Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Hello,

Does anyone know if a good web host? I am looking for one that is

• Honest - will acknowledge there is a problem when there is a problem.
• Fair - will refund me or at least try to compensate for downtime.
• Reliable - will not have any noticeable downtime. I don`t know if this is possible but it`s good to aim high right? :-)
• Excellent support - stuff like "Live Help" would be a plus.
• Offers good value i.e. the cost:benefit ratio should be acceptable.

I have been through many, many hosts and I am really fed up of looking. They all seem to have the same cycle: Start off good > get lots of customers > get bad > lose customers > get good again or go out of business or switch business.

It seems that many of the hosting companies are run by technicians and not businesspeople. So basic things like apologising for stuff that went wrong, fixing the problem fast and offering compensation are never part of their modus operandi.

All of the hosts I`ve been through have had the "top ratings" and "awards" so that doesn`t mean anything to me at all. Please I`d appreciate some honest answers.

Whoever, you recommend, please tell me how long you`ve been with them as well.

Thanks,
Aleem

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Get Your Name in ".com" at the International Internet Authority

I believe every web host you use will have some problem from
time to time. They may also have a sense of arrogance to them.
I am not involved with web hosting but I speculate that
technology being employed is new and often times cutting
edge. The Internet is not like the industry auto mechanics. The
auto industry may have new and unproven technology but we
(the consumer) never see it. On the other hand we (the
consumer) want, use, and demand better and better technology
to run our daily lives.

There are so many companies offering host services. There are
so many of which have made mistakes in the past, or will in the
future. That`s why you are having trouble with stability. The
Internet industry is really quite new in consumer hands.

With that said, I personally use two companies. One used to be
smaller but was bought by a larger company. I haven`t noticed
any differences. Since comments like “top ratings” (with
evidence) are not important to you, I am not sure why “how long
I have been with them” is important.

Regardless of all that, I have been using Mountain Media
(mountainmedia.com) for my online store for 2 years. I have
never noticed an interruption in my service. My secondary
server is operated by Omega Communications. I have been
with them for around 7 years, starting with the company they
bought. Omega has been in charge for about 4 years. I have
never noticed an interruption but they did notify me of
scheduled maintenance down times. It`s like a two hour window
every 6 months or longer.

Hope that helps.


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Vincent Wilcox (a.k.a. KRAKR)
Drummer
My band: Letters Make Words

Where you looking for windows or linux hosting?

I know exactly what you mean.

I don`t even bother shopping around for a hosting service anymore. I just go straight to Hostway. I`ve had something on their servers for the last eight years, and have never traced a problem to their service.
Their main location is in Chicago. No earthquakes, no Hurricanes!
The prices are not the cheapest, but they are very clear on what is delivered, with little fine print.

Aleem,

I`ve had websites at Earthlink (formerly Mindspring) since 1994 - still do. No problems whatsoever - highly recommend. They have always been responsive with customer service and problem resolution - what few problems I have had over the past 12 years and probably a dozen sites or more.

In the past few years, I have used GoDaddy.com for most new sites. They have been terrific, too.

I would recommend these two companies to anyone. Probably many good ones out there but I stick with what works ... and I hate hassels. Less hassels, happy Richard.

R@ 

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Richard Arnold · Key Concept Writers · Business Communication: The "Key" To Success· Law of Attraction Blog · Life Ain`t Brain Surgery Blog

Hi Aleem,

 

I hear you and I a feel for you, I have been in this business for over 10 years and have dealt with many web hosts. There is not one of them that can live up to what you asking for.

Like Vincent mentioned there is down time and that’s for good reasons especially if its planned for upgrades and improvement. Some things that I am always making sure is that there is someone I can take to 24/7. It almost sounds to me like you have been dealing with Reseller hosting so far. But there are many good hosting companies out there and I am not sure what your hosting needs are. But I can gif you some advise about what to look out for to meet you standards.

You may want to stay away from a reseller of hosting to insure you are dealing with the people in charge of the servers and service. That does not mean resellers are bad but you cut the middle man out when it come to service most the time. Other good key indicators are if they promote their own datacenter, 24 x 7 live support promises more than 99% up time and if they are listing their equipments and facilities. That means they are not afraid to show and let the experts know what they have. Last they should be able to do dedicated bandwidth so you not sharing it with to many web servers.

 That all comes with a price tag and specialty if you go all the way with a dedicated server which will give you everything you are asking for. Then you will have to have some one that can manage the server if you go dedicated. Here are some bigger companies:

http://www.aplus.net

http://www.apollohosting.com

you can filter out more at directory listings for hosting business like http://findmyhost.com/ or other directories specially if they can filter by Guaranteed Hosts Only.

But after all, your local hosting company may be able to meet all that as well and they often go an extra mile for your business which I can’t say from the big guys.

 

Best regards,

I have been using www.GlowHost.com for a couple of years now and they have been great. I rarely have downtime. I think in 3 years it`s happened twice, and I think one time was because I had an old email as my contact and didn`t get my invoice.
The prices are excellent and they fix things or answer questions pretty quickly.  They also offer a ton of things in the CPanel, like web stats, bulletin boards, scripts, etc.
I`ve been very happy and have never even thought of leaving. I currently host 2 sites there - DippyChick.com and NHCeliac.com. I used to host my real estate sites there too.
Good luck!

I have been using Bluehost.com for about a year now (after having a problematic host for 3 years).  I have found them to be very responsive and I have yet to have any downtime.

~Kim

 

Hey everyone, I just thought I would chime in since a part of our business is web hosting. I saw the quote by yourNameinDotCom, “Start off good > get lots of customers > get bad > lose customers > get good again or go out of business or switch business.”  I thought this was humorous because I have noticed the same trend.  Before I started offering web hosting I used to use a bunch of different web hosts and I saw this happen a few times.  A lot of the discount hosts I worked with would pile 1500 to 2000 web sites on one server so they could afford to offer their hosting for $2.00/month. The monthly price was great but once the server got crammed we continually had problems because the server simply couldn’t handle the load.

We currently manage 4 web servers.  2 Unix based machines and unfortunately 2 Windows based machines.  All of the servers are fairly stable, however, a server is just a computer and occasionally will need to be rebooted or in the case of windows it may freeze up.   I have found the Unix based machines to be more stable often-running months at a time without a full reboot.  We do our best to stay up and online at all times however a few minutes here and there is inevitable.  I think our longest downtime in the past year was 1 server was down for about a half hour because I got in and  screwed some stuff up and had trouble fixing it.  

Basically the moral of my story is that you get what you pay for and hosting is no exception. For $2.00/month a host will not be able to offer good personable human support and a quality service. That being said I have had positive experience with a few national discount hosts such as www.ipowerweb.com, www.valueweb.com, and www.seanic.net.  I have also heard positive things about www.hostway.com. Although both good web hots for uptime I have heard negative things about www.godaddy.com and www.earthlink.com both related to limits on programming and database functionality.  I also had a terrible experience with www.onehost.ws (Start off good > get lots of customers > get bad > quit using ) Good luck! Let us know how you choose and how they work out. 

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Ryan Stemkoski
Zipline Communicatioins
www.gozipline.com

www.webmasters.com
That is all I have to say!