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Web design & hosting: Web Hosting Reviews
- 8/26/08 10:04 PM
Web Hosting Reviews
by Sovereign - 8/26/08 10:04 PM
I find that every now and then users will leave positive or negative reviews on hosts they have tried. Let's attempt to organize this information in a way where it can be accessed easily by anyone as soon as they visit this forum.
I encourage anybody to reply here with a reasonable review, meaning not just "this host is great... sign up here" (because those will be instantly deleted), but rather the pros and cons about the host you are with. I think users will most likely want to know about the average uptime that you've experienced, customer service encounters, what price you are paying for what features like amount of disk space, bandwidth, etc. It would be a good idea to mention whether you are a business, individual, or organization, so other users can identify their web site needs with what you are describing. Perhaps also include whether your host makes frequent back-ups of your web site, if they offer 24/7 live support, and other items worth mentioning.
We appreciate any reviews you may have, but please keep it personalized and don't just list all the packages your host of choice has to offer, because (a) those will also be deleted and (b) that information can be found on their website already.
One last note: If you are writing about a host that isn't mentioned yet, reply to my post here, but if you find there already is a review, simply reply to his or her post. Why? It keeps things structured and all the information together.
Thank you and we'll see how this works 
!
~Sovereign
PS: There is a difference between a review and advertising. I encourage you not to use this opportunity to “advertise” the host or your web site. The idea is to direct users to hosts that may suit their needs and at the same time alert them about hosts that are less than satisfactory.
Aplus spam filtering no longer works
by rnfriends - 9/20/08 6:14 PM In reply to: Web Hosting Reviews by Sovereign
I have been a happy shared hosting customer of Aplus' for years, and I have referred numerous friends and clients to them for the same. Their spam filtering *used to be* fabulous. Now, though, it is broken, and they tell me it won't be fixed.
The problem: It is blocking good emails, even from reputable sources like the NY Times, AND there is no way to add desired email senders to a whitelist! This is an untenable situation, and I am now looking for a new Web host.
Profile motive
by lsuedulive - 12/4/08 3:36 PM In reply to: Aplus spam filtering no longer works by rnfriendsWe all operate on the profit motive. Many net companies now offer no spam filtering free. We have tested BellSouth ISP and they allow all spam in while sending a *PURCHASE* email each week telling us we need to buy their SPAM filtering software.
We use live.com and also gmail.com and never receive any spam nor so we receive any *PURCHASE* emails.
You get what you pay for!
by WebmasterWendy - 9/29/08 3:26 PM In reply to: Web Hosting Reviews by Sovereign
As a webmaster for a full service Internet company clients come to us with websites hosted at various hosting companies. While the majority are reasonably priced there is one major company that by far the cheapest I have seen. When it comes to hosting you get what you pay for. GoDaddy offering hosting fees as low as $4.95 a month with DNS look-up times and connection speeds 3x SLOWER than other hosting companies. Their customer service representatives are friendly and helpful to the best of their ability provided you survive the average 45 minute to an hour hold time. Just goes to show that cheapest is NOT always the best choice.
3 Minute Holdtime
by lsuedulive - 12/4/08 3:38 PM In reply to: You get what you pay for! by WebmasterWendyI called GD support everyday for the last week as a test.
The average wait time was 3 minutes. http://melvillehighschool.info
Run the DNS and you will see it is hosted on GD.
Maybe they like this New Orleans Cajun Gumbo?
What about Homestead? Or a better recommendation?
by antilafamily - 9/30/08 4:39 PM In reply to: Web Hosting Reviews by Sovereign
I'm completely clueless in regards to building a website, so Homestead sounds attractive to me. I like the ability to use their templates and graphics and you don't have to know html or anything technical. I've found others that also offer templates, but you cannot insert your own picture into the banner section, basically you can only modify the text. I have a specific design in mind, I just don't know how to build it myself. I looked up their user ratings though on cnet and they weren't very favorable, saying customer svc is nonexistent mainly.
Another question, I see different platforms like linux or windows. I use windows (vista), does this mean I can only use hosts that use windows? (most I've seen have been Linux and I don't have a clue about that)
Bottom line, I need a website host for dummies, only problem is I want to be able to customize to my own liking. Is there such an animal?
Thanks for any recommendations!
Christy
What I think
by Sovereign - 9/30/08 7:57 PM
In reply to: What about Homestead? Or a better recommendation? by antilafamily
The 'looks' of a web site can be accomplished with almost any provider, so I wouldn't base my decision on just that. Things that are important are uptime, price, customer service (live support for example), web space (if you need a lot), and backups.
Each host ought to have statistics on their uptime... which is how often the web site is up and running vs down. The average uptime is 99.9%. That's what a lot of them claim anyway.
