I currently have all my web hosting (very little), mail and usenet news from Gradwell Dot Com, in general I'm happy with the service but they do seem to be becoming a specialist VOIP supplier with the web hosting playing second fiddle so I'm looking for alternatives so that I can spread the risk a bit and/or be ready to move if I feel the need.
I realise it's quite a spread of services I'm after so maybe there aren't any other 'Gradwells' out there that can provide it all in which case I may go for separate suppliers. I suppose that at least minimises the chaos if something goes wrong.
What I'm after is:-
A good, fast, no binaries, NNTP server. Preferably associated with an ssh shell hosting service so that I can run a command line news reader with near instant response from the NNTP server. When I moved to Gradwell it was a revelation how fast their service was compared with anything that accessed the NNTP server across the internet.
Mail forwarding under my control in some shape or form. Currently most of our (family and small business) mail is read usign the IMAP servers at Gradwell except for mine which I forward to the machine where I have the ssh account and read it with mutt there.
Hosting with ssh access.
I'm wondering if a virtual server might make sense, they're available for a tenner a month (or less?) now. Does anyone here have experience of virtual servers?
Any recommendations (or otherwise) for good hosting would be welcome, one major criterion is fast interactive ssh access as I do all of news and mail handling via ssh to 'their' server.
Oh, one final "nice to have" requirement - while Googling around yesterday I saw one hosting site offering ssh access *plus* a web to ssh interface so you could get to the command line from anywhere with a browser. I.e. you wouldn't have to install putty onto a friend's machine to read your mail.
2009/4/16 Chris G cl@isbd.net
I'm wondering if a virtual server might make sense, they're available for a tenner a month (or less?) now. Does anyone here have experience of virtual servers?
I've had good experience at http://1and1.co.uk/
Their cheapest vserver is a tad more than you suggest at £15pcm - but their support has been excellent when I've had to use it, and would recommend them. They offer a number of Linux based OS, though I have to admit that the current packages I use with them is (ahem) Windows Server - but as they don't offer OS support I don't see that makes much difference to the recommendation. Their control panel offers a reboot facility if the server locks up - or a complete re-image if you cock things up completely - which I've had to use once. Tip: When setting up a software firewall, remember to allow through the port you use to logon to the system.
We did have issues with their Web hosting service - but that was because we were overloading it. We've since upgraded to a 4 CPU/8GB physical server!
I did look at Amazon EC2 instances. I like the principle of them, but they are just so expensive compared to dedicated servers if your running 24x7.
Greg
On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 07:12:44PM +0100, Greg Thomas wrote:
2009/4/16 Chris G cl@isbd.net
I'm wondering if a virtual server might make sense, they're available for a tenner a month (or less?) now. Does anyone here have experience of virtual servers?
I've had good experience at http://1and1.co.uk/
They're one of the places my searches have taken me to. They have a special offer on their Linux virtual servers at the moment - £11.99 per month for the first six months.
Their cheapest vserver is a tad more than you suggest at £15pcm - but their support has been excellent when I've had to use it, and would recommend them. They offer a number of Linux based OS, though I have to admit that the current packages I use with them is (ahem) Windows Server - but as they don't offer OS support I don't see that makes much difference to the recommendation. Their control panel offers a reboot facility if the server locks up - or a complete re-image if you cock things up completely - which I've had to use once. Tip: When setting up a software firewall, remember to allow through the port you use to logon to the system.
:-)
We did have issues with their Web hosting service - but that was because we were overloading it. We've since upgraded to a 4 CPU/8GB physical server!
I did look at Amazon EC2 instances. I like the principle of them, but they are just so expensive compared to dedicated servers if your running 24x7.
Thanks for the feedback.
2009/4/16 Chris G cl@isbd.net:
On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 07:12:44PM +0100, Greg Thomas wrote:
I've had good experience at http://1and1.co.uk/
They're one of the places my searches have taken me to. They have a special offer on their Linux virtual servers at the moment - £11.99 per month for the first six months.
Make sure you read the fine print. My only criticism. If you sign up for a "discounted" package, you may find that you're in for a longer minimum term than you expected. You'll also find in six months time you "really expensive" package is now really cheap - but you are still paying the old rate. Even if you're outside the minimum term, you have to order a new package at the cheaper rate, transfer everything, then cancel the old expensive package. I can't say I blame them, really, it's just a PITA.
Greg
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Chris G -
Greg Thomas