Find the Right Host for You!

CannonBallGuyCannonBallGuy ModeratorShared Hoster
in Hosting Discussion & News
Finding the right host for You!

There are thousands many web hosts out there!
This guide will help you choose the best one!


If you're going to make a website, you're going to need a host to get it onto the World Wide Web.
When looking for a web host, you need to think about several things:

1. Size
The amount of web space is obviously important, but keep in mind, most plain web pages consisting mainly of text will be under 25kb.
So if your only going to have say 10 pages and they are all going to be text, you only need a quarter of a MB.
If your going to have a few hundred pages all with lots of flash and images, you will need a lot more.

2. Bandwidth
Basically, the more people that go to your site, the more bandwidth you will need.
If the site is only aimed at friends and family, you won't need much at all. But if your making a big free flash game site, loads of people will be visiting every day and they will use up a lot of bandwidth quickly.

3. Uptime
This is how much the hosts servers are up. If they have a poor uptime, for quite a lot of the time, people won't be able to go to your site.
Lots of hosts have a 99.9% guarantee.

4. File Transfer
The most common way to get your site onto your server is to use FTP. I would avoid hosts that do not provide this as it is a pretty basic requirement.

5. Support
A host with a working, free, 24/7 phone line is great, but these are hard to find.
Try asking the support staff a few tricky questions to see if they actually know what they are on about.

6. Email
Most hosts will provide some form of email but you may require more than one address. You may also require POP3 access and the ability to Forward emails.

7. Secure Server
If your going to be running a shop, you may need a Secure server which not all hosts offer.

8. PHP, CGI-bin, htaccess
These are quite important. If a host doesn't have these look elsewhere.

9. Subdomains
You may or may not need to have subdomains (http://SUBDOMAIN.yoursite.com) and you will need to know how many you need too.

10. File types
Things like FrontPage extensions. These are not always allowed and this is bad if you use FP.

Good Luck!

If you know of anything I could add to this article or think something is wrong, please email me or check out my site!

- CannonBallGuy
IndexScript Forum

Comments

  • PythonPython Forum Leader The Royal RAM
    yet another great article from CBG :)

    The Royal Ram

  • CannonBallGuyCannonBallGuy Moderator Shared Hoster
    You really think my articles are any good? lol
    IndexScript Forum
  • ayushsinhalayushsinhal Junior Member Shared Hoster
    CannonBallGuy wrote: »
    Finding the right host for You!

    There are thousands many web hosts out there!
    This guide will help you choose the best one!


    If you're going to make a website, you're going to need a host to get it onto the World Wide Web.
    When looking for a web host, you need to think about several things:

    1. Size
    The amount of web space is obviously important, but keep in mind, most plain web pages consisting mainly of text will be under 25kb.
    So if your only going to have say 10 pages and they are all going to be text, you only need a quarter of a MB.
    If your going to have a few hundred pages all with lots of flash and images, you will need a lot more.

    2. Bandwidth
    Basically, the more people that go to your site, the more bandwidth you will need.
    If the site is only aimed at friends and family, you won't need much at all. But if your making a big free flash game site, loads of people will be visiting every day and they will use up a lot of bandwidth quickly.

    3. Uptime
    This is how much the hosts servers are up. If they have a poor uptime, for quite a lot of the time, people won't be able to go to your site.
    Lots of hosts have a 99.9% guarantee.

    4. File Transfer
    The most common way to get your site onto your server is to use FTP. I would avoid hosts that do not provide this as it is a pretty basic requirement.

    5. Support
    A host with a working, free, 24/7 phone line is great, but these are hard to find.
    Try asking the support staff a few tricky questions to see if they actually know what they are on about.

    6. Email
    Most hosts will provide some form of email but you may require more than one address. You may also require POP3 access and the ability to Forward emails.

    7. Secure Server
    If your going to be running a shop, you may need a Secure server which not all hosts offer.

    8. PHP, CGI-bin, htaccess
    These are quite important. If a host doesn't have these look elsewhere.

    9. Subdomains
    You may or may not need to have subdomains (http://SUBDOMAIN.yoursite.com) and you will need to know how many you need too.

    10. File types
    Things like FrontPage extensions. These are not always allowed and this is bad if you use FP.

    Good Luck!

    If you know of anything I could add to this article or think something is wrong, please email me or check out my site!

    - CannonBallGuy



    very good article
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