The price is also important. It sounds like that you shouldn't be paying more than $4-$5 a month. You can probably even get a discounted rate if you buy a yearly package.
Customer service is another aspect. That's usually where I go online and start reading reviews that other customers leave for that business. If you ever should run into a problem or have a question, it needs to be easy for you to get a hold of them... whether it's via phone, email or live chat.
Web space is important if you plan on having a large web site with lots and lots of multimedia like videos, etc. Otherwise, most hosts giive you enough space to host a basic web site.
Backups are also quite important. Should any of the hosts computers/servers crash, you want them to be able to retrieve your web site from a frequent backup. It would be terrible if they lost it and everything you had was gone. Some hosts require YOU to make the backups, good hosts do it for you.
To answer your other question: The operating system you are running at home (like Windows XP or Vista, etc) is not related to what the host will be running. Most people get Linux hosting because it is generally cheaper and plenty efficient as it is.
Also, many hosts have built-in site builders that allow you to create your own web site. My host for example has 2 or 3 different builders. You can also usually install other system with a few clicks like Wordpress, Joomla, Typo 3, etc that allow you to build custom web sites with little to no HTML (one of the languages web sites are writting in) knowledge. Most of those system, called CMS, have hundreds of template freely available on the internet (as a quick search on for example 'Wordpress templates' reveals).
Another good tip is to look for a host with a money-back / no strings attached guarantee. That way if it doesn't turn out to be what you expected, you can simply cancel with no fees involved.
Last but not least, I don't know if you already have a domain or not, but I tend to recommend getting the domain seperately and not with the host of your choice. The reason for that being is if you need to switch hosts, you simply cancel and don't have to wait for them to release your domain - that could turn into a hassle. If you registered your domain with someone else, you just have to login, change one value and you're all setup for the new host.
Now, the biggest challenge of all: taking all that in consideration and finding a host that offers just that. Not many hosts are perfect in all of those categories mentioned above, so I would prioritize what you really want and what is just good to have, and then look for hosts that offer just that - and don't forget to read reviews or get recommendatios from people who are happy with what they have.
~Sovereign
Yahoo is a great start for newbies
by mepaula - 10/28/08 2:27 PM In reply to: What about Homestead? Or a better recommendation? by antilafamilyHi:
I started using yahoo small business in July of 2005. My quilt club had a so-called-professional doing the website, but he never updated it, returned phone calls and essentially fell off the face of the earth. I was able to get the information for our domain name and take over control. I had never done a website except for years ago with homestead (when it was free) & geocities. So after spending a month looking around for resonable web hosts. I settled on Yahoo, I have never had any problems with them. Whenever I needed help via phone I called and got right through... let me say though... that during 9 - 5 monday thru friday can have quite a wait time. I usually update the site after 11pm. The only issue I have really ever had that wasn't simple user & computer malfunction on my part (an yes they talked me through it), is the fact that I have VISTA and the Yahoo Sitebuilder doesn't work correctly with it. I haven't bothered trying to make it work since last spring. I have a desktop with Windows XP on it and simply use that.
I have my site monitored and I haven't experienced any down time or problems with email.
When I meet small business people who want a website but cannot afford a developer yadda yadda... I recommend Yahoo. It is very easy to create nice commercial websites with Yahoo and you don't have to have special software to create a website... Yahoo provides it. They have everything you need for merchant tools, and are very helpful.
The site builder is very easy to use, great templates to work from and add-ons for your business.
Good luck!
Questions to ask before choosing a Web Host
by mepaula - 10/28/08 2:53 PM In reply to: What about Homestead? Or a better recommendation? by antilafamilyI have been researching webhosting, and I have to disagree with Sovereign, that you should only be paying 4 to 5 dollars for a site.
1) First off... read the fine print and check if they host Adult sites... those puppies hog bandwidth, make sure you are not sharing a server with them.
2) Also, ask how many sites you will be sharing the server with. People aren't patient enough to spend more than 5 to 10 seconds for a page load.
3) Make sure there is a money back guarantee.
4) Never sign up for a long term contract in the beginning. $4.99 sounds great, but for 10 years? Paleeze! Do you really want to take the chance locking yourself into a contract you will have to buy your way out of? Again, money back guarantee.
5) Ask what country the data is stored in.
6) Back to Bandwidth, be wary of unlimited bandwidth offers, they usually come with escalating price scales some hosts offers don't include file types like .jpg & .gif files and other large media file types. Sure the storage space is unlimited, as long as it is only text. ASK Questions to ensure that you don't get slammed with bandwidth overrun fees.
7) Ask what type of Connection your host has if speed is a factor to you. If they Tell you they are using T-1/OC-3 line... they wont be very fast, they are connecting at the rate of 1.544 megabits per secont... a lot of smaller companies still use T1's to connect your side to the world. The largest and best hosts use multiple lines (OC3 at 155.52 Mbps) to give their clients the bandwidth they need for multiple sessions.
