Non-unlimited Hostgator Alternatives? For both hosting and VPS?
 

Hey,

I notice you are very knowledgeable about hosting and see you post one webhostingforum as well. Curious if you can give me some advice. I have been looking at some alternatives then the typical EIG companies (i have a few sites left at Hostgator) and wonder w hat your thoughts are on host dime, site5 and others. I actually don't want an "unlimited" host since I like to use all the stuff you can do with a hosting accounts with limits (own cloud for example) so curious who you might suggest.

I use Veerotech right now and they are decent but I have had server downtime a lot in the last couple months which is bugging me. That being said they are responsive when I put requests in.

Given that they use light speed I can't use them for adult products so was curious your thoughts on other hosts for shared, reseller and VPS.

This question was asked in a private message. Rather than hide our tech advice in private conversations, Site Staff will often answer PMs (from any site) here in the digitalFAQ.com forum, so that others may read and benefit from our expertise. Please continue the conversation here. Either login or join as a Free Member, and we can continue troubleshooting your video, photo or web related issue. Thanks for understanding our tech Q&A policies.

When you've been around for years, you learn a few things. I like to help others avoid the same mistakes that I made in my past. So let's get you on the right path...

Not a problem, glad to help. :)

Hostdime is okay ... but other hosts are better. And Site5 is one of the better ones.

The full list of suggested hosts is here: http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/web-...web-hosts.html.

EIG is a horrible operation. And as you may have read, it's a company that screwed me over 3 times by buying out hosts that were being used. Back in 2006, EIG's obliteration of Readyhosting damaged part of this site. Long story there, but that's when I began to warn others of their bad behavior. Getting away from the EIG monster is definitely in your best interests.

If you don't need "unlimited" (which actually *is* limited), then look at hosts that specify resources. These days, it's really about disk space, not bandwidth, though both are advertised (often falsely) as "unlimited". So consider a resource-specifying host like Stablehost or Namecheap.

Just note that not all "unlimited" hosts are bad. Site5, Arvixe, and several others do an admirable job of trying to be transparent about what is and is not limited. (Even Stablehost has unlimited bandwidth, as bandwidth is cheap these days.)

Veerotech is a really good host that's been around for several years now. It's why they're one of our suggested hosts. It's also a host that we rely on for several satellite projects, both for reseller and for VPS.

The only negative is that they're still finding their long-term footings. There's some changes to their policies and offerings. But long-term, these are all good things. It's only a temporary nuisance. I keep in touch with many hosting owners, and that's one of them. I like what I see and hear, and it's only going to get better.

What server are you on?

Yes, for adult hosting, I strongly suggest Arvixe.

For everything else, it really depends on budget requirements (which hopefully isn't stupid cheap), and exact location needs (if any). My favorite hosts are pretty well reflected in the review list, but I can deviate when giving exact one-on-one advice.

At the moment, Veerotech is still a favorite for reseller hosting, as is Stream101.
Stablehost and WebhostingBuzz for shared
And Namecheap and EuroVPS for Xen VPS. Stablehost for OpenVZ/Virtuozzo VPS.*

* Stablehost finally has OpenVZ vswap! Woohoo! Excellent.

So tell me more about your sites, and I can help you narrow it down to the best choice. :congrats:

Hi there - I am concerned about this, do you have any ticket numbers that I could take a look at?

Hey, thanks for answering. I sent it in private because I didn't want Brent freaking out when I asked questions because I am still happy with them, just concerned on a few items. I always need a plan B if things don't work out which is why I always do research.

And to give Veerotech credit where credit is due, Brent spent a ton of time answering every tiny little question I had on hosting before I signed up which I think you would have a hard time getting from many other hosts.

I am on their level 2 reseller in their Dallas Data Center. I love the fact it comes with WHM, WHCMS (which I am not using but trying to get implemented), lightspeed and softaculous and I never use all the resources so rather be able to use everything softaculous provides versus being artificially limited. I use the high quality servers as one of my selling points when it comes to my clients versus the yahoo's here in town that use GoDaddy. I also love that it comes with its own domain reseller.

That being said they have had some servers in Dallas that have had issues and been down several times. I know they are transitioning me out to other servers but my sites have been down twice in the last month or so. I have also had issues with emails disappearing or not routing out when I forward them to a clients gmail account. Several got lost on one client account which they gave me an earful which forced me to put them on Google Apps earlier than planned. Another client gets half the emails in her Gmail account and I know they (Veerotech) see them going out but I have looked in the clients gmail account and they never come through. This is not an issue I have ever had with HostGator (EEK). I think there are some latency issues with one of the Tier 1 providers but that is not Veerotech's fault but it does cause slow load times (I can't move to east coast servers since my clients are in Hawaii and I worry about latency).

