Web Hosting Options

[soma104]

Hi,

I'm relatively new to web design, and I have a few clients who have asked me to design and maintain site for them. I've been looking through web hosting packages and prices to help me determine the total cost for them.

I'm a little confused as to what the difference is between Unix, Linux, and Windows hosting.

I'm also confused as to how much bandwith is necessary. Some sites offer 1,000 mg, 6000 mg, 50 gig, 20,000 mg, and everything in between for virtually the same price. I know what bandwith is, but I have no idea now much of it I need.

Since I don't know anything about mysql, and PHP, I'm not even worrying about them.

I'm attaching the links to a couple of the sites that I found, that I am considering. Your opinion would be very much appreciated.

http://www.ez-web-hosting.com/webhosting.htm
http://www.123ehost.com/webhosting.htm
http://new.dotcanada.com/index.php?page=default

Soma

[FatalException]

The major difference between Unix and Windows hosting comes into play when you are deveoping applications or interactive webpages for the site. Most books and tutorials are written with a Linux / Unix environment (they're 99% the same since Linux is based on Unix) in mind. I would suggest choosing a Linux / Unix server if you have the option; it will make transitioning to more advanced web design far easier than with a Windows host. Windows hosting is useful if you are going to be programming in Microsoft-type languages for your site (like ASP or something). Since you didn't seem to say you even knew how to program in PHP, I'll assume you also don't know how to program in ASP (which is arguably more difficult to learn).

As far as bandwidth is concerned, that all depends on how popular you expect the site to be. I would bet a site like techimo which gets tens of thousands of hits daily probably uses many hundred or thousand gigabytes of transfer each month. My own personal blog, though, gets hit about 600 times a month and that uses up less than 100MB of bandwidth per month for me. Also, if the site is graphically intensive, each hit will consume more bandwidth. Most people are fine with just 1GB per month to 5 GB per month of bandwidth, starting out. If you find your site gets as popular as TechIMO, though, you will definitely need to upgrade.

The first web host your posted look best of the three to me. It had the most features for the lowest price. One thing, though, that I've dealt with when it comes to hosts... talk is cheap. They may SAY "99.997% uptime guaranteed!" but how do you verify that? How do you ensure that you are REALLY up all that time. I've run scripts on my own web host with that guarantee and they determine that my own host reboots about once every 20 days (going down for between 5 and 20 minutes each time). While the times aren't inconvenient, usually 3 or 4AM, I do have a number of international visitors to my site who may be viewing it at the time when it goes down. I've emailed the hosting company to complain, but their response has basically been: "Sorry, your script must be wrong, our servers NEVER go down..." or, when I ask about the guarantee, they say "prove that the servers went down, and then take us to court to get your money back." Well, that's HARDLY a guarantee...

I've just found in changing from host to host that sometimes paying a little more is worth it; but that isn't ALWAYS the case. I've dealt with 4 hosts in my time. Two aren't even worth mentioning, they were so terrible. The other two were great:

www.olm.net
www.lunarpages.com

OLM was by far the most courteous, well-run, professional web host I have EVER dealt with. They've been around for 7+ years, also, in a REALLY tough market (web hosting has a very high turnover rate). Their feature set isn't as great as LunarPages, but if reliability and quality technical support are what you want, OLM is the answer. Lunarpages' support isn't as great as OLM's, but their feature set is more advanced for a lower price.

[AgentCrypto]

i like unix/linux servers because of SSH & the cost
but i also like windows because of .NET

checkout
http://www.penguinhost.net/hosting/professional.html
i had them in the past and they offer cpanel which will help you alot

also unless you have site traffic like yahoo or hotmail
then you will mostly never use over 20GB unless you are sharing large files or becoming a mirror

[soma104]

Thank you for your replies. Unfortunately, I still can't seem to make a decision. There are so many options, and so many that I don't understand.

One site is for a doctor. Several pages, just listing what he does, etc. The most complicated thing may be a form for questions. I think that I could probably get that from any of the hosting sites.

The other site I"m building may involve people posting messages, maybe a buy and sell thing. If you could just tell me which feature to look at for that, then I may be able to sort through my options a little easier.

My main thing is that I'd like to go with a site that will allow me to pay in Canadian dollars. It will make everything a little easier for me.

Soma

[filipino]

how about www.godaddy.com

[soma104]

Would you recommned going with the Dedicated hosting IP?

Soma

[large_nostril]

If you plan on doing multiple sites (beyond just these two), you might want to look into some kind of reseller package. That way you can allocate the appropriate storage space and bandwith quotas and charge your clients appropriately.

I used to use Spremacy Hosting's Corporate plan. They're a good company. Never had any downtime, problems, etc. And the staff is very willing to teach you things. Most of what I know about hosting comes from them and I now run my own servers.

Other good hosts are:
LunarPages
DreamHost
PowWeb
iPower

If you could just tell me which feature to look at for that, then I may be able to sort through my options a little easier.

Basically you just need PHP and some form of SQL (MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc.).

My main thing is that I'd like to go with a site that will allow me to pay in Canadian dollars. It will make everything a little easier for me.

Now that I don't know much about

Would you recommned going with the Dedicated hosting IP?

You probably won't need that. Very few things do.


Small sites that are just going up really don't need much at all. Most small business sites won't exceed 50MB of storage and won't exceed 500MB of bandwith a month. I know, I host about 90 SB sites and only 3 to 5 exceed those numbers.

[soma104]

Thanks Large_Nostril

I agree with what you said about the resellers package, but I'm not ready at this time to make such a commitment. I'm hoping that I can look into that somewhere down the road.

I will take a look at the links you provided, and hopefully something will fit into my budget. I'm starting to give up on the Canadian site, because I'm finding that they either don't have as much to offer, or their prices are way too high.

Soma

[soma104]

WOW ! I just checked out dreamhost, and it seems too good to be true. Is it? They have a promotion that will end up costing me under $10 for the year.

It appears to have everything I need, and I couldn't possibly find a better price.

Thanks for all your help

Soma

[large_nostril]

I don't know about the "$10 for the year" but they are truly a great company. Them and LunarPages are top on my list. Do you have a link to the info on the promotion? Are you talking about the referal option?