Webby Hosting

[Pete@BMM]

Right chaps, what started out as a 10 min hunt round google for a good host is now 5 hours in and sat eve has gone!

I was all set to use 1and1 (good price and good features) when I googled and every review makes them sound pretty hellish. I am aware that ist hard to find good reviews somertimes as peeps are keener to speak up of a bad expereince rather than a good one, but I am utterly stuck now as to who to go with.

Any feedback of 1and1, Servage, Heart Internet or any others to fill me in on would be cool.

Dont need anything fancy really, my sql but thats about it but as always more would be nicer than less. No need for a dedicated server.

Thanks guys - driving me up the wall this bloody hosting thing.

I know Jimmy has had fun with his hosts (hostrocket etc) but couldnt work out if you had settled on something...

Pete

[glypo]

Well we used to use 1&1 on RcKingdom, was fine for a few years. Certainly not the cheapest for the site owner to pay, but the backend was easy enough and hosting was reliable. However when things go wrong expect the worlds worst customer service. I won't go into specifics of our problems there, but basically after weeks of downtime the site owner got annoyed and I migrated to Primehosting.

However I also setup Nitro Models on 1&1 and that's been okay. No problems as such, so we have not had to deal with customer services. This was a shared server setting which was hit and miss with speed. The database are not local on the server though, and I found they overload some of their database serves. After creating several databases, it automatically selects a random db server, and using trial and error, I found the fastest one and that seems okay.

At NeoBuggy, which due to the massive popularity of the website, we're current using 3 dedicated servers, at 1&1 also. These have been fine. Not the cheapest, but not the most expensive either. They deal with the massive load fine and all is good on that front, when Phil says Neo is largest 8th news site he really isn't kidding!

I know also Jimmy is 1&1 dedi as well now, and well I've personally noticed the site has been running smoothly recently. Hopefully he'll post his views on it.

Basically there are LOADS of hosts out there, I know as I manage sites on loads of different ones. All I can say is, I haven't found the perfect one yet. If anyone knows the perfect host, I would really love to know. 1&1 have awful, awful, awful customer service but apart from that the actual hosting service really is quite okay.

If you are looking for good shared hosting, I certainly would check out Prime (http://www.primehosting.co.uk) also. I setup DXR's site on Prime (http://www.dirtxracing.co.uk/home.php) and also migrated RcKingdon to it as well. I can't comment on their dedicated servers though, having never used one from there.

[Pete@BMM]

Thanks for that Jason -

I am stunned that Neo uses 3 dedi servers! I shudder to think of his bandwidth.

I was thinking along similar lines, in terms of 1and1 support, hopefully I wouldnt need it - but never say never.

will have a look at the primehosting sit.

Pete