I have three parts to my business, local websites (hence the reseller program), ecommerce sites I run myself and internet marketing courses I create. I love being able to log into one cpanel and get to every other account on my hosting. I love having softaculous over simple scripts or fantastico and I love knowing my limits so if I want to use something like owncloud to store files, I am within the T&C's of the hosting provider. Cloudflare is fantastic as well.

I have a couple sites I will transition away from HostGator in the next few months and I can put them on my reseller hosting but I have gotten some interest in the adult field so I want to push those models to good quality hosting, another reason I ask. Also, I get asked sometimes about hosting suggestions and if there is one thing Veerotech doesn't provide is the chat function, not a big deal to me, but it is for others.

The email issues I worry about since I run Digital Access Pass and need to make sure the CRON job sends the appropriate email out. I worry that emails won't go out. I am considering using either Mandrill or Sendgrid to ensure emails are going out but that is an additional cost I need to budget in for clients.

WHY Reseller versus VPS?

While I am still learning how to code and learning more about Linux I wont pretend I am at any place to run my own servers. With Reseller I feel like I have less to maintain than if I got my own VPS. Right now I think I pay $35 and will probably need to go up to level 3 soon but it doesn't bother me as I do have clients paying the cost and I want to make sure they have good hosting. And, I like supporting the small guy.

Conflicting Opinions on Hosting Companies

I also asked because I had looked at Site5 and got a lot of conflicting information, some loved them, some hated them, some thought they had good tech support, some thought they had bad. I was interested in Hostdime since they are using SSD HD but the biggest issue I had with them is Orlando hosting.

Sorry about the rambling but I am truly looking to get the best hosting experience for those that ask, not just a quick $100 affiliate payment. Plus, when I have issues with client sites, I get an earful. Unfortunately clients here in Hawaii spend so much on rent that it leaves little less for other expenses so I need to balance quality with cost. I feel like I get this with limits because I can always add.

Brent, I am sure you know who this is now but I wanted to keep it quiet since I do think you provide a good experience, there just some issues that concern me, and I didn't want this to be indexed in the interwebs and think you are not a good host.

Would you mind touching base with me via a ticket (please specify you need to speak with me)? We've had a few routing issues in Dallas this month that caused some connectivity issues and I'd like to see if this is what caused an issue with the server your accounts are on. If it wasn't, I'd like to further investigate and take action immediately to be sure this doesn't happen again.

-Brent

Brent,

I sent a ticket in but I don't see it in my support portal so making sure you got it.

I don't see any recently opened tickets - did you open it from inside the account management portal?

I doubt you could make them ever freak out. Not their style. You'll only get professional high-quality responses from them -- especially Brent. I actually enjoy seeing how hosts respond to problems. That's what makes them quality or not. We're also a Veerotech customer, with a reseller plan in Dallas. But we've not seen any issues.

That means either
(A) Our monitors are not working correctly, or
(B) You're having an isolated issue with that account, or with that server.

Anyway, Veerotech aside...

You may find this tool from Site5 interesting: http://www.website.me

Yes, getting away from Hostgator is in your best interests. If you needs adult content, you'll want to avoid putting those sites on LiteSpeed servers. Arvixe is my suggestion for sites of that nature.

Chat "techs" are almost never techs. Real techs answer tickets -- not phone or chat. What you end up with on chat/phone is a glorified secretary -- not even L1, more like L0 techs! You may feel better talking to a "live person", but it isn't somebody that can really help you. They can only respond to very basic questions ("how do I use FTP?", "how do I set up email", etc). And most of that is in a knowledgebase (KB) if the lazy person would bother looking.

I would recommend Mandrill for DAP. (Tip: Use port 2525.)

Yes, agreed, running your own VPS is usually a bad idea. See also The Myth of VPS Hosting: Reasons to Avoid It! Part 1. Veerotech, Stream101 and Stablehost all have excellent reseller plans, and all are "small guys" that we use for similar reason. No reason to use a VPS, unless you just really need a custom environment AND have the skills to admin the server.

Most online reviews for large hosts are infested with know-nothing comments. You need to separate real comments from those that barely know how to turn on a computer. Because that latter group of people tend to gripe, and their comments are often useless. That goes for both good and bad feedback! Just think of all the complete idiots that still claim they have "no problems" with Bluehost/Hostgator ... but we all know the entire host (all servers!) have been down 4-5 times, for a day each, in the last 8 months. So you need to be careful with what you read.

