New Host or Server?

[Ghome1971]

I am fed up with my current hosts regular downtimes. My site is hosted by someone who I suspect is a one man band. I don't want to give names as he has been helpful and my costs are fairly goods. However, my site is down to often (two weekends in a row) and when it is I am unable to reach anyone.

My site is quiet greedy on bandwidth due to large images and fairly high visitors. I think is is around 15GB per month - but can't check as my site is down at the moment!

I am looking for a new host or even my own server. Firstly does anyone have recommendations. My priority is and in this order:
1) reliability
2) friendly, knowledgeable and patient customer services
3) cost

Can you give me any pointers of areas of caution?

Thanks

Geraldine

www.stardustkids.co.uk

[Bruce]

Hi,

I would suggest searching on the forum for ' Reliable Hosting ' and you should come up with quite a few results.. here are a few examples...

http://community.actinic.com/showthread.php?t=22644
http://community.actinic.com/showthread.php?t=21567
http://community.actinic.com/showthread.php?t=20751

Kind regards,

[RuralWeb]

Actinic do a hosting service now so I would check them out

[Ghome1971]

I really wanted some advice on hosting verses own server particular with respect to a novice with a busy website.

I am not sure if my limited skills would allow me manage my own server. I am also concerned that if I had my own server provided by say Pinbrook that the technical support I require would not be at my low technical level. However, my site is busy now and down time is costing my me thousands.

Does anyone with limited technical skills have their own server. Does anyone else know what level of ability is required.

Best Wishes

Geraldine
www.stardustkids.co.uk

[RuralWeb]

Your site is down Geraldine - I would not run my own server as you may have SE issues with it. I am sure jo will give you some good advice at your level - as you say you need to sort it quickly.

[leehack]

Geraldine,

Once your site is setup and emails are all being received, what further contact do you need to have with them? I never understand this regular contact people seem to have with their hosts. A relationship with a host is usually like one with your electricity or gas supplier in my experience. You do the original setup, you setup the payment method and let it run for years without a need to talk.

You mentioned that you are using 15GB per month, which to me sounds big. I maintain a site with 600 unique visitors a day, image intensive and some large videos and it only ever reaches 10-11GB per month.

Is your traffic comparable? If not, i'd still take a look at what is using your bandwidth as it just seems high to me. A dedicated server is a nice but expensive option, most sites are fine without this, check your bandwidth usage and just find a reliable and proven host.

In the meantime setup on webfusion, it will cost you about £100 and you can be assured that your site will be up while you investigate the various options available.

[Ghome1971]

I don't understand how having my own server will effect my SE listings. Will my address not be the same?

My bandwidth is high because I have loads on images and photos that are fairly high res so the designs can be seen. I have around 400 pages and around 1300 visitors per day. I may have a few very images that have sneaked into the site but most the the images are as low as I can get away with. I get loads of feedback from my customers and noone has said the site is slow.

I am waiting for Jo to call me now so that I can try to get my site moved asap.

Geraldine

[pinbrook]

for the record our dedicated servers have the same control panel as our shared hosting, thus you require no technical knowledge to manage the server. We manage the critical issues such as OS, firewall, software such as mySQL, PHP, anti virus, spam filters and so on. the main advantage isnot having to share resourses such as processor/memory etc

Since it is a DS you can of course install extra software, but this has then to be manged by yourself. Of course if you prefer you can manage the server via command lines but obviously most people prefer not to.

Several of our clients have moved from shared hosting to DS and not had to change a single thing they do.

[leehack]

Geraldine

The page containing your sitemap is 207k or 0.2mb. I daresay your sectiontree script and your sitemap could be reduced substantially by Norman. This would have a dramatic effect on the speed of the pages loading for your visitors on slow connections and more importantly would reduce your bandwidth usage - win, win situation.

I would say that whatever it costs for him to do this for you, would easily be repaid within your first year.

[pinbrook]

Garaldine I've sent you a PM

[edit] no i haven't as you don't accept them.

someone will call after 4pm this afteroon.

[Ghome1971]

Malcolm: Can you explain what you mean about a dedicated server affecting my SE listings.

Lee: My sitemap is generated by Webcrawler which was recommended on this forum. I update it regularly. Do you think it really is a problem? Actually my site was over 20GB in Jan (http://www.stardustkids.co.uk/stats/)

Thanks

Geraldine

[RuralWeb]

Can you explain what you mean about a dedicated server affecting my SE listings

This is not what I said - I said running your own server may affect the SEs (you asked about running your own server which is different to a dedicated server).

having a dedicated server with eg pinbrook will not affect the SEs - having your own server under your bed may.

[Ghome1971]

I meant a dedicated server!

[leehack]

200+Kb for a sitemap is large IMO and is the kind of thing that is impacting on your bandwidth. Anything that large is going to be slow for people on slow connections. I guess nowadays you have to make a decision whether to cater for broadband and dial up or just the broadband users. I understand that you want nice pictures, but i would bet my house that your current images could be optimised better (saving loading time and bandwidth) and you would not be able to tell the difference. Its just an opinion.

If you are using 15GB, i bet this could be cut down to 10GB with no adverse effect on anything. You have some very large pages. I could use a MB of your bandwidth by visiting just 5 selected pages. Multiply that by your 1,000 visitors a day and its easy to see where it adds up.

If you are going dedicated server, it will be immaterial really.

[Ghome1971]

"If you are going dedicated server, it will be immaterial really"

Pinbrook offer only 25Gb with a dedicated server. Is it normal to have these restrictions? I notice a number of other companies offer unlimited bandwidth.

Geraldine