins I would have to remember.
 
MadHMC150 said:
Your domain was held 'hostage'... We have terrorist web servers now?! Like I said, godaddy will 'support' any issues you have correcting the problems... No need to take helpless .coms hostage. Also that just seems like a bunch more work and logins I would have to remember.
Click to expand...

Terrorist? Sure whatever. More like dishonest business people from a site that deem reputable at the time. No need to take cheap shots because I believe in precaution in this area of running my business. http://www.webhostingtalk.com/ is a great place to learn more about hosting company practices, including Godaddy.
 
I personally would never have GoDaddy host, I don't trust them at all for hosting. It's just a cheap solution to hosting and I don't think it's a quality one. I register my domains through there, I love them for that, but otherwise it's the cheapest place on the market, that rarely makes anything the best. I'll stick with something I control and I agree with Pixelseed.
 
Godaddy is known for one thing and that's domains. I wouldn't host with them or 1and1. And make sure you use promo codes, I would never want to pay full price for that stuff.
 
I was a huge proponent of hostmonster (is also bluehost), loved the performance, loved the price, everything was great ... until this weekend.

They shut off my account because not all the files I have on there are directly related to an html page hosted there. I use it to host a mirror for our fests here, and a lot of my photographs, plus other files that get linked to externally to the site ... they consider that using it as storage, which apparently is not allowed. So they shut me down.

Now I have to find a new host, move my 4 domains and all my files. And in the meantime the website is inaccessible (except the control panel so I can get my files) and my e-mail is not working which means my brother-in-law's business (also hosted there) is losing business because he can't get his e-mail.

Man this is lame ... so I have to find a new host ... any suggestions (other than hostmonster or godaddy or 1and1?) I had 1and1 prior to hostmonster and it's performance was not the greatest, hostmonster's was fantastic, will hate to have to move.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top