Web Hosting

[j1979]

i had my own domain/host back in 2000/1, im wanting to host my own site again. but having done nothing webwise for best part of a decade i need some help. i was getting only about 50/60 hits a day back then with no meta tags, but was all just for fun. No business at all, so traffic was never an issue.

Ok so now im looking at hosting a site, for fun/learning at first, then as possible small side line business. (i will buy a domain name now and another later if i go down sideline business route)

the site will contain some flash animations, and will be linked from a few friends sites (not busy sites). I also have a friend who has his own web business and he specialises in site ranking. He said he will help me get my site a higher google ranking for free (not sure how much higher)..although im looking for as many hits as possible, just to test for poss futre business

Without going into too much detail, what i want to know is what sort of bandwidth should i go for. 5gb, 30gb, unlimited etc. + anyone know any really good hosts at cheap prices?

what kind of hits can i expect with small to medium exposure and therefore what bandwidth considering i will have some flash although the bulk will be pain html with a few jpg/gifs.

PS, i im extremely rusty at all things to do with the web. So any tips will be greatly received

thanks in advance j

[Saracen]

.....

Without going into too much detail, what i want to know is what sort of bandwidth should i go for. 5gb, 30gb, unlimited etc. + anyone know any really good hosts at cheap prices?
....

I've no specific help for you, but having had a number of sites at a variety of hosting companies, I can make a few general observations.

Firstly, "good" and "cheap" tend to be mutually exclusive. If you are trialling this with a view to business use, I'd seriously suggest look for "good value" rather than "cheap".

As for the bandwidth, well, there's a gotcha or two there as well. Pretend I'm offering to sell you water, and one deal offers a specified number of gallons per day, but is supplied through a 12" mains pipe. The other offers "unlimited", but without telling you, I'm supplying it though a 1mm microbore pipe.

How "unlimited" is that unlimited water deal? It's unlimited in that you can use all you can get, but good luck getting more than a slow trickle.

Now pretend I'm talking about bandwidth and you see the point.

Also, there are a lot of apparently good hosting deals out there, but the crunch comes in being sure what performance and reliability will be like. And, it's often difficult to tell with tests, because until you start using real-world volumes, things often go well.

So if a deal is "cheap", it's often because what you get is sub-standard as soon as your usage becomes demanding. Suppose you take a cheap deal on a shared server. Even if you're guaranteed only 20 customers per server, do you know what the other 19 are doing? If they're all resellers, there may only be 19 other accounts, but each of them may be hosting 500 "cheap" sites.

All I'm really saying is to be VERY careful what you look for, and try to check out the suppliers. It may be one thing running a personal site from a £10 a year site, but it's very different if your trialling it with a view to business, because that server is likely to be unsuitable.

Also, I'd say it's impossible to predict what bandwidth will be needed without having a pretty good idea of the site, the balance of content and the hit level. A popular photographic gallery is likely to have higher bandwidth usage than an equally popular political blog, because of the type of content. Without knowing a lot more about what you plan, it's hard to predict.

So, I'd suggest looking for a hosting company that's fairly big and has a range of options available. If you can find one that gives the option to upgrade from a shared server, to a virtual server with guaranteed minimum and specified burstable RAM, and then to a dedicated server, and that offers fast pipes to the net, and has a good customer service rep, yet still does good prices, then try them. And tell me who it is.

[j1979]

Thanks Saracen, for taking time to write all that, it's certainly given me plenty to mull over.

what do you think about hosting from home at first? my connection has OK upload and ive got an old p3 server knocking about somewhere, or is security too much of a risk?

[Saracen]

Again, it depends on what you're trying to achieve, and will be doing. It also depends on your background. Setting up a server at home and hosting web content is, generally, dead easy. Doing it well isn't.

Firstly, check your ISPs T&Cs, because while some will allow it, others won't and you risk losing the account if you do. Even then, there's the problem that, unless you've got some very hairy-chested home internet connections, you've got a single point of failure if your net connection goes down for any reason.

As for security, that all depends how you do it and how good you are at setting up the server and firewall. It's certainly possible, with the right hardware and setup, be be pretty secure ..... if you know what you're doing. But do you?

Personally, I'm of the opinion that using a home server for development and testing is fine. But opening it up to the web for any serious purposes ..... not convinced.