SSD will not help as much as Orlando may hurt, being that you have a Hawaii location. I would not suggest anything east of Dallas.

Stablehost (Phoenix) may be ideal for you, though it has LiteSpeed.

So Arvixe in Dallas is probably your best bet.

Site5.com is also in Dallas, but I forget if adult content is against their ToS.

Namecheap is another good option, also Dallas, but again check their ToS for adult. I forget off-hand if they're using LiteSpeed.

Yep, choosing a good host is always in your best interests. I spend my time using sites daily, not trying to make them run. We have dedicated servers, VPS and reseller accounts with some of the best hosts around the world. It's rare that I have to fart around with a server, as opposed to using it. That's always the goal to me.

Threads like this will only help them. :congrats:

Brent, Sent it in via support portal so let me know if you don't get it.

I agree with everything said on here. While I am not a full on tech I am not ignorant of hosting. The last project I worked on before striking out on my own was the building of a Global Data Center in Utah (Gold lead certified, $325 million dollar project) for the Fortune 500 internet company I worked for. I was part of the risk management and insurance team on the project as well as insuring the business interruption risk of those data centers going down. I learned a lot about data centers and how websites talk on those projects.

I like Dallas and Phoenix because they are in Zone 1 earthquake zones with connections to quality power and fiber sources. Utah is a risky earthquake zone (zone 3) and while not as dangerous as California or Oregon, remember, 11k foot mountains don't just pop up out of no where.

You are right I don't want to go further east than Midwest given my clients in Hawaii which is why I am always looking for the best for my money.

Thanks for the website.me , it looks really interesting. themes also has something similar I haven't tried yet but as I get more clients and websites might make sense.

Brent, part of the reason I want to get this cleared up is I am working on a new course that I want to be able to recommend your service to those in the course. I just want to make sure the uptime is there and the email works properly. While the affiliate commission is nice it is not the reason I am wanting to recommend. I hate everyone of the GURU's that push Bluehost which IMO is about 10X worse than hostgator. I have one client on Bluehost and my god... slow... slow... slow and a crappy cpanel. I am doing everything I can to get them onto my reseller hosting.

Thanks for all the help everyone and if anyone needs help from me on anything (doubt it, you guys have it down it seems), please let me know.

I did get it & have replied about the email issue. There's a number of things that could have happened with the email issue. Once you reply back with a to/from address, I can attempt to track it down - it depends on how long ago the issue was.

It looks like your account is on one of our oldest servers, which will be getting upgraded soon. There has been some issues with this server aside from your email issue we've had two occasional issues:

• 1. a network routing issue
• 2. a glitch that forces the server to only transfer speeds at 100mbps vs gigabit, which causes a high I/O wait and ultimately slows the server down. We think this may be network related.

That said, we know this server needs to be upgraded (more so a migration to a new server). To keep from causing chaos, we don't migrate entire servers willy-nilly (referring to the HostGator "upgrade" when EIG acquired them).

Looking at your account, your storage usage is fairly low, which means it wouldn't take very long to do a transfer to another server. If you're interested, I'd be willing to give you an upgrade to our cloud servers with the same plan specs in terms of bandwidth & storage. We could also put a single site on our cloud to have you test before hand.

The only thing is, our cloud is located in Chicago (not much further from Dallas in terms of connectivity though).

Some details can be found here: http://www.veerotech.net/cloud-web-hosting

I'd like to note also, our "cloud" isn't the typical "cloud" you'll find many throwing around as simply a buzzword - it's build on VMware & NetApp, 2 technologies that are mostly used in the corporate world in terms of IT. This is "high availability" hosting that is extremely fault tolerant the only single point of failure is the website itself.

You'd also have much higher resources in terms of I/O & memory per account:

• 4GB Memory
• 20mbps I/O

If you'd be interested in this, please let me know. Else, I'll wait for you to reply to the current ticket so I can do some troubleshooting in regards to the email issue. The server itself, while there's been a few minor intermittent connectivity issues, is still within our 99.9% threshold, 99.973% to be exact for last month.

-Brent

Can you elaborate on this a bit more? What type of "adult products" are you talking about? There's a few misconceptions that have been going around for quite some time on what is allowed on a Litespeed server in terms of "adult" content. Given that this is a public forum, we can discuss further via ticket about that depending on what you're looking to host.

Thanks Brent,

I will put it on my list to look at the cloud hosting this week. I am not concerned about Chicago since latency will about the same and plus my family lives in Chicago so I am assuming this is the Data Centers up around northern Chicago which if I remember correctly were quite advanced (microsoft had a big one up that way).

