Fuddland

Gosh, it appears my hosts Bloghosts have been forced to call it a day and close for business. This is rather sad as they really have been top-notch hosts; their customer service was particularly impressive. I’d like to personally thank Jay and his team for all their hard work over the last eighteen months or so.

Things won’t be shutting down until the New Year, so I have a little time to sort out moving to a new host. Any recommendations?

#1

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 07 – 22:41

I’m about to look for one too so would be interested to hear your findings. I’ve been keeping some notes of recommended hosts over the past couple of months:

Lyle (D4D) etc. recommended http://www.34sp.com/

Recommended on Wsg list “£4/month”:
http://www.nsdesign.co.uk

Recommended by htmldog (http://www.htmldog.com/)
http://www.titanhosts.net/

Others:
http://www.bloghosts.com/
http://www.blogomania.com/

#2

David | 2004 / 11 / 07 – 23:18

Re #1: Thanks for those, I’ll check them out [except perhaps the second-last suggestion ;)].

#3

Mark | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 09:19

When I had my first site and I didn’t need adult requirements I found 34sp.com to be first rate. As far as hosts go the hosts of my current sites are excellent to deal with but they’ve had hardware issues and resources-abusive users on and off for several months now so I’d hesitate to recommend them at this time.

#4

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 10:51

Yegads, forgot to delete that one, sorry.

I’ve twice used the online chat support at web-mania (open 24 hours, last time was at 02:10 today!) so I can vouch that their pre purchase support is excellent.

There’s also a web hosting forum.

Thanks Mark - I was looking at 34sp so it’s good to hear another perspective.

#5

Gordon | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 11:58

Well I’ve been using 34sp for a year now and no problems at all. Admittedly I seem to have lucked out and my site isn’t on the same server as some of the ‘resource abusive’ sites.

If you don’t mind their weird payment systems 1&1 were OK. I have a couple of friends who are with them and aside from the money issues I got stung with their services are excellent (although the back end admin is a bit of a bugger to use).

#6

Jann | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 15:29

I have now been using WebHost4Life for well over a year and have found them to be peerless in value for money and service. The fact that they’re based in California has no bearing on the speed and efficiency of their 24/7 support and they’ve seemingly bent over backwards to help when I’ve needed them.

I initially chose them because of their M$ related offerings (.net, asp and MSSQL) but they also provide all you’ll need for php and MySQL as part of the package. They’ll even install modules not listed should you require them.

I use the $9.95/month package but they do one for $4.95/month which would probably be ample.

#7

David | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 15:53

Thanks for the recommendations/testimonials guys.

NSDesign was disqualified straight away for having a big warning on their site saying that I “appear to be using an older browser which can not view webpages created using CSS”. I’m using the currently-in-beta Opera 7.60 Preview Release 2, so I don’t have the greatest of confidence their technical expertise.

34SP would probably be my best option except that they only offer one mySQL database as standard — you have to pay extra for more. This doesn’t affect me right now but could do in the future if I decide I want to, for example, play around with Wordpress, which [I’m fairly sure] would require a new database. I don’t want to pay for a new database just to delete it when I’ve finished messing with it. Charging extra to have your data regularly backed-up is also a bit off, in my opinion.

After getting used to Bloghosts and their weblog-friendly way of organising things, I’m trying to find someone who operates along similar lines, so Blogomania is looking good, although it charges four times what I’m currently paying. [The packages aren’t exactly the same though, so it’s not an entirely fair comparison.]

Webhost4life also looks good, but for some reason I have an innate prejudice against Windows-based hosting [inexplicable seeing as I can’t seem to bring myself to switch from Windows to Linux for my own operating system needs].

Currently I’m most tempted by Moxie’s service, which is almost identical to my current one and they’re wooing Bloghosts customers with offers to make the transfer as painless as possible. [The temptation obviously has nothing to do with the rather attractive women who work for them, I wouldn’t be that shallow. ;)]

#8

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 16:24

I know what you mean about preferring a host that’s geared toward bloggers - Moxie does indeed look good - and anyone that includes a dog as part of the team gets my vote ;-0)

#9

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 16:36

p.s. email query sent to Moxie at 16:11, reply received at 16:30.

