Our host for work, here in Canada, was Network Solutions for awhile.
We switched recently, but it had nothing to do with bad service or country of origin.

Mario

Thank you for all the input.

Nice spam, Jive.

You can always tell the sincere replies from those looking to make a buck. Anytime you see more than a couple of exclamation points in a post, disregard it. It's spam.

Gee thanks. I guess I should just disregard all of the enthusiastic comments about Vegas (exclamation points 'n all) around here as spam too, huh?

I'll have to remember to leave out the exclamation points next time I post about how Vegas delivered just so you don't think it's spam.

I only posted a referral link here once, which I was up-front about and said anyone could use it or not.

I even looked around the net for a code to help others save $25 off any plan. I found it after I signed up myself, so I didn't get to use it, but I posted it thinking I could help others save even if I didn't.

But I guess that's just me trying to make a buck...

BTW, glennchan, I heard about that 777 deal too. $9 for a whole year was quite a deal (too bad it's over). But that BEST code ain't too shabby either; it makes the $25-off coupon I found seem paltry by comparison :)

Also, for domains, I would highly recommend Yahoo! Small Business' (link). At $2.99/year (for up to 5 years), their price cannot be beat. Previously, I registered most of domains with Godaddy who had great service, management features, and prices. While I still think Godaddy has better domain management features, I'm fine with registering my domain with Yahoo for 5 years, and then transfer it over to Godaddy when those 5 years are up (that is, if Yahoo hasn't gotten better functionality in 5 years time).

>1&1 has all of those, included in all Unix [non-MS] host plans, even at $2.99/month.


careful. I signed up for one of their cheap plans and use it as a backup storage server. It works really well.

However, when I tried to run CUSTOM cgi and php, they said on the cheap plans it's only for their pre-built cgi's etc. At least that's what I found out. Again, I'm still with them, and I'm sure if I paid another $10 or so per month I could run whatever I wanted. Just read carefully (with any host!) to make sure you can run the scripts you want to run at the price you're looking considering.

Sean
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Stay away from 1&1.

Why? I just got a bad bad taste from them, and their control panel is very hard to navigate.

Sean,

That's a very good point. It really is important to think through the requirements before choosing host plans.

At least the CGI issue is covered in their plan comparison, although it takes familiarity with CGI to understand what they mean by "CGI Script Monitor" on the $9.99 and up plans.

I was surprised to see 1&1 has 5 million customers and 18,000 Mb/s internet connectivity, with their own backbone. They also say they are the largest web host in the world, and the fastest growing too (could have something to do with their 6 page color ads in pro publications...)

Another thing that was hinted here earlier is that it's nice to have X GB datatransfer per month for $3.99 or whatever, but if your web site sits on a Celeron PC together with 8,532 other web sites, the data transfer your customers see may be at dial-up speeds.

Haven't you all seen really slow web sites?

1&1 has been fast in my use for what it's worth. I would hope most of the large companies haven't oversold their bandwidth, but I'm sure some of them do it.


Sean
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Been using www.asmallorange.com

No live tech support, only via email. But it's quick. When I had questions, it was answered within the hour or less, and these were mainly at night.

What I like about them is if they feel they don't have enough servers to accommodate their users, they will actually stop new subscribers until they get new equipment.

Active message board. Here's the link - http://forums.asmallorange.com/

Their plans might not be the cheapest compared to some of the others on this thread, but I've found them to be very reliable.

Found good reviews at webhostinngtalk last year when I was doing my search for a hosting firm - http://webhostingtalk.com

Someone mentioned domain transfer a few posts up.....made me think (yes it hurt). How much hassle is involved in moving a domain registration from one company to another (ie...initially registered with XXX and want to move it to XXX when time to re-up)? Does it make a difference when sites are active and attached to the domains?

From what I know:

1- Yahoo supposedly makes it harder for you to transfer away your domain names. i.e. it's hard to get EPP codes from them for the domain types that use EPP codes

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=430661&highlight=yahoo

They will also nickel and dime you, because $2/yr domain names means that they are losing money. Subsequent years are $10/yr and I think they gouge you on features (like email).

2- ICANN rules are supposed to make domain transfer easy. The "losing" registrar (who is losing your business) is not supposed to do anything to stop your transfer. To transfer, you initiate the transfer from the winning registrar. If the domain is active, you just wait a few days and the domain will be switched over. The new DNS may take up to 1-2 days to percolate through the internet.

Anyone can also steal your domain if it's active. To prevent this, set the status to locked.

Your domain tranfer will fail if:
A- You just reigstered the domain. You need to wait 60 days before you can transfer.
B- The domain is about to expire.
C- The domain is locked.
D- The domain registrar gave you a non-working EPP code (this was my problem with dreamhost).

The transfer is "free", since your domain expiry gets extended a year.

I hope you guys don't mind that I bumped this down. Does anyone have any ideas to share?
________
I have a client who is an actress looking to set up a website to host her resume, photos, and some video clips. She recently asked me about website hosts.

Which one would be the best for her? Any of the ones mentioned here? I am thinking mostly in terms of the videos being quick and easy for directors, agents, etc to view without problems.