My biggest worry is the management compared to reseller. I don't pretend to be a linux or vmware person, in fact I am just starting to do virtualization on my MAC which can show you how little I really know.

In the Cloud servers do you get the same "tools" you do with a reseller account, such as WHM, Cpanel on each account, enom reseller, private Name Servers, softaculous, etc? Will i have any issues using something like DAP (works fine on normal servers) Also, do you get the same type of support you get from the normal hosting? Sorry if these are silly questions but I don't want to step into something I am not prepared for (everyone pipe up here on what I should do too)i.e. better servers but have to manage them all myself.

You are right I don't have a ton of storage. Most of these are little local businesses and when I build the sites I make sure the images are small enough to get quick load times. I only have one client that I am moving in that has a little higher storage issues because he is a Master Sommelier and he blogs a lot. I will be doing some commerce sites too but I don't do big heavy sites anyway.

BTW, did we ever figure out what was going on with Ion Cube and PHP?

I should have been more specific in details - we run our "cloud servers" on top of the VMware & NetApp infrastructure to provide the same features in terms of cPanel, WHM, etc. Your features & usability options would not change. In short, anything you have running on your accounts now, should not have any issues with going up to our cloud platform.

Our cloud is IaaS through Atlantic Metro, which our Chicago location is at 725 South Wells Street.

The major difference is the back end & the resources per account.

Support is the same, no matter what the ticket is for, we don't have different service standards for different products unless it's for something like a self managed server. No worries - silly questions are only silly if not asked. :)

I see your domain is using our DNS cluster for your private nameservers, which is good. There wouldn't be any DNS changed needed either, as ALL of our servers use the same cluster.

BTW, did we ever figure out what was going on with Ion Cube and PHP? - I dropped the ball on this. The problem appears to have been with Softaculous. How heavy is your WHMCS in terms of usage? I'd like to work with you to do a fresh install using a "full" WHMCS package and not the automated install from Softaculous. Let me do some testing with a test account to be 100% sure this is the case before we start fooling with a site that's in production.

-Brent

Brent,

I actually have not used WHCMS yet since I haven't take the time to set everything up yet but I want to by Q4 instead of sending out manual invoiced to clients. Getting WHCMS is a bit daunting so I have been procrastinating a bit so when you get a chance, test the fresh install and let me know, I can always uninstall via softaculous and we can then just FTP into the account and do a fresh install. Curious if you recommend installing it on a subdomain, i.e. billing.mydomain.com or how I have it with my domain.com/billing ?

Let me look over this stuff this week. I kinda feel like a fool not to take you up on the offer right away but I just want to know what I am getting myself into before making the move. ;)

Will do. Per the ticket reply, I'm actively tracking down the email issue.

For the upgrade offer, no rush - it's an open offer and would be extended whenever you have a chance to decide.

I would recommend that you run it on its own cPanel account using a subdomain - billing.yourdomain.com - this will help keep things isolated. We can help set this up for you as well, no problems there. I'd also highly recommend an SSL for it - using the FQDN of the subdomain, so https://billing.yourdomain.com

-Brent

As I've mentioned, Hostgator is Bluehost. EIG migrated HG into their structure, and converted it to the "Bluehost method". For example, using the non-better BetterLinux OS. (It's really buggy, and looks to be nothing more than a really badly reversed engineered version of the industry standard CloudLinux.)

I hate the "gurus". And the ninjas, rock stars, masters, and whatever else the snake-oil peddling 20-something choose to call themselves. To me, nothing says "narcissistic millennial kid" more than those ridiculous descriptions. Most of Generation X and the Baby Boomers -- the people with money! -- find them to be completely stupid. Take my advice: When you see the guru/etc non-sense, run! Find yourself a professional, and avoid those Google-educated goobers.

Sorry, pet peeve. :P

We're doing this as well, for many services. But I'm not impressed with WHMCS, and we're instead deciding between Blesta and ClientExec. CE is an option with your Veerotech reseller account, and then we have an owned license for Blesta. Like Windows desktops and WordPress sites, WHMCS is too big a target. So, as with hosting, choose your billing panel wisely.

Just to add: Subdomain as it's own cPanel account. Not a subdomain under the main domain account. This is another good reason to have multiple hosts and multiple servers. When we launch our billing portal, it's going to be on a completely different VPS. Veerotech is where we have a reseller account, but the main sites and billing portal are on one of our other servers. (Note that we're not a "host" as such, though we do host clients. And we need a billing panel for multiple reasons, not just those hosting with us.)

