Identifying and Avoiding Dishonest Hosting Providers? 95
An anonymous reader asks: "Recently I have had the (dis)pleasure of dealing with the buyout and resulting problems problems of Managed.com by WebHostPlus, Alphared (aka Orangefiber) being dishonest about backup facilities (no power backups and not multi-homed), and CalPop overselling bandwidth. What can we do to protect us from these companies, they all seem to be have web sites and be real companies, but we seem to get scammed by them. The dishonest ones look a lot like the honest ones. We can't afford the attorney's fees or to build a data-center, and that is why we pay the monthly fee to host a server, but the companies do not have what they claim to, nor do they care about the customers. We contacted two attorneys in the United States and they said that the companies didn't have any assets worth going after. What does Slashdot think of these problems and what can we do to avoid them?"
Ask Slashdot? (Score:2)
Of course, that'll only kill about 10% of their business. The rest of it comes from the clueless PHB set.
Re:Ask Slashdot? (Score:2)
They offer great packages and they just keep getting better (without the price going up). If you sign up from this link [dreamhost.com] or use the code 7BACKNOW, you will get $7 back which is basically your first month of:
-20gb storage/1T
Re:Ask Slashdot? (Score:3, Informative)
Dreamhost is nice for a small site, but there is an unpublished CPU limitation that you can't go over, meaning that unless you're serving a few large static files, you're going to hit that cap before you ever hit their oversold promises. I use dreamhost, and they're OK, but you should know their limitations.
By the way, if you DO decide to use dreamhost, use the MAX97 code instead... the parent's code gives them $90 and you $7. MAX97 takes the entire referral fee off your bill.
Re:Ask Slashdot? (Score:3, Interesting)
http://blog.dreamhost.com/2006/05/18/the-truth-ab o ut-overselling/ [dreamhost.com]
http://wiki.dreamhost.com/index.php/CPU_Minutes_FA Q [dreamhost.com]
I hope that helps. Ive been using Dreamhost for several moderately high bandwidth sites over the past year and I have no complaints at all, infact I enjoy their 'professionally unprofessional' stance (re the newsletter).
Re:Ask Slashdot? (Score:2)
Now, unless you actually start crashing the server with faulty scripts, you are in the clear.
Ask Everyone. (Score:1)
Re:Ask Slashdot? (Score:1)
I've been with them for years now... not the cheapest around but I've never had a problem with them and I know for a fact their infrastructure exists.
Checkout their forums here http://forums.rochen.com/forumdisplay.php?f=2
I will admit to knowing the CEO reasonably well
Re:Ask Slashdot? (Score:2)
I highly recommend pair Netorks [pair.com]. I've been using them for years and never had a problem. In fact they've been good to me. They definitely cost more than a "value" host, but have some key benefits. Uptime is excellent, bandwidth is never a problem, shared servers aren't overloaded and in fact locked down once they're full. They use open source sofware including Apache, MySQL, and FreeBSD. More importantly, they donate a portion of their business' profits back into the OSS foundations/companies whose products
Re:Ask Slashdot? (Score:2)
They were way less expensive than our previous provider and offered way more features/storage/bandwidth.
Sure, they are a bit more than the "value" hosts, but isn't that point of the Ask Slashdot in the first place? After all, you get what you pay for.
Re:Ask Slashdot? (Score:2)
Google? (Score:2)
Re:Google? (Score:2)
Re:Google? (Score:3, Interesting)
The world has gotten to be too litiguous for this. 5 years ago people would not have had any doubts before posting that a company sucks.
Nowdays people will think 10 times before doing that. For example, if I have some shitty experience with a company I usually post the exact description of a problem I run into with all relevant details including a mail trail where applicable. No emotions. No expletives. I have noticed that I am not the only one doing this lately. Noone wants to get
Re:Google? (Score:2)
So if you have a bad experience with a host, be sure to post about it
Re:Google? (Score:2)
I will post, and I post if I have bad experience with any internet provider (hosting or other). I simply do not use expletives. The moment you get into the realm of "sucks", "idiots", "fucked up", etc you can get whacked for slander and have libel tucked along with it in most countries.
On top of that in many countries (UK for example) the victim can get your website shutdown instantaneously with a simple letter. The reason is that UK (and other countries) libel and slander laws actual
Re:Google? (Score:3)
As far as I can tell, one of the best ways to find a decent hosting provider is to already be a member of a small online (or
Re:Google? (Score:2)
The way they network the sites together, they get a high pagerank without being obvious link farms.
If they put as much effort into making their hosting reliable as they do in scamming us...
