Recommendations for webhosting sites? (1 Viewer)

[Ken Woodrow]

Do you guys/gals have any recommendations for webhosting services? I have domain names registered and just need a place to host less than 50 MBs of non-commercial personal content. I'm looking for something with reasonable fees, no pop-up adds, and the ability to handle MS Frontpage extensions.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,

Ken

 

[Darren Lewis]

There are lots of companies offering web hosting these days, some better than others. Prices and service vary wildly. I initially started out on Yahoo Geocites but quickly moved over to a paid host.
I signed up with a big company which offered a good deal. Big two-page glossy ad in all the magazines. The problem came when I needed some decent tech support. They weren't very good, and as my website expanded and I needed custom libraries installed and help with MySQL database restoration - forget it. I was just another one of their millions of customers.
I've just spent a few days hunting around the net and reading articles on web hosts. I was looking at UK companies, but there are plenty of people on here who will be able to recommend US companies.
I've just switched to a great company, who have bent over backwards to help me - even transferred the MySQL database over for me. They are a UK based company with a friendly personal service. Their servers are located in Florida (costs are cheaper). You can find them here.
Best thing is to browse all the web hosts sites and see which offers the best deal. Contact their sales team with questions and see what the response is like.
Things to bare in mind (based on an article in a local PC magazine):-
1. Level and hours of tech support. Do they have support forums, telephone support or live chat. I work long hours so it's no good if the tech people are not their at evenings and weekends for me.
2. Server structure and software offered (eg you need Frontpage extensions). It's no good if the server is an old Pentium 120 in a spare room
3. Disk quota and bandwith. What happens if you go over?
4. Control Panel for your site, and ease of use.
5. Terms & conditions. Is there a trial period or is there a long contract?
6. Level of security of site and are there backups regularly.
7. Uptime of servers (no good if they are always offline)
8. References from people who use the service themselves.
Here are some sites that the article recommended (haven't looked at them all personally)
www.webperf.net
Link Removed
Link Removed
www.hosthelp.com/questions.php
www.tophosts.com
Hope all that helps.
Darren.