#10

Cheah Chu Yeow | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 18:29

If you’re up for it, get yourself a VPS. It’s more work, but I find it much more gratifying ;)

#11

David | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 19:13

Re #10: [After researching what a VPS is] Hmm, sounds a bit much like hard work to me — I just want cheap and reliable. [And someone else to have to deal with technical problems of course ;)].

[Edited by commenter — 19:25]

#12

Jann | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 22:17

http://segpub.net/hosting/

Free-BSD hosting. Prices are in $Australian so you can probably halve them…

#13

Cathy | 2004 / 11 / 08 – 23:44

Re #12: $AU to $US is about 1.3 to 1 ratio atm.

Beehost are doing very similar packages to Bloghosts ( :-(, btw, on their demise) at similar prices. Also offering free hosting to Bloghosts customers until the end of December :-)

#14

Rank | 2004 / 11 / 09 – 05:54

I use Servage, @ $7.50 US a month and with unlimited databases, email addresses, and subdomains I manage to run several blogs, a photo gallery and at last count I think 5 MySQL databases quite easily.

#15

David | 2004 / 11 / 09 – 10:26

Re #13: Since Bloghosts aren’t charging us any more, Beehost’s offer doesn’t immediately strike me as a reason to switch to them — but more to the point, I’m having trouble finding testimonials regarding their service. Know anyone who uses them?

Re #14: Hmm, Servage appears to be very attractive indeed. Will definitely check them out.

#16

Kevin | 2004 / 11 / 09 – 13:51

Well being involved with Beehost I figure I’ll jump in quickly. Most of the customers previously have been businesses but there have been a few blog customers like myself, niceperson.org and before becoming an admin on his own server Aquarion was there too.

Because I enjoy taking MT apart and such there’s a blog background there, which is why I’d been trying to get something for blogs sorted out. We’d just sorted everything out when Cathy told me she’d be hostless so I arranged the free hosting offer to match Bloghosts. It’s not amazing I know; we’re just trying to make sure we can give everyone the time and attention they need to migrate rather than trying to juggle everything on New Year’s Eve when Bloghosts’ free hosting runs out.

Anyway, that’s a quick overview of the situation. If you want any details feel free to drop me an email.

#17

David | 2004 / 11 / 09 – 15:16

Re #16: Thanks for the clarification — I feel better about a company with whose founder I’ve had a beer. :)

#18

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 09 – 22:59

By ‘eck Kevin it’s a small world - I remember the post you did John Cleese’s birthday party on the DVD forums!

#19

Kevin | 2004 / 11 / 09 – 23:15

You? What? Who? I know I was bragging about the party but I don’t remember that. Which forum?

I’m having random post black-outs again aren’t I? :-)

#20

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 09:45

I wouldn’t call it bragging, just a fun post :-0))

#21

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 09:47

(should add: you have to register to view the DVD forums)

#22

Lyle | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 15:03

I would still look at 34sp, even bearing #7 in mind regarding the one database thing. Of course, so long as your table names are different, they can all fit into the one database - and if memory serves, all WordPress’s ones start with “wp” anyway, which helps keep them away from other tables with similar names.

In eighteen months of using 34sp (and I use them for a fair number of sites, not just d4d) their service has been without fault. In that time they’ve had two server outages, both times fairly major, and both times fixed within 12 hours. Bearing in mind that they don’t actually make any “99.99% uptime” claims for their standard hosting, I think it’s significant that they still work as hard as poss to restore service.

#23

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 17:52

So does “subdomain” mean a variation of the main url?

For example:

fuddland.org.uk
and
fuddland.anothername.org.uk

you couldn’t also have, say

completelydifferentname.net

with the same account, you’d have to have two separate packages?

#24

David | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 18:07

Re #23: Almost right. A subdomain of http://fuddland.org.uk would be http://anothername.fuddland.org.uk. So for example, the BBC has the domain name bbc.co.uk, then news.bbc.co.uk is a subdomain. Some packages offer a limited number of subdomains, some offer an unlimited number [although the mathematician in me always wants to say, “But you don’t really mean unlimited, do you? You mean ‘loads of’.”].