Re:Google? (Score:1, Redundant)
Re:Google? (Score:2)
help a poor college student out here :) (and I honestly wouldnt recommend it if I hadnt had a great experiance with them)
Re:Google? (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Google? (Score:2)
My web host, pair Networks [pair.com], is listed on Netcraft [netcraft.com] as being fairly reliable, #14 out of all hosting providers as of the time I post this.
How about looking at the websites? (Score:2)
Re:How about looking at the websites? (Score:1)
The real solution is asking around for options before searching for them on the internet. Try to contact a few clients if you really don't know anybody. And last of all, visit their office: although they are an internet company, they still have some office and hosting site you could request a tour for.
It sounds pretty stupid, but works.
Re:How about looking at the websites? (Score:2)
Re:How about looking at the websites? (Score:2)
That's a tough one, really. (Score:1)
Do your homework. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Do your homework. (Score:3, Informative)
before I host anything any where (now note I get hosting for 2-24u at a time) I ask for tour of the NOC.. I want to see where I will be at - this is where I look at what is around that - most people and NOC's label peoples servers very noticeably and you can see what other companies host there at that exact place..
Web hosting Talk (Score:5, Informative)
Ask Slashdot! (Score:1, Funny)
Think Global, Host Local (Score:2)
NearlyFreeSpeech (Score:1, Informative)
They charge *only* what you use, and I havent had any problem with my webstie. Even when once they reported some sort of attack, nothing seemed particulary at issue in any of the sites they host.
You can also host anything you want.
Check them out.
-AC
Re:NearlyFreeSpeech (Score:2)
* Their control panel is elegant and their their ideas are fresh.
* They bring out new original features often (but lack some of the grandeur of Dreamhost for example)
* You get 2 cents of balance when you signup (~20 MB of transfer) so you can see for yourself.
* You can buy 'buckets' of bandwidth, you specify how much you want and when you want it to expire and get varying discounts on their (quite high by shared hosting standards) bandwidth rate.
* Responses from s
You can't (Score:3, Insightful)
Dedicated:
If you want to be the safest with a dedicated server, order from one of the providers such as EV1 and TP. You are less likely to be screwed. The downside to this is higher cost and less personalized service. The large companies have their problems, but them disappearing generally is not one of them.
Shared:
No matter what, there is a good chance you will get screwed. It is simply the nature of the industry. There are thousands upon thousands of hosts out there. Before purchasing service, check for comments on the company at WHT (webhostingtalk.com). That will give you an idea of the hosts popularity (based on the number of complaints) and the level of service (based on the types of complaints). Most threads relating to companies are negative (a happy customer has no reason to post). More importantly, take a look at what you are getting. If the host is offering unlimited bandwidth or disk space, stay away. Every host out there counts on you using only a fraction of the resources allocated to you. If you are paying $20 month, do not expect to host a website getting thousands of visitors per day. Simply put, you get what you pay for.
More important than anything else, keep backups. If you don't have a backup from the previous 48 hours, it is your own fault.
It's a valid question... (Score:2)
So someone is looking for hosting. Go to Google. Find lots of hosting sites. Some featured advertisers, some just search results. In among all of the results, find sites that let the public review hosting providers.
You look over a few providers, pick some to look into in more detail, google for reviews, see they're all mostly good, and settle on one. Then you find _another_ site, where all the reviews for a hosting provider you picked are completely the opposite of everything else you've researched on
Re:Tour... (Score:2)
In other words, get real. No company would ever agree to that. The reverse, perhaps, if you were to pay for the trip and they pay you back if you decide to go with them...
Re:Tour... (Score:1)
Homework. Eyeballs. RTFC. (Score:5, Insightful)
Step two: Referrals. Who else do they host? Check uptimes. Talk to their other customers. If they won't give you references, or if they can't give you companies you've either heard of or can verify have existed and are independent, walk.
Step three: Read the contract. Better yet, have your lawyers read the contract. Anything fuzzy? Push them on it. If they waffle at all, or look like they're trying to get you to sign terms they might give way on if you push (not the price, the *terms*) DANGER. Established hosting companies should have their risks well set out and know what it will cost them to assume whatever level of risk - at worst, they should simply change pricing if you try to reassign risk, or simply tell you they don't offer that service level.
Step four: GO LOOK AT THE FACILITY. No excuse for that. If your business is going to depend on this facility, you need to see it. No trusting web photos. This is your place of business and your physical plant. If your business depends on it being available, or worse yet on it being something that you describe to *your* customers, it's your responsibility to eyeball it. If you don't know what you're looking for (and if you're a business type, there's no shame in that) then find a technical person to eyeball it with you and pay them for their time.
