How Much Do You Pay to Host Your Website?

DosGusanos asks: "I was curious how much people around the U.S. and around the world pay for hosting. Obviously size in cabinets/rack units/square feet, included features such as bandwidth, UPS/generator, management, etc. factor in. The configuration I am particularly interested in is three machines, one www, one search, and one database. The machines would be hooked up to a T1 and networked to one another over Ethernet. Anyone paying for colo or hosting in this same ballpark? How happy/upset are you with your provider?"

Comments

This may seem obvious

[martissimo]

but, Webhostingtalk's website is basically a forum with user reviews, recommendations, and gripes dedicated to exactly the questions you seek answers too ;)

Beware of Rip-Offs...

[redink1]

While I tried to find a new host a month or so ago, I stumbled upon Your Host Sucks and the WebHostingTalk Forums. Both are excellent for finding out if a potential host is worth the bother of going through... I saw quite a few horror stories while browsing around. For example, I think FeaturePrice said a failed router was an 'act of god', and therefore the down-time didn't fall under their uptime guarantee. Yeah. God smited their router... try proving that in court.

Also, the WebHostingTalk forums have a dedicated forum subsection for having companies compete over you... it was somewhat amusing when I did so. I got like 5 responses within an hour, plus 5 or so e-mails. But then I realized that the bandwidth I'd require was much greater than I anticipated (or could afford), so I edited my post saying something like that. And they're still e-mailing me. Like once a week...

Hurricane Electric, Baby

[ShotgunEd]

The same guys who host php.net and mysql.com mirrors have an absolutely amazing deal for website hosting. Ten bucks a month for full Unix development environment (with javac, gcc, crontab, and all that stuff), a real shell account, and a sweet webserver setup: PHP, MySQL, cgi-bin (with Perl and Tcl), anonymous FTP, SSL, and a whole mess of POP features. Plus, they have onsite UPS/generator, a gigabit backbone, and lots of other hardware goodies.

Running your own server loads of fun, don't get me wrong, but $10 a month for all this stuff seems worth it. Unless you really have money to burn, it's impossible to the same kind of performance out of your own server... Do you think Verizon will run a gigabit backone and Hubble power connector to my house for $10?

Hurricane Electric http://www.he.net/

Re:Work == lots of bandwidth

[Courageous]

You've just advised people to engage in a behavior which can justify their termination. Did you know that?

Just curious.

C//

JohnCompanies - Collocation Services - SWEET

[Desus]

I don't usually post but I'm very satisfied with my Johncompanies FreeBSD Box

I pay $65 / Month
- root on your own server
- Full FreeBSD Filesystem
- 2 gigabytes disk space
- 40 Gigs transfer / Month
- Firewall access
- Unlimited tech support
- We supply the hardware

I'm currently running a very kickass apache box with an incredible uptime (they've been down once and they weren't really down, just a network problem, 90% of my customers were able to still reach the sites)

I'm hosting over 30 domains on there, not low bandwidth either. And I'm probably going to be buying more boxes to setup a web serving cluster as the number of users increases

The support is fast fast fast. I get replies in less than 5 minutes in some cases.

http://www.johncompanies.com/

how to buy a dedicated

[pretzel_logic]

ask the sales team a few questions:

Ask how many internet connections they have and what speed with each one.

Ask how many NIC cards will be in your machine.

Ask what your max Mbps is

(This always gets you put on hold) Ask what the machines bus speed is

Ask if RAM upgrades/HD additions are priced per month or if there is a one time fee.

Ask if they will search your box for illegal materials. (you be surprised how many said yes) That means you are not the only one with root. so throw them out of the list.

Ask if you get unlimited users accounts. (dell host caps you at 100 pops) thats not full service!

Ask what the minimum billing is for support. some have 30 min some have 1 hr.

Ask if they use a in house linux distribution.

Ask if they offer security bullitens and offer links to patches.

call there tech support before you sign up and tell them you are a customer. (play the dumb blonde) see how they treat you.

Ask your salesman for their cellphone. (that gets some laughs)

Look up the server companies IP block then hit em on ARIN and see if they own a substantial block or if they own one at all!!

Ask if you are your own dns or if you have to use theirs.

Ask if your on a virtual dedicated.

Ask what the levels of discount are per GIG over allocation.

Ask who owns them

Ask about offsite back ups storage., how far away is it?

Ask if you are allowed on their property

Ask the price of additional IPS

Ask if you can tour the facility

Ask if you can ethernet multiple boxes to bypass bandwidth fees.

Ask if you can host adult sites

Ask if your machine has a control panel that support insists you use. (cobalt!!! ahhhh!!!)

ask how long they have had a business license.

and last, ask about the spam policies and what they consider spam and what the fine is per message.

that should help with the fodder ;)

Re:Rackspace

[Darth Maul]

I have three servers at Rackspace with the Private Net between them. They really are amazing. Service is actually *service* and they truly care about customers. It's amazing, and I'm more cynical than most people, but Rackspace truly impresses me.

My web pages are not just static HTML, either. This site serves an hour-long interactive training course that certifies over 3000 people a day. And the servers have been working perfectly. In fact, one of my three machines there has an uptime of 355 days (tomorrow is a whole year!!!). They're all running Linux, of course.

For a side-by-side comparison....

[uigrad_2000]

use www.hostsearch.com

Find one that looks adequate for your needs, then ask about it on webhostingtalk.com, to make sure it's reputable.

Re:Rackspace

[KC7GR]

There's one little thing about Rackspace that they, of course, neglect to tell you; They're a spammer nest.

Rackspace has a long history of being apathetic at best to spamvertized sites, despite their anti-spam Terms of Service. As of 3-Dec-02, they're still hosting at least 20 or so spammers, and chunks of their netspace may still be listed on SPEWS.

Cheap or not, good customer service or not, I would be very wary about selecting Rackspace for any sort of hosting.