Website Hosting

[BostonDan]

Hi Everyone,

I'm starting a business consulting service and looking for advice on who I should use to host my website. My website is a very basic HTML site without flash or video. Does anyone have recommendations on which company I should engage with for hosting my site. The domain I purchased is currently registered with GoDaddy.

Appreciate any feedback.
BostonDan

[GregN]

How Big? How much traffic? Does it need to be up 7/24? E-Commerce involved? Using a content management system? Have to be on a particular OS ( Linux, Windows ) or WebServer (Apache, IIS, etc )?

If it is a very simple HTML site that can run under Apache, there are numerous free hosting sites, take a look at ByteHost for example.

The only problem you may find with free hosting is reliability...

[BostonDan]

Hi GregN,
The website is very small, total size is currently under 10MB. I will not be conducting e-commerce. It needs to be up 7/24 and I'm not using a content management systems(unless you consider Microsoft Expression a content management system). Reliability is very important. I'm using this as a sales tool to use with referrals and not with a wide audience. I'm expecting very limited traffic, but I have no idea if I'm correct. I'm currently leaning towards InMotion Hosting due to a few review websites I've seen, but I have no idea if the reviews are objective or review sites hosted by InMotion Hosting. Most important to me is reliability and support.

Thanks again
Dan

[GregN]

Free and reliable hosting, from experience, tends to be mutually exclusive.

At 10Meg, running Apache as a webserver, you could do it at home. Pay the few bucks for a fixed IP or use DynDNS...

At home the downside tends to be performance, your upload speed is limited. With low traffic, it isn't so much an issue. Also some ISPs block port 80, so you'd need a redirect

If reliability is a major issue, beyond that of assurances from the hoster, you need to get an SLA from them that has penalties. You won't obviously find cheap or free hosting with an SLA, but if you have to be sure....

[stevech]

For many years, my personal web site is on my always-on garage PC. Also on that PC is Sage TV (TiVo-alike, for HD), HomeSeer for home automation, and other apps.

The web server is within the HomeSeer software. In addition to home automation control/status remotely, I have my own HTML web pages, some of which have server-side asp (VB script) and server-side java script for dynamic content. The HTTP server in HomeSeer passes these scripts to Windows' Scripting Host (WSH).

Because this web server isn't Apache nor MS's IIS, it has proven to not be attractive to hackers.

Indeed, my home upstream speed to my ISP is but 1Mbps, but that's fine for my needs.

My domain name is provided by Hover.com (GoDaddy is on my black list). DynDNS deals with the IP address from my ISP- which very rarely changes.

But all of this is for my DIY/fooling around. Perhaps your needs are very modest and can be met with one of the free or nearly free hosting services.

[sdeleeuw]

If you're registered with GoDaddy they often have cheap hosting deals...

I run several websites from a Synology DS111 at my house (cable connection, 22mbps down, 5mbps up). This Synology also keeps backups of the computers around the house and runs Squeezebox server for my Squeezebox units around the house, amongst other things. It's fast, very reliable, and pretty easy to set up. I put a poll about site speed on one website and posted the site address to my Facebook asking people to answer the poll about how fast the site loaded. Most of the people all around the country said it either came up lightning fast or very fast, and it's not a small site.

For a small site I'd go with this solution again vs paying for hosting in a heartbeat... I'm fairly comfortable that it can handle a fair amount more with no slowdown. It was sad that I was paying for hosting and it was slower than my Synology on a cable modem.