John

Regarding Godaddy -- no way would I ever again register a domain with them.

What was your problem with GoDaddy?

I switched to using GoDaddy from Network Solutions for all my domains 7-8 years ago, always tip-top service, great admin and everything always worked.

Network Solutions refused to transfer my domains until I sent a carefully crafted fax to their corporate counsel. Took 30 minutes before they called me and released my domains immediately.

craftech,

Try TypePad. It's an online blogging system, it has what you are looking for. It seems to be very easy for the person who really doesn't care about the technical issues of html, etc.

They offer a free trial.

http://www.sixapart.com/typepad/compare

You could also check out Wordpress - http://wordpress.org/
It's a bit more technical compared to TypePad. But it has a lot more third party plugins.

craftech,

Try TypePad. It's an online blogging system, it has what you are looking for. It seems to be very easy for the person who really doesn't care about the technical issues of html, etc.

They offer a free trial.

http://www.sixapart.com/typepad/compare

You could also check out Wordpress - http://wordpress.org/
It's a bit more technical compared to TypePad. But it has a lot more third party plugins.
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Awhile ago Riredale suggested Sitespinner to create the website. I was thinking of using that to create the actual website for her.

I was more here interested in a recommendation for a website host (in keeping with the theme of the thread) that would work well to stream or download the videos, load the photos well, etc....
Would those you mentioned be good for that?
John

John,

I use SiteSpinner and I like it a lot.

Regarding hosts and video.....read carefully in the TOS about what they do and do not offer. I like my host (site5) but they do not support streaming video. I can still put video up but it won't stream. Another host I looked at had a limit on the size file you could upload at any one time. Although they offered a lot of bandwidth, they limited the file size that could be uploaded (10 mb). That knocks out many vids you might want to put on your site. As with everything, make sure you read the TOS of the hosts mentioned here carefully - I almost went with that one until I found the file size limitation. I called customer service and they said no limit existed.....I directed him to the TOS and he said "WOW....didn't know that." My host now doesn't limit the size and I can live w/o the streaming.

My advice, look at the hosts folks here have suggested and dig into the TOS for each. The forum listed a few posts up is also pretty good for getting the ins and outs of a variety of hosts.

HTH

Keith

edit: here is the TOS section I mentioned: "10.2 - To avoid unfair resource distribution at no time shall Customer use more than 15 simultanious processes by and with any of Customer's applications and not upload any file larger than 10 megabyte. "

For incredible value, check out www.yrhost.com . Hosting starting from $10/year!!
If you like what you see, please sign up thru my website www.theashbrookes.com and click on "about us"

cheers!

One thing to consider when going with a web host is their policy for handling security breaches -- I'm talking about when the real-deal hacker gets into your site and installs bad stuff. What do you want your hosting company to do when that happens? Isolate the problem and contact you to resolve it? You'd expect no less.

Unfortunately, many hosting companies take the approach that the account holder is responsible regardless. This could mean the loss of your account with no opportunity for redress, reimbursement or receiving a backup. Who could you complain to, after all? They hold all the keys. I've seen it happen.

Before going with any company I would ask them to spell out exactly they will do if such an event occurred. If they aren't willing to isolate the problem and contact you to work it out, I'd move on.

David

P.S. I host with JaguarPC, and generally have been very happy, but their security violation protocol, as described above, leaves me willing to jump ship.

Which one would be the best for her? Any of the ones mentioned here? I am thinking mostly in terms of the videos being quick and easy for directors, agents, etc to view without problems.

icdhost.com is pretty good value, and offers pretty good uptime. One thing that's good about them is that they oversell very little (i.e. unlike dreamhost). When companies oversell, their servers can get bogged down by the few websites that take up all the resources (bandwidth, CPU, RAM).
Email support response is usually within minutes- that's nice.

$60/yr, $5 domain registration is pretty good value.

If lots of lots of people view the videos on her website, then she'd need a bit more bandwidth- which costs money. But you can always buy more bandwidth, and:
If she ever exceeds the limit, that implies there's hundreds of people who've watching her videos. In which case she'd probably be busy with work, which is already a good thing.

icdhost.com is pretty good value, and offers pretty good uptime.....If lots of lots of people view the videos on her website, then she'd need a bit more bandwidth- which costs money. But you can always buy more bandwidth, and.....

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Thanks to Glenn and the others for the feedback. One thing I am a little confused about Glenn is about the videos. You said earlier in this thread that Icdhost.com would NOT be good for videos. I gather from the last post that it WOULD be good for videos. Please clarify if you would.

Regards,

John

Yeah I did contradict myself there. If you have lots of people downloading your videos, then you do need some bandwidth. 7GB is still kind of a lot. A website without video won't run anywhere near 7GB/month.

You can calculate things out per month. File size * # of downloads = bandwidth. If you run out, there may be overage charges or they stop your site.

Dang, I'm making this more complicated. But my guess is that your friend won't use up all of that bandwidth. Suppose 30MB of video... your friend would need to be handing out 200+ business cards per month.