March 28th, 2010 
admin Hosting Company Review Update
Just thought I would follow up quickly after my 1st summary post on various hosting companies and types of hosting plans. Over the last week I have moved around 3 hosting accounts and had to configure a VPS at a new host.
SHARED HOSTING :
Hostgator is still tops for me for shared hosting. The more I have dealt with other hosting companies support, the more I realize how superior Host Gator’s support is for response time. I have only used Hostgator’s shared plan and I have maxed out a couple shared accounts there due to bandwidth usage and size of files on my account (I was over 80,000 inodes on the account) that it began to effect page load speeds. I will say that no other shared hosting provider had ever let me load as much and use a much CPU/bandwidth as Hostgator does. (Stay away from Super Green and Just Host)
Many shared hosting providers will advertise unlimited everything but in the fine print the thing that will usually get you is CPU usage. If you are loading lots of files like a website where visitors download from your site or you have higher traffic, then you will probably hit the CPU limits and some hosts without warning will just freeze your account. The main issue I faced with “cheap” shared hosting was their load speed and server timing out. Some hosts overload their shared servers. I never experienced that among my 6 Host Gator accounts.
Also, Hostgator shared hosting servers have all the latest software and behind-the-scenes server side software/settings that a lot of various wordpress plugins and software need to run vs. other hosts I have did not have the right software/settings and created errors and back-and-forth replies with tech support.
I opened a test shared hosting account with Cool Handle Hosting so I could test some new autoblog and twitter software. They have a deal this month where shared hosting starts at only $10 for entire year. So far the support has been decent but slower than Hostgator, but the servers seem to load fast and I am running 2 sites right now on it with up to 50 posts a day between 2 sites with images in each post.
I will probably max it would pretty quick because like I said above if my site has lots of videos or images that need to load every time a visitor clicks on the page then you can sucks up CPU and Bandwidth pretty quick. Overall though Cool Handle has been good and they are responsive with requests. If you can get the $10 for entire year, it is well worth it.
Reseller Hosting
I honestly have never done reseller hosting because they have the same CPU usage and Inode(file) limits as shared hosting so whats the point of paying $25 for Reseller hosting when I could have 3 shared hosting accounts spread across 3 different shared servers/IP’s where each shared hosting plan has its own CPU limits. For autoblogging with lots of sites I would rather just have 3 shared accounts for the same cost as 1 reseller account. I would blow up a reseller account too fast.
Virtual Private Servers (VPS)
I spent some time reading reviews on VPS and from people I know that run some memory intensive autoblogging software, Liquid Web and ServInt are good for support. I ended up though going with Future Hosting because they offered more for the money and have good reputation also.
Configuring a VPS takes more hands on approach managing the account than shared and future hosting has been decent if you have some knowledge with WHM and setting up a nameserver, but for a newbie they don’t have phone support so you have to just deal with email back and forth.
They are pretty responsive though and I would recommend them. The other VPS I have heard good things about but haven’t used are KnownHost and WiredTree.
If you are new to hosting or coming from dealing with bad “cheap” shared hosting, go with Hostgator. Realize when you google “Best Shared Hosting” or “Hosting Review” or “Worst Hosting” that all those search results sites are affiliate sites that are just pushing hosts with the best payouts. For example many push Just Host/Super Green. I know of at least 20 people who had to dump Super Green and Just Host because their servers were down a lot, pages would time out, and support was horrible(overseas) . I had 2 Super Green Accounts and dumped them after only 3 weeks because I had multiple days of their servers being down. It was awful(in fact when you cancel they offer you a entire free year of hosting to stay with them and I still canceled). In fact I have seen entire forum threads full of people complaining about Super Green.
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MISERABLE CUSTOMER SERVICE, SHADY BILLING PRACTICES & BUGGY FEATURES – STAY AWAY!!!
I have used Cool Handle (formerly Pronet Hosting) since Sept. 2007. When they were Pronet, I had no complaints. But since the switch, I have had THREE HUGE ISSUES that have prompted me to switch to a different service.
Issue #1: I stopped getting ALL my emails from Facebook and Twitter. It took them over a month to fix the issue, and insisted it was a Facebook problem. Excuse me? I know thousands of customers of other hosting companies get their emails from these social networks just fine! Each time their customer support would contact me, it would be a brand new person who had not taken the time to read my previous messages/exchanges with their team. They’d ask me the same questions again and again and nothing got done.
Issue #2: I got an automated email about my upcoming renewal (FYI, they send this email 7 days before your renewal is due, but if you don’t want to renew, you have to turn off automatic renewal 15 days before the renewal date or you’re charged a $29.95 “service fee.” So they conveniently send you your reminder after it’s too late to cancel your renewal without incurring the charge). I emailed their support team to ask how to NOT renew my hosting. They sent back instructions, which I followed exactly. Then a few days later I was charged the $90-something for the renewal. I contacted the support team again, explained I had not renewed so please refund my credit card. They said I didn’t cancel the renewal properly so they wouldn’t refund me. I told them I followed THEIR employee’s instructions and it wasn’t my fault they sent me the wrong directions. Again, every time I had an email from them it was a NEW employee who had not read the history on the ticket and I had to repeat myself again and again. It took OVER A MONTH to get my refund. Even then, I still had to pay the $29.95 “service fee.” Their billing department was arrogant and unprofessional to deal with to boot.
Issue #3: And the kicker was today my website was DOWN and I got an email from them that the server had data corruption and it might take 10 hours to restore!! Needless to say I am canceling my accounts with them and going elsewhere. The alternative I found is cheaper and already has better customer support.
This company deserves to go out of business – they don’t know how to treat customers, handle bugs, or maintain reasonable uptime.
yikes, thanks for comment Michelle. Coolhandle has been running a customized server configuration for users of a autoblogging software I use and I have heard nothing but positives regarding how well it runs but only have 1 shared account with them for some test sites…i tried their customer service on 2 occassions and it was ok but not as quick as hostgator…..i still use Host Gator for my shared hosting…because they are really responsive and works well for high-usage wordpress sites….lots of shared hosting providers will shut down/freeze your account if you use large wordpress site or lots of plugins because they suck up a lot of CPU usage….
your experience sounds like the experience I had with Super Green Hosting….they are aweful
I have had the pleasure of using Coolhandle since Late 2005/2006 I could not say enough good things about them, I have actually never had to contact them for technical issues, my site has had ZERO down time in five years!
When I do speak to them they are friendly courteous and efficient.
I’ve recommended coolhandle to six friends and associates over the years and they are equally pleased.
Price point for services rendered can NOT be beat.
I know I’ll be with them for the rest of my professional life.
Hi,
Thank you guys for sharing your experiences.