Internet Host rant!

treeman

treeman

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If you're not interested in reading a random rant, please move on.

Ok, it started when I decided to move to a virtual server after finding my site was running a bit slow, arguably, this was my first mistake. I decide to move to a VPS package with the same host, 1 and 1, this is where you all go, "oh, 1and1, that explains it!" Anyway when you move to a Virtual server, apparently all possible help and support ends, you're out there on your own, as calls to 1 and 1 were met with "sorry we don't help with that", fine, but they could have explained that before you switch. It took me about 24 hours, Googling like crazy, installing and updating PHP, creating new databases, learning about "dropping table" etc, etc, to finally get my site up again, luckily I had done a full download of my site beforehand.
For two weeks all was bliss, super fast site, no probs, then on Friday, I may have pressed the "back up site to server" button, but whatever I did, meant my site went from being 9 GB to 21GB and put it over my allocated HD space. Now in the normal world of good customer relations, you'd think they might send out an automated email saying "you've gone over your allocated space, please upgrade package". But oh no, the just shut your site down! absolutely nadda, zilch! I'm only alerted by a customer wondering where his pics are!

So I can see what the issue is, though i don't see why, but for the sake of speed, I upgrade to higher package. Of course that doesn't fix it, so I phone them and the best help they can muster from some very grumpy tech guy is, "you need to repair the container, so put it in repair mode, copy personal data after opening it in SSH, find the fault, delete the fault and restart the
container". If any of that makes sense to you you're a better guy than me!
Needless to say I tried, screwed up, lost everything, and now back on shared hosting after rebuilding the site.
Now currently looking to move hosting over to a smaller more idiot friendly company.

I'll add if anyone gets this far, when I downloaded my site to my machine, it creates a folder of about 400MB, why when the site is on the 1 and 1 server does it take up 9GB of space?

Thanks, feel slightly better now…………. but not a lot! :)
 
Move along, nothing to read here ... :D

First problem is finding a really helpful server provider at a reasonable price and with at least a basic form of management ... for that my friend, you either need a server in the US or loads of money to throw at a Brit provider ... sad though that is.
 
Some vps providers offer managed services ie they help a lot.

With shared hosting only your webspace and database space is counted. With a vps your allocation includes the full operating system. As generally you have unlimited bandwidth with 1and1 I backup to an offsite ftp place so I am not filling up my server space with backups. They're not as bad as amen hosting. I had a vps with them for a week. They trashed the whole thing and told me to restore from *my* backups when the machine was set to backup to that server. I'm so glad I hadn't moved everything over at that point. Disaster recovery has to be uppermost. If the host doesn't do full backups or failover within the monthy cost then they're not worth wasting your time with. I had another go at another host for doing that. I said I was paying for backups so if they trashed it they could damn well get everything back before they broke it. They did.

If anyone does know of a reliable vps provider that can do unlimited bandwidth, 2GB ram, semi managed with min 50GB disk space and plesk 10 30 domains for under £30 inc vat then let me know! I'm paying £40 odd for 1&1 but it is reasonably reliable. They used to help more so I think they've worsened the service. I'd expect them to support the OS and panel they provide and chase the panel provider about bugs. I'm always finding them. Get better support bitching on twitter most of the time.

1&1 didn't help me recently so I'm looking around for another host.

Eukhost used to be ok but they went crap as well so I ditched them and went to 1&1!
 
gramps said:
Move along, nothing to read here ... :D

First problem is finding a really helpful server provider at a reasonable price and with at least a basic form of management ... for that my friend, you either need a server in the US or loads of money to throw at a Brit provider ... sad though that is.
Click to expand...

I Disagree.. I've had two very good hosts in the UK - eUKhost and Site5 (who, admittedly are a US based company with UK servers) both offer managed VPS servers and other packages.

I guess what 1&1 sold you was an unmanaged server, leaving you almost completely on your own when it comes to problems, which is pretty scary if you don't know what you're doing, managed servers are much better as it's fairly similar to having shared hosting, with the additional benefits that a VPS offers :)
 
There is no comparison between server providers in the UK and US - bandwidth, disk space, management ... all are far more expensive in the UK ... and good companies are few and far between. Using US server providers gives you infinitely more options to get a better server spec and management at a reasonable cost.
There are a very limited few in the UK that can provide anything approaching a similar package at anywhere near a compatible price.
 
Heart Internet. the best host providers in the country and you can always get in touch for help off them
 
Except for their vps offerings though as they're unmanaged so you're on your own as you are with 1&1. They mention charging for help too and were cagey with me about what support they offered within the monthly price.
 
Dataflame - I doubt they are the cheapest, but UK based and tech has always been brilliant. I was recommended them for shared hosting by someone who raves about their VPS services, so can't personally recommend the VPS service, but got to be worth looking at.
 
FWIW, i've decided to go with these guys http://www.openmindhosting.com/ I actually spoke to a real human, that was in the UK, spoke English, and understood exactly what I wanted. Admittedly a bit more than twice what I was paying, but this includes managing the server for me.
To be fair to 1 and 1, they don't offer a managed package, but it would have been helpful if they'd explained that before you take on the package. And made it quite clear, you do need to have a certain level of knowledge to manage it yourself, especially if your use to shared hosting where you have no idea of what actually goes on at the backend to get, and keep, it all running.

Fingers crossed for a smooth switch over, then just spend another day uploading all the images to Photocart that were wiped, Hoo bloody ray!! :)
 
I am an infrastructure engineer and personally would just build my own server and install it myself rather than paying someone. Only requirement would be the server to go in the loft and static io from my internet provider.