8) you want 24/7 telephone support, OC3 lines or the latest hardware in their data-center.
Tophosts
by lsuedulive - 12/4/08 3:42 PM In reply to: What about Homestead? Or a better recommendation? by antilafamilyChristi,
tophosts.com is your answer. From there test 1 hoster at a time. All have a 30 day money back. You cannot lose.
Test linus first. MS Expression Web 2 is a free DL and a free trial.
There are so many free trials you can test a new hoster every 29 days for 6 months for free then you will have the basic idea.
I WANT TO OPEN MY OWN WEBSITE WHAT IS THE REQUIREMENT
by duncann - 10/6/08 9:51 PM In reply to: Web Hosting Reviews by Sovereign
HI,
I AM LOOKING HOW TO LEARN HOW TO OPEN A WEBSITE BYMYSELF AND ALSO WHEN
OK... for starters
by Sovereign - 10/6/08 10:12 PM
In reply to: I WANT TO OPEN MY OWN WEBSITE WHAT IS THE REQUIREMENT by duncann
Please try not to use all caps when posting, because it makes messages harder to read and some may consider it 'yelling' ... and now to your question:
It's one thing to have a web site, but another to actually have something on it. If you just want a web site, a place users can go to see whatever you want them to see, that's very easy and can be done within 24 hours.
To own a web site, there are really only two requirements: money and patience.
Now, you don't need a lot of money, but if you want to be professional, a little bit is required. You need to purchase a domain for about $10 (like godaddy) and a place to host it ($3-$5 a month, or a yearly package). I can't really recommend a host to you because I don't know what your web site will be for. If you buy a domain at godaddy, I believe you can host a small web site for free. That should actually be sufficient for training purposes. Eventually, you can get a different host where you can install different systems to run the back-end of your web site. Usually the setup and everything is less than 24 hours and soon, when someone types in your domain, they will see a web site... with either nothing on it or a preinstalled template.
You can add text and images to your liking, and may even get a little into HTML/XHTML and CSS.
Sounds pretty easy, right? Well, this is where requirement #2 comes in... patience. You have to be willing to read tutorials, forums, guides and become comfortable with trial and error. Almost anything is possible with web site now-a-days, it just takes some skills to figure it out. I suggest if you are really serious about this, go to www.w3.org (the organization to set the standard for web design) to read about HTML, XHTML and CSS. They have many tutorials and samples to understand web site code. All you need for that is something like notepad or notepad++.
What it comes down to is this: do you want to get something out there quick and easy (using templates) or do you want to create whatever your heart desires (learning the codes and principles of web design). The choice is yours.
~Sovereign
i want to buy
by duncann - 10/9/08 10:39 AM In reply to: OK... for starters by Sovereign
i want to buy and also get my own website that will fit not high templet because am a starter for that matter.
i will want to meet professional in this besiness
Book
by lsuedulive - 12/4/08 3:51 PM In reply to: i want to buy by duncannHere are some ideas. Try these.
ebay
tophosts
MICROSOFT FRONTPAGE 2000
Expression Web 2
Microsoft FrontPage 2000: No Experience Required
Gene Weisskopf
ISBN: 978-0-7821-2482-8
Best Web Hosts
by DatR - 10/14/08 12:19 PM In reply to: Web Hosting Reviews by Sovereign
Here are 3 hosts I've personally used and my reviews:
Netfirms ( http://www.netfirms.com ) - great for basic hosting, meaning HTML static files and basic CMS applications. I had problems with Joomla timing out many times on Netfirms hosting. I thought maybe it was my implementation, but upon moving to another host it had no problems. I also had my colleague have problems with Netfirms and Wordpress. Every time they would use the upload feature for pictures the picture would upload but it would look like the upload got tainted and the picture would be all scrambled. Other than these two problems, netfirms was pretty good, just didn't do what I needed. Price I think was around $100 / year.
Hostmonster ( http://www.hostmonster.com ) - moved one of my Joomla based sites here and it worked really quickly. One of the fastest load times for Joomla that I experienced from the 3 hosts here. Even with many components, Joomla ran fine. I haven't run anything other than Joomla on here, and I don't use the control panel much, so no comments there. Uptime has been 100% as far as I could tell. I have never seen my site down.
Domains at Retail ( http://www.domainsatretail.com ) - I use the Deluxe package at this host ( Linux Deluxe Hosting for $9.99 / mth ). With this package I host more than 10 sites. You simply in their control panel pick the domain name, and map it to a subdirectory. And then the domain name loads up with everything in that directory like it was it's own hosting. Also, like hostmonster have had 100% uptime as far as I could tell.
Like was said above, each host has its pluses. Depends what you need it for and how much you want to pay, how much bandwith you are using, etc, etc.
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