Step five: If you're concerned about their available bandwidth, ask to see bandwidth reports. Ask for peers who can verify their connectivity. When you visit a facility, ask to see the external switching facilities and rough-count circuits if you have to. If you're still concerned, then tell them you want legal guarantees (with penalties) in the contract for available bandwidth - they shouldn't bat an eye at that, since the more bandwidth you (verifiably) use, the more they should be able to bill you, probably. If they balk at potential penalties for short bandwidth, there's likely a problem. Typically, they themselves will offer tight bandwidth monitoring just so they can bill you for those bits.
Step six, and final for me: HAVE A BACKUP PLAN. Things can and will go wrong. The best hosting provider out there might suffer incredibly bad luck and multilevel catastrophe. EVERY admin will have horror stories of 'the two things that would never go wrong together' going wrong. My favorite is a switching center in downtown Boston having *both* of its redundant data pipes being taken out by construction on the same day by the Big Dig, on opposite sides of the building. This might mean having a small backup system in another center on the smae provider. It might mean having a staging system in a home office that can be brought live on limited bandwidth. I don't know, that's *your* problem. It might just mean having a really good PR checklist. But HAVE A PLAN.
Sure, if you're not dependent on an uptime number, these steps may not be necessary. But if, as the question seems to imply, your success or failure will be tightly coupled to the reliability of your hosting provider, then there's no substitution for Doing The Work.
WHP (Score:2, Informative)
Blotched migrations (why keep the nice shiny fast servers, when we can move you to our own slow oversold ones?), horrible support (tickets unanswered for weeks or closed without reply), constant downtimes (usually 2-6 hours / day for weeks o
imagelinkusa.net comments (Score:1)
1 linux server (i think its RedHat)
2 direct ftp/http access to the server
3 unlimited subdomains/email/sql dbs
4 fast service (i had to do a bit of a reset and they moved my stuff to a new server/reset my cp password and did a package upgrade all in the matter of 5? hours
not that i have anything big on site but THE SITE DOES NOT GO DOWN and if they dink with the servers you get a set of emails (weeks before, week before, during , j
Let the BOFH be your guide... (Score:2, Interesting)
1. Hack a server or two and have a poke around the network yourself to see what they have.
2. Assume the worst when talking to them. If you say with full and complete confidence that you know they're lying, they'll admit it (if they are).
Re:Let the BOFH be your guide... (Score:1)
Go visit (Score:1)
One place I looked at promised backup power. Then when I asked to see it, they explained that they only had the fittings and a contract for a backup generator that would be delivered in a couple of hours. Given that they are in San Francisco, that's a stupid plan, my-nurse-only-lets-me-use-a-spoon stupid; in an earthquake, their provider wouldn't have enough generators and probably wouldn't be able to deliver th
crystaltech (Score:1)
And yes, they now do linux...
This is why you work a couple years for others (Score:2)
Eventually, when you start your own business, you'll have a good bead drawn on what works.
It's complicated (Score:2)
Hey it sounds hard to pull off, but it beats simulating an earthquake or hurricane.
Don't go with 'flashy' hosts. (Score:2)
First of all, don't go with 'flashy' hosts that try to woo you with their whiz-bang web design unless it's one of the big, well-known hosts. By this, I mean look at their website design. Does it look like a template? The sort that involve stock art pictures of people. If so, stay away.
Second, are the prices absurdly low, or are the figures absurdly high for the price? If so, stay away. (I would also imagine that you want to go for neither the lowest or the highest price you can find.)
Third, you probably d
Re:Don't go with 'flashy' hosts. (Score:3, Interesting)
You know.. I actually never thought of that but it's totally true. My web host's site had no CSS when I joined and the tables were all borked so bad I had to call them. $60/year for a gig of space and 3 gigs of bandwidth and m
Host with a Telco or Big ISP (Score:1)
Get in touch with your credit department (Score:4, Interesting)
Somewhere in there, you will have a credit analyst. Make friends with this person. They will have access to Dun & Bradstreet reports, paydex scores, and a host of other information about the hosting provider. They are the best people in most companies to research other companies -- because that's what they do for a living.
In a smaller company, it might make the most sense to speak to the department head/CFO, because you don't want their normal sales analysis, but rather a dependability analysis (similar, uses many of the same things, but not automated).
If you have questions, ask for CPA certified financials -- or at least a letter of attestation from a CPA firm that says they own/lease the multiple facilities, lines, etc. and that the company and pricipals are financially sound.