All these vps companies put you on shared hardware and can't promise you server performance 100%, therefore another customer could take up all the resources on your virtual host and you get impacted. You will probably find no sla's for getting the issue sorted.
 
Karl12347 said:
I am an infrastructure engineer and personally would just build my own server and install it myself rather than paying someone. Only requirement would be the server to go in the loft and static io from my internet provider.
Click to expand...

and wouldn't that be against the terms of most people's agreement with their ISP?
 
If you did go for a US server, get a UK ip address.

There is nothing wrong with uk hosts

There are things wrong with certain hosts.

I personally doubt you needed to upgrade to a vps, changing to another host on shared hosting would of probably cured the speed issue as you were probably on an overloaded server.

What is your monthly bandwidth/daily visitors? (if you don't mid sharing)
 
Dale_d3100 said:
There is nothing wrong with uk hosts
Click to expand...

Find me a UK host offering this spec for under £100:-

2x Dual core Intel Xeons running at 3.0Ghz w/2MB L2 Cache.
4GB DDR RAM.
2x 160GB SATA Hard Drives.
10mbps unmetered bandwidth (3.2TB/mo).
Five IPs Included. Additional IPs Available w/ justification.
cPanel / WHM Included.
Free Remote Backups - 12 Hour Incremental using R1 Soft (160GB).
Free apache/mysql load balancing w/2 or more servers.
Full management.
1 hour hardware replacement.
APC remote reboot
Fully distributed, multi-location monitoring of PING, HTTP, DNS, POP3 and SMTP.
No Setup Fee.
No long term contract.

I doubt you'll come anywhere even remotely near the price, the UK has greatly inflated server prices - that's specifically what's wrong with UK hosts.
 
gramps said:
Find me a UK host offering this spec for under £100:-

2x Dual core Intel Xeons running at 3.0Ghz w/2MB L2 Cache.
4GB DDR RAM.
2x 160GB SATA Hard Drives.
10mbps unmetered bandwidth (3.2TB/mo).
Five IPs Included. Additional IPs Available w/ justification.
cPanel / WHM Included.
Free Remote Backups - 12 Hour Incremental using R1 Soft (160GB).
Free apache/mysql load balancing w/2 or more servers.
Full management.
1 hour hardware replacement.
APC remote reboot
Fully distributed, multi-location monitoring of PING, HTTP, DNS, POP3 and SMTP.
No Setup Fee.
No long term contract.

I doubt you'll come anywhere even remotely near the price, the UK has greatly inflated server prices - that's specifically what's wrong with UK hosts.
Click to expand...

Are you talking virtual (some of that) or physical?

I can get that for £150 (not sure on bandwidth limitations on this package)
 
Dale_d3100 said:
Are you talking virtual (some of that) or physical?

I can get that for £150 (not sure on bandwidth limitations on this package)
Click to expand...

That's a full physical dedicated server with root access and full 24 hour management for £90 (including the R1Soft backup and over 3TB bandwidth!). I assume that your £150 is plus 20% VAT so twice the price even if it is a similar spec and I guarantee it won't have the bandwidth, I doubt it would have the R1Soft backup.
 
Nope, our is running windows and use our own backup software we use in house.

My ping will be better than yours ;-)

But yep £180 for dedicated.
 
Dale_d3100 said:
My ping will be better than yours ;-)
Click to expand...

:LOL:

Its such a shame that servers are at such a premium here, there are some good hosts but they are seriously hamstrung by cost.
 
After a recommendation on here, I pay £20 a year for absolutely no limits on size, bandwith etc from http://www.fasthostingdirect.co.uk/

I thought for £20 I'd take a punt.
Got my website and two wordpress blogs running on one domain and another website on another. Works well.

They've an offer on at the moment for £20 for two years.
 
Byker28i said:
After a recommendation on here, I pay £20 a year for absolutely no limits on size, bandwith etc from http://www.fasthostingdirect.co.uk/

I thought for £20 I'd take a punt.
Got my website and two wordpress blogs running on one domain and another website on another. Works well.

They've an offer on at the moment for £20 for two years.
Click to expand...

No such thing as unlimited. If your site gets too big, they will move you to a more expensive package.
 
Byker28i said:
After a recommendation on here, I pay £20 a year for absolutely no limits on size, bandwith etc from http://www.fasthostingdirect.co.uk/

I thought for £20 I'd take a punt.
Got my website and two wordpress blogs running on one domain and another website on another. Works well.

They've an offer on at the moment for £20 for two years.
Click to expand...

Hope it's not a critical Internet presence.
There really is no such thing as 'unlimited' but that wouldn't be what I was most concerned about.
 
gramps said:
and wouldn't that be against the terms of most people's agreement with their ISP?
Click to expand...

Unless he was running an open mail relay, smurf amplifier, or other similar nasty I can't see why, unless the ISP is dreadful.

(One of the ISPs I use actually explicitly allows customers to run anonymising mail relays, provided certain conditions are met)
 
www.RackSrv.com is datacentre not like hosts that offer shared, reseller, etc.. They offer VPS unmanaged (But if you go to webhostingtalk.com) you will find tons of help there or even scroll through the topics to see questions already asked. They also have a tut section. RackSrv also do dedis, and higher.

I also have a VPS from them.

I know about 10 hosts who rent servers or racks from them. I 100% recommend them.
 
Unlimited web hosting I'm with 99.99999 uptime 98% score and took me a few hours to find a decent site cheap hosting unlimited usage and great feedback ratings at £2.50 a month! bargain...
 
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