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How Can I Find a Good Web Host?

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Summary: Where to host your website depends on what kind of a website it is. Options range from free to expensive based on your needs.

How Can I Find a Good Web Host?

You've got a web site, and you're looking for a good web host. But there are so many web hosts that it's almost impossible to tell one from the other, much less understand if they'll be what you need. There are a number of factors to consider when selecting a web host, and we'll cover several of them here.

We'll start with the practical reality: how much can you afford to spend on a web host?

If the answer is "nothing" then you're not completely out of luck, but you will have to live with some restrictions. Depending on your needs there's a good chance you may not care about the restrictions. Here are some of options for free web hosting:

Your ISP: Chances are that you have some amount of "personal web space" available to you as part of your account with your Internet Service Provider. You're already paying for your account so the incremental cost is free. Limitations might include:

  • a fixed amount of storage (usually from 5 to 25 megabytes - good for a small to medium sized site)
  • an inflexible URL (usually http://yourISPname/~youraccount)
  • limitations on any server-side components and almost certainly a restriction on any server-side custom scripting.
  • possible bandwidth constraints which are either a limit to the amount of data that visitors are allowed to view from your site over a period of time, or simply poor effective bandwidth as you share it with other sites on the same server or hosted by the same ISP.

A common them among ISPs is that many of these restrictions can be adjusted or lifted - for an additional fee, of course.

Free Web Hosting Sites: There are several services out there that will host your website for free. The most common one I see is Yahoo! GeoCities. Limitations are similar to those I listed above for many ISPs with the addition that for ads will appear as part of, or over a portion of, your website.

And also as before, many of the restrictions including the ad requirement can be adjusted or lifted for an additional fee.

Your Own Machine: if your expected bandwidth needs are low and you're connected to the internet via some type of broadband connection and you can leave a machine on all the time and your ISP allows it and you're a bit technical to begin with, then you might just be able to host your own web site on your own machine in your own home. This really does take a little bit of education about setting up servers and dealing with things like the DNS system if you have a dynamic IP address but is actually quite doable.

The biggest roadblock to this approach is typically ISPs who allocate their resources assuming your connection is that of a simple client and not a web server. Their policies will often specify that you may not run a web server on your connection. Though, you guessed it, this restriction can often be lifted - for an additional fee.

If you have a little money to spend there are more options:

Shared Server Web Hosting: shared web hosting is a lot like the service you might get from your ISP. For a relatively low monthly fee you get some amount of space and bandwidth. Many ecommerce and commercial web sites are in fact shared hosting sites. Shared hosting companies often provide better service since it's all they do, and they offer assistance in doing things like getting and setting up your own domain name or other features.

Managed Hosting: If you want a dedicated server all to yourself but you don't want to worry about the details of managing the machine, the operating system, and the software on it; you just want to host your site (or sites), then managed web hosting might be for you. It's the most expensive alternative (pricing varies on machine and bandwidth specifics) but the hosting company takes care of "managing" your server for you - including software updates, hardware issues, downtime, and often backups as well. Ask-Leo! is hosted on a managed server at Rackspace.

UNManaged Hosting: This is exactly what it implies, the web hosting service provides a server, power, and a network connection. Everything else is up to you. This requires the most expertise but can also be surprisingly cost effective. Typically you get full remote access capability to the server that is dedicated only to you. With great power comes great responsibility though, and you'll be responsible for any and all software on your box as well as backup.

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Article 143 | Posted January 23, 2004

Recent Comments

After much searching on google, I went to FindMyHosting.com and signed up with 3Essentials hosting (www.3essentials.com). They had excellent ratings, which was primarily why I chose them. Since I was a little hesitant, I called them to get some questions answered. They're really responsive, I got someone of the first two rings.

Happy Host Hunting...
W.T.

Posted by: W.T. at January 9, 2006 09:48 AM

I have found an excellent web host. They help me with every problem I have ever had and they are very cheap too!

http://www.affiliatebus.com/hosting.php

Thanks for the help!
Jonathan

Posted by: Jonathan Bismark at January 26, 2006 07:43 PM

i have a static ip,how can i host my website on my system.plz help me in access my file via ip address anywhere...

Posted by: bannu456 at May 4, 2006 08:54 PM

Hello, I would like to know is there a company that I can call that will help me with my key words to put me at the top. Also, is it a good idea to have more than one .com address for a business. I was told that some company have as many as 40

Posted by: dywayne at January 29, 2007 02:04 AM

Dear Leo,

Thanks for all the help and the answers that you have posted. I'm an editor and i like to post a website for me including all my videos editing etc..like a demo reel.

I was wondering how much it cost by month or year? for a webserver to host my files. say for exemple i have 100mb or 200mb of data. is it very expensive and it's better to do it from home if i have broadband cable 786kbs?

thanks

Posted by: David at September 20, 2007 03:16 AM

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

There's no single answer ... it depends on your needs. It can be free,
inexpensive ($10/mo) expensive ($100's per month) or more. My guess is for
someone starting out free or inexpensive will do just fine until you discover
you need more, at which point you upgrade. (It's the path I took).

I do NOT recommend hosting it yourself on your DSL. Outside access will quickly
saturate your connection and make it slow for you to use.

Leo


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Posted by: Leo A. Notenboom at September 20, 2007 12:24 PM

Found some pretty balanced reviews over at http://thebestwebhostingreview.com. Hope this helps.

It really depends on your needs. The site I just mentioned seems to only cover cheap, shared hosting.

Posted by: BC at December 25, 2007 04:46 PM

I have changed a lot of host providers along the years, because their support was miserable.
The only host I could find, which is cheap and reliable, with 24h support is: http://www.eboundhost.com/af/af-sabre
Livehost.net used to be the best, but not anymore since Thomas left.

Posted by: Val at January 28, 2008 02:34 PM

i know this topic is too old , but i reach to this article within my search , so i want to mention some companies which offer a wonderful free hosting such as byethost.com and ofcourse these days we can't forget blogers websites such as blogger.com , blog.com , blogspot.com , wordpress.com and more ...

thanks leo...
http://www.seo123.ws/links

Posted by: peter at June 19, 2008 04:48 PM

This is the best place to go, they are such a help!

http://www.lunarpages.com/id/aham2936

Posted by: Alex at July 4, 2008 11:00 PM

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