[j1979]

As for security, that all depends how you do it and how good you are at setting up the server and firewall. It's certainly possible, with the right hardware and setup, be be pretty secure ..... if you know what you're doing. But do you?

no i have'nt really got a clue, but as with anything i do, i read, read, read from the internet. Its always good to get pointed in the right direction first tho. I come from an IT background tho, so how hard can it be?

[Rainmaker]

I can highly recommend you check out S-i-g-m-a for your web hosting. They're a fairly small outfit but they're independent (not Heart resellers lol), and dedicated to providing high end enthusiast oriented hosting. I love them

For £6 a year (yes, year - not month!) you'd get 6GB of webspace (that's right, GB not MB like most companies). That's not just for html files either, you're totally free to store anything you like on there (software, documents, video, music etc) whereas most hosting companies are very restrictive about what files you're allowed to keep on your space.

Their servers are in Germany and London, in well respected data centres on 10 gigabit fibre pipes which means virtually unlimited super fast speeds. If your site is amazingly popular and large, you MAY hit their throttle. But don't get worried, it's very fair and transparent. The first 60 GB of bandwidth a month (more than most sites could use!) is at the full 100 megabits/sec, but after that the speed for file downloads is restricted to 10 megabits/sec. Normal web traffic is NEVER throttled even after the 60GB/month, only binary file downloads.

You get unlimited email addresses, 10 MySQL databases, unlimited FTP accounts, a nice web based control panel (ispCP), webmail, IMAP, POP3, SMTP, subdomains, SSL enabled email servers, SFTP for secure file transfers... need I go on?!

I get my full 2.3 MB/sec 24/7/365 from these guys, and they even have 100% UK based 24 hour support via email and web tickets. I know I sound like I'm on commission (I'm really not lol ) but when you find a company this good you tend to tell folks about it - which is a good thing for Sigma as it means more customers. More customers = more investment = everyone's happy.

They also support Joomla, PHP, etc etc and will install things on your server space on request. They do have more expensive packages, but with all the above you'd have to be pretty big to need it. They also offer dedis if that's your thing.

Check them out, and if you do enquire tell them Rainmaker sent you - I'm a good customer so they'll know to look after you

[Saracen]

.... I come from an IT background tho, so how hard can it be?

If you go down this route, in about a year, I'm gonna rub your nose in that one!

[j1979]

If you go down this route, in about a year, I'm gonna rub your nose in that one!

kinda thought my words had the "famous last" ring to them while i was typing. I guess im going to give it a go anyhow, as it will be good for me to learn something.

but im sure your right, my tail will be well and trully between my legs if you are.

[j1979]

I can highly recommend you check out S-i-g-m-a for your web hosting. They're a fairly small outfit but they're independent (not Heart resellers lol), and dedicated to providing high end enthusiast oriented hosting. I love them

cheers for that i may well give them a go!!

[PeterStoba]

cheers for that i may well give them a go!!

Metoo

[jamiesalter]

jeez, i'm at LiquidSix and i don't get nearly the amount i would at Sigma if i paid the same. However, i've never had downtime and do have amazing support?? Sounds like i might change though. cheers for the link.

[Rainmaker]

Wow, LiquidSix are expensive! Although none of their packages offer anywhere near as much as Sigma do, if you try to balance them like for like, their most EXPENSIVE package (£99.99 a year) still gives only 1/3 of the coverage of Sigma's CHEAPEST (£6 a year) package. To truly match the cover you'd have to pay LiquidSix about £300 a year to get Sigma's £6 a year package LMAO

[FLUFFYTOY]

I can highly recommend you check out S-i-g-m-a for your web hosting. They're a fairly small outfit but they're independent (not Heart resellers lol), and dedicated to providing high end enthusiast oriented hosting. I love them

For £6 a year (yes, year - not month!) you'd get 6GB of webspace (that's right, GB not MB like most companies). That's not just for html files either, you're totally free to store anything you like on there (software, documents, video, music etc) whereas most hosting companies are very restrictive about what files you're allowed to keep on your space.

Check them out, and if you do enquire tell them Rainmaker sent you - I'm a good customer so they'll know to look after you

I shall take a look at them myself as well, they sound very reasonable. cheers

[PeterStoba]

Sigmas customer support is amazing, submitted a ticket last night and an answer was here before i woke up