Blast
posted on april 7, 2003, tag: site
Yeah, for the last day and a half, my site has been broken. You haven't noticed (unless you tried to post a comment), and there was nothing I could do about it. For the second time in less than three weeks, my host, HostRocket, screwed something up on the server and managed to take over 2 days to fix it.
A few years ago, when I signed up with HR, the service was fantastic. A startup company, HostRocket had few customers and great customer service. They would answer questions and fix problems within minutes. They were almost always available by phone or via AOL Instant Messenger. Their prices are great (always have been), and they offer a ton of great features and packages.
But, somewhere along the line, HR made a mistake: they became successfull. Now, years later, they have tons of clients. 50 servers, a data-center, a support staff, et al. The problem is, there are constant problems. Their support system has gone completely down the tube and their constant efforts to expand to deal with new customers causes nothing but problems for their current client base.
I've stuck with HostRocket through thick and thin. I've dealth with the outtages, the [somewhat constant] DOS attacks, the problems, as well as the great prices and services. I think, however, that this is the last time I will deal with their mistakes. If my site goes down again like it did this weekend, I will be moving to a new host.
Does anyone have a suggestion for where I should go (if I do)? I need PHP, MySQL (no less than an 8 db allowance), at least 350MB of space and at least 5GB of bandwidth a month. I don't want to pay more than $10 dollars a month. Unlimited subdomains would be great (or at least 5), as well as the ability to use all the normal things (phpMyAdmin and some sort of web interface for controlling domain stuff). Let me know.
Comments
There are 17 comments, comments are closed
Josh on 04/07/2003:
I would recommend http://www.cyberpixels.com to anyone. I have been using them for about 6 - 7 months now and they are great. It's kind of got the start up flair that you talk about with HR. They are on AIM sometimes, very fast support in the forums. Relatively fast on the actual support site. Servers have never gone down for me and if they do they are on it within minutes trying to get it back up. Their prices are extremely low, and the features are good. This is what myself and several of my friends use and we have all been very happy.
kerry morrison on 04/08/2003:
Do what everyone else in business does today...look to Canada for cheap labour, goods and services.
I host all my stuff with a great little company called Retrix would be so cheap with the exchange rate and not really any reason for you to be near the servers.
These guys have the best customer service i have ever seen.
Donna on 04/08/2003:
I use Blogomania and really like them, but their plans look a little small for your needs; they're a reseller for HostingMatters, and I'm deeply impressed with the HM service; the forums are very helpful, and so the staff is nothing less than devoted to working out problems (which are few). Other friends of mine have used and recommended Verve Hosting and Insider Hosting; there's also a relevant thread about this at the MT forums here and here and even here (that second link looks especially promising).
sean on 04/08/2003:
I just switched over to IExpressHost after running my own servers from home. $100/yr, 1gb disk space, 30gb bandwidth/month, 8 domains, MySQL support and all kinds of other goodies including SpamAssassin on their mail servers. My account went active within a few hours of the signing up and their support was awesome. Great customer service which is something you don't get too often these days.
Garrett on 04/08/2003:
Thanks for all the suggestions. I'm definitely gonna look through all the packages and see what looks the best. Right out of the bag Cyber Pixels looks good, but kind of frighteningly small. Only two servers kinda scares me.
Keep giving suggestions if you've got 'em, and I'll let you know how it goes.
Linus on 04/08/2003:
I would have suggested my host, The Burgh Live, but ... 8 databases!? What do you do with 8 databases? :)
Josh on 04/09/2003:
Cyberpixels has more than two servers. I guess that is out dated. By their forums they seem to have around 8-10, going by the different names of the servers they talk about.
jason on 04/09/2003:
just say no to cyberpixels!
my wife and I have been with them for over a year, and the service has done nothing but go down hill. We are currently shopping around for a new hosting provider for our ~10 domains.
check out the forums...cyberpixels forums
ther last two domains I added to my account took 21 days to work properly. They are terribly understaffed, and will readily admit that they are behind in setups and help tickets.
josh is lucky to be on a server that is unaffected — but it will come around his way soon. the orbital server was down for over a day this week; water was down for an hour last night; they get DoS'd all the time...
good luck
pita on 04/10/2003:
"the orbital server was down for over a day this week;"
I was down for almost 4 days and my site is still not working correcting with Cyberpixels.
I signed up with them on 3/17/03, less than a month ago, and this is my second downtime. Definitely say NO NO NO to cyberpixels! It "looks" good, but looks can and in this case are deceiving.
I'm on a hunt for a new host as well. Good Luck to ya!
Jarod on 04/10/2003:
I recommend Altera Hosting (http://www.alterahosting.com). Excellent support system, good prices, good reputation. You can check http://www.webhostingtalk.com and do a search on them or find another one from there.
codepoet on 04/11/2003:
Yeah, I have a CyberPixels horror story as well.
After waiting 72 hours for them to even acknowledge my order, my request for setup instructions, my request for an update, and then my request for cancellation (one ticket) I finally had to go to their billing processor, 2checkout.com, and request a refund (which they gave me in under 10 minutes).
Aviod CyberPixels until they fix their staffing issues.
Garrett on 04/11/2003:
Thanks for all the help, everyone. I will definitely be avoiding CP now. Eek.
Josh on 04/11/2003:
Hm they have been nothing but helpful and courteous to me. The server problems get resolved stat too. I'll be sticking around, for such nice people and price, it can't be beat.
They are behind on help desk tickets, but who cares, they answer questions on AIM, E-Mail, and Forum. Help desk tickets aren't necessary.
iexpress sucks on 07/20/2003:
36 hrs later, still waiting for activation of account. no emails to me y it taking so long. i recommend it a nono
chet on 08/17/2003:
i use awp, awphosting.com, the support always replies within an hour, sometimes 2, and the prices are pretty good..... to purchase additional space or bandwidth is really cheap, and thats where alot of places end up making their money because nobody looks at those prices.
although, i have been considering switching to alterahosting simply because the prices are better. and also, the techtv weblogs are hosted by altera :)
Ben on 09/19/2004:
Just came across this, thought I'd at least retort to some of the less than cordial remarks.
I could go into detail on the various outages spoken about here (and would be happy to) I just don't think anyone wants to hear me drone on about why some of our server's were down.
Suffice it to say that those problems have been fixed, and our helpdesk is not backlogged by any means.