Some hosting packages do allow you to have to different domains on the same account, which I’d imagine makes running two or more different sites easier to manage, although I’ve no experience of this myself.

#25

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 20:45

Ah, thanks David. So I need a hosting package suitable for blogging with MT/WP which offers more than one domain name. And under £50/year. And very reliable. Anyone?

#26

David | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 20:58

Re #25: Don’t want much do ya? ;)

Depending on how much space and bandwidth you’ll need, I’ve a feeling you might struggle to find hosting [and presumably domain name registration?] for less than £50 a year. Servage offers up to 25 domains on one account so they could be an option, but that’d be at least €7.50 [plus VAT, so I’ve discovered] a month — you do get over 2Gb of disk space though, and 82Gb of bandwidth, and although they guarantee 98.98% uptime, they claim to have a history of 100% uptime. That reliable enough?

You could also ask BlogMoxie for a custom package and see what they quote you.

#27

Cathy | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 21:11

Erm, Beehost :-) If you went with the middle (commonest) package it would be £30 for the year plus £12 for an extra domain for a year.

Sorry, plug over, onto business! I just managed to read the thread on the DVD forums - that wasn’t Kevin, that was some other bloke whose name I didn’t catch due to him turning up near the end (although he was in time for birthday cake :-) ).

Speaking of bragging though, I’d just like to be insufferably smug for a moment and mention that it was me who accompanied Kevin there and won the lucky draw in the first place :-)

#28

David | 2004 / 11 / 10 – 21:39

Re #27: Ooh, Beehost has updated its pricing structure [and prices?] since yesterday. Still no company address or contact details though. £30 gets you the medium package and a second domain if I’m not mistaken. Update: Sorry, I misread “middle” in Cathy’s comment for “medium”. So I was mistaken. :) The rest of this comment still stands. But is that including domain name registration? It doesn’t say if they do that [at all] on the website. You could also play the currency-conversion game and pay in dollars — $54 = £29.25 at the time of writing, a saving of 75p! :)

I’m ignoring all the John Cleese stuff due to mega-insane jealousy. ;)

[Edited by commenter — 21:43]

#29

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 11 – 14:52

I sat next to John Cleese at a performance of Cyrano de Bergerac starring Robert Lindsey, Stella Gonet et al. He was as moved as the rest of the audience and took out a big white hankie to dry his eyes.

Daisy aka Star Spotter

#30

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 11 – 14:54

re #27 - dammit, so it’s not Kevin selling the Dells on Ebay?

#31

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 11 – 14:56

Just as well I didn’t email the seller and start waffling, eh?

Thanks for the info, judging by the (not very reliable) info from TypePad stats I either need 1gb or 12gb of bandwith per month. Yes exactly. About as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike. I’ll have a good think about this. David, have you made a decision yet? She says, thinking she’ll copy David…

#32

Kevin | 2004 / 11 / 11 – 17:44

Prices haven’t really changed at Beehost, although I guess the bulk buying discounts weren’t up earlier. And there are some contact details on the enquiries page, given the rest are in whois I might try and get them put on later today; I’ve just been rushed off my feet. But you’re right about what £30 would cover.

Domain registration isn’t included though, that could be clearer. Officially it’s not a service offered at the moment, but in the past I’ve arranged it for people unofficially. There’ve even been some registered in my name for people who are shy or just want me to get all the associated spam :-)

Oh, and I’m not selling any Dell’s on eBay but I do have a power supply for one of their laptops that’s barely been used if you’re interested :-)

#33

David | 2004 / 11 / 11 – 23:29

Re #31: Okay, I’ve made my decision. Actually I made it two days ago but this thread is still pretty lively so I kept quiet. :) Hmm, perhaps I won’t tell you who I went for, let you decide for yourself. :P

I don’t quite understand that huge range of bandwidth either.

#34

Daisy | 2004 / 11 / 12 – 16:31

Oh go on, you know you want to tell us… ;-))

#35

David | 2004 / 11 / 16 – 15:20

Re #34: Ah good, things have quietened down. Following Rank’s recommendation, I went for Servage, and it seems to be working out. I’m taking my time with getting things all set up, so I’ve not put through the DNS transfer request just yet.

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