Completely difference animal. I have Wine and Parallels on my Mac, and it doesn't have anything in common with server virtualization. Desktop and server tech is completely separate, and there's honestly zero overlap. Desktops are simple by comparison. Something like VMware Fusion or Parallels is very dummy friendly, while Wine can have a small learning curve for advanced workflows (like video editing). But servers are at least 10x harder than Wine.

Admin'ing your own server is not fun. I do it daily, and sometimes I don't want to. Use shared/reseller for as long as possible. And when you do have to upgrade to VPS (or cloud VPS), get a good service for management.

I missed this question. I have gotten a couple of requests from Adult Cam models to set up their membership sites. Drupal is what I would probably use for them but I don't want to run into issues if they are nude models. I would never suggest the stream off their hosting service but it is still adult. Am I incorrect about what light speed allows?

Brent, would it be easier for me to load in ClientExec instead of WHCMS? I am indifferent to which platform, I am just looking to automate my billing (mandate from the wife since she does my books - be careful marrying a woman with a CS, Accounting and MSIS degrees).

And since I can't seem to pull all my thoughts together right now, could we used the shared SSL or do I need to go get my own and if so... suggestions for an inexpensive SSL...

Ahh, yea, that wouldn't work with LiteSpeed - things like an adult "store" and such are OK.

That's entirely up to you - I've never used ClientExec, as we are heavily based in WHMCS so I can't comment on them.

If it's going to be used on your reseller plan, the plan includes a domain standard SSL - just be sure to be certain which domain you'd like to have it issued for.

I'd be more worried about how she reacts to nude models. :laugh:

Not domain (something.com), but the FQDN (fully qualified domain name, which also means subdomain). So you'd want it to be on "billing.domain.com", not domain.com, if using best practices of NOT having a billing panel on the primary site. For example, as discussed above/earlier, to have it be a separate cPanel "domain" (which can be a subdomain in cPanel). Subdomains do not have to be virtual, which is what it is when added inside a root domain account.

I know, this is complex. I hope it makes sense to you (offliner). :unsure:

// change topic

I'd still recommend having multiple hosts, depending on the need. Accounts at both Veerotech and Stablehost are one of the strategies we employ. (Although we have about a dozen servers powering our business in all, some dedicated, some VPS, some reseller. This site is power by EuroVPS and Namecheap currently. I curious how well it loads for you, being Hawaii access from an Amsterdam server. It should be fast.)

I think your original intention to this thread was heading the right direction. I just didn't want you to ditch Veerotech. I'd make it a primary.

@Brent:

You know what would be nice? If hosts would sell reseller accounts with satellite access to another server for the helpdesk/billing panel. That would remove the need for multiple hosts. If one goes down, the whole thing doesn't tank. That's always been the concern. (Noting I hate hosts that use others hosts for their sites/panels. That shows zero confidence in their own offerings!)

And given the advances in resource calculations, I wonder if it could sum all space/db resource use by both accounts into a single stat. That way, the main reseller and single billing/support shared account (on another cPanel server) would pool disk/bandwidth/db resources. Not CPU or RAM, of course. That's another benefit of the satellite server.

It's something unique that you should look into. :wink2:

Did I tell you she is not only incredibly brilliant but incredibly cool as well?

Yep I get it. I am just trying to figure everything out as I streamline my business.

My biggest concern is keeping them out of natural disaster areas like earthquake and flood, its the Risk Manager in me. While my business is not at the point where I need multiple hosts, I am big on being prepared deepening on my needs and always having a plan B, C, and D.

I have a commerce store I am transitioning off of Shopify into Opencart right now so I gotta figure out where I am better off putting that SSL. Still means I need to buy an SSL (and I only have one IP address not two if I remember correctly). Still would love some recommendations on inexpensive (name cheap has some inexpensive ones) depending on how much protection you really need

I'm curious what you did, if anything...

What about tornadoes, hurricanes, landslides, volcanic eruptions, etc? (It's a rhetorical question.) I saw a statistic a few weeks ago, that showed something like 85% of the U.S. is in natural disaster zones of some kind, with 100% of cities having some issue. In fact, devastation is worse in cities, and it's not because of the density. People there are just poorer prepared.

Other countries were mostly worse!

So ... good luck! :hmm:

We've updated our list of suggested hosts several times since this post, so give it another gander:

Need a good web host? — Read our 2018 Review of the Best Web Hosts Quite often, problems with web sites are caused by having a rotten web host. Worse yet, many hosts try to blame you (the customer) for the problems! So dump that lousy company. Say goodbye to slow sites, unresponsive support techs, and downtime. Find yourself a new host today. Whether you need shared, reseller, VPS, semi-dedicated, cloud, or dedicated hosting, something on our list should be a good upgrade for you.