Re:Get in touch with your credit department (Score:1)
Re:Get in touch with your credit department (Score:1)
For truely small companies, my suggestion would be to ask your CPA to do it -- or for suggestions on someone who can.
Go local (Score:3, Interesting)
Like anything else... get references! (Score:3, Informative)
The best thing to do IMHO, is to get a personal reference from either a comparable website to yours or a friend who actually uses the product. For instance, when I was looking at VPS's about two years ago, it was very reassuring to find out that Damn Small Linux was hosted with the provider that I had short-listed (and eventually chose).
several things to consider.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Doing your homework is always best. The internet is a wonderful tool and when used properly the answers to all your questions are out there. I say this often, and it holds true in just about everything. Cost is always a concern noone wants to spend more than they have to, but if someone is selling you an entire cabinet for $400/mth power included, I would question where they are making their money. That's not to say that you should willingly pay $2000 for a single cabinet, but cost and quality are usually related to each other.
Referrals are probably one of the best ways to go. Because we are small and are forced to compete with the big guys we have to cut corners. While I refuse to cut corners where it matters, I have to shave on the "extras" that aren't necessary for operations. For example, instead of spending $100k on advertising a year, we buy equipment. Instead of buying $2k desks and $8k conference tables, we buy....equipment. I think you get the idea. Since we spend very little money on advertising our growth comes specifically from word of mouth. There are plenty of good providers out there just like us that operate the same way.
Basic checks (Score:1)
go with what people recommend (Score:1)
I use 1and1 because... (Score:1)
I have been using 1and1.com [1and1.com] as my provider for about 3 years.
They are a very large company, originally from Europe. In Germany they are the largest hosting provider. What they did when they entered the US market 3 years ago was what brought me to them:
Any other company would have spent the allocated marketing millions for buying ad space and all that stuff. They gave away their best (shared) hosting product for free for 3 years, no strings attached - no ads (on your site), no need to stay with the
Re:I use 1and1 because... (Score:1)
Re:I use 1and1 because... (Score:1)
From everything I know about them they're a "mass market company", i.e. they are great and cheap as long as their standard offerings suit your needs. I would not expect great individual service from such a firm. So far they are exactly what *I* need - something cheap and a standard offering, I've no special requests. If I did I would probably look for someone else where I could expect more individual attention, as 1&1 is set up I don't expect this from them, it's m
Re:I use 1and1 because... (Score:1)
Honestly, I've seen more 1and1 advertisements than any other hosting company, except maybe godaddy. They regularly take out 6 page spreads in PCWorld, as well as other tech magazines.
That said, I use their 5 dollar/month package, and I haven't ever had any real problems with their service. Some of their administrative stuff can get a bit wacky now and again, but that's about it. Then again, I'm a fairly lite user.
Re:I use 1and1 because... (Score:1)
I was talking about their start in the US market only, not about ongoing operations now. Of course they'd switch to "normal" marketing at some point. However, I think most companies that START something new (a new market, new offereing in existing market, anything) would do that with a big ad campaign rather than relying on giv
Re:I use 1and1 because... (Score:2)
As far as I am concerned, any company w
Single-use credit card #s (Score:2)
Single-use numbers are available for Citibank and MBNA cards, but there are probably others. I would suggest using them.
Re:Single-use credit card #s (Score:2)
A few tips (Score:2)
There's a few things you can do:
Don't know if they offer what you want, but... (Score:2)
How about doing business in your community? (Score:2)
You can come take a look at my big honkin UPS system, my generator backup, and I'll be happy to sit you down and walk you through our multihomed, m
Go local! (Score:1)
If you're paying $5/mo. for webhosting, do you really think you're getting top-notch service??
$5 (Score:1)
My suggestion: get a solid, reputable provider such as Rackspace, EV1, Peer1, thePlanet, etc., and one or several cheap hosting providers as backup in case of disaster. Served me well several times.
Re:$5 (Score:1)
Yes, but if you're paying $500/mo. you have a much bigger bat to wield when you aren't happy with the service you're receiving. :-)
nearlyfreespeech.net (Score:2)
I really enjoy their service, and the price is definitly right, kind of pay as you go.
Re:nearlyfreespeech.net (Score:2)
Go Local (Score:2)
Pre-sales questions (Score:1)
http://whreviews.com/ [whreviews.com]
That's a good site to use to find honest hosts and to show one how to dig through the mess to find one that's not listed. I think you'll find that the information there is still pretty current and worth reading.
Full disclosure: KGIII
Call them (Score:2)
Try reading the reviews. (Score:2)