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Building a website... need advice on hosting etc

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dcv

macrumors G3
Original poster
May 24, 2005
8,021
1
I'm about to build a website for my sister's new business. I'm an application developer so I know my DHTML/XML etc but have only ever worked on corporate intranet applications and never actually built a website in my life!

So far we have bought a domain name. Er, what do I do next? :eek: I need to find someone to host the site - any recommendations? I'm based in the UK if that makes any difference. I just clicked onto uk2.net but I have no idea about how much web space I'd actually need, or monthly traffic, etc :confused:

The site will contain company contact info (remember this isn't a personal website), news, client biographies and there will be downloadable content (video/audio clips) which will obviously take up some space. (How much? I don't know yet.)

What do I need to look for in the web host?


Apologies for the completely stupid n00b questions*... any advice/recommendations or links to existing useful threads here or external sites would be greatly appreciated. Cheers :)



*and oh god, there will be more...
 
dpaanlka

dpaanlka

macrumors 601
Nov 16, 2004
4,868
30
Illinois
Well Dreamhost is ridiculously cheap if your ok with occasional short spasms of downtime.

$10 a month for 20gb of space ant 1TB of bandwidth and like 650 or more email addresses, plus every week that you continue being a customer they add more storage space and bandwidth.
 
Apple2Mac

Apple2Mac

macrumors regular
Sep 3, 2006
108
0
If you are looking for simple inexpensive hosting I like IXWebHosting

They both provide multiple domain hosting per account, PHP, ASP and MySQL...
 
Flowbee

Flowbee

macrumors 68030
Dec 27, 2002
2,943
0
Alameda, CA
dcv said:
Apologies for the completely stupid n00b questions*... any advice/recommendations or links to existing useful threads here or external sites would be greatly appreciated. Cheers :)
Click to expand...

Well, there's this thread...

There are a few things you want to consider when choosing a host (in addition to price):

The amount of storage space you get on the server.
The monthly amount af bandwidth your allowed (especially important if you're hosting audio and video).
The charge for additional bandwidth, should you exceed you monthly maximum.
The tools and services that are provided with the account.
The hours and responsiveness of customer service.
Average amount of server 'downtime.'

I personally use A Small Orange, and they have been wonderful for me, but they don't offer quite as much bandwidth/£ as many other hosts.
 
D

dcv

macrumors G3
Original poster
May 24, 2005
8,021
1
Thanks for the replies, I shall have a look at your suggestions :)
 
EricNau

EricNau

Moderator emeritus
Apr 27, 2005
10,728
281
San Francisco, CA
I asked about hosting on here also, and A Small Orange was very highly recommnded, so that's what I chose.

It's great and their service is AMAZING!
 
XIII

XIII

macrumors 68040
Aug 15, 2004
3,449
0
England
DON'T use Dreamhost.

Hosts I have found to be reliable: Site5.com, and asmallorange.com :)

Site5's plans will probably be excessive for your sister's site, ASO would be about right I think. Don't overestimate how much space/bandwidth you use.. it takes a lot of hits on text pages to pass 10GB bandwidth (ASO's small plan). Also, if you go with ASO, on a small package, paying/month, if you find you are using too much, just email them and ask to be upgraded.

That probably didn't make much sense, I'm rather dopey at the moment for some reason.. I'll try answering again tomorrow. :p
 
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dcv

macrumors G3
Original poster
May 24, 2005
8,021
1
OK thanks again... it seems A Small Orange is pretty popular around here then! I'll definitely check that out. Yes it'll be a small business and though there will be some video content on the site it probably won't be downloaded very often or by a large volume of users.
 
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dcv

macrumors G3
Original poster
May 24, 2005
8,021
1
OK I've just signed up with A Small Orange :) Just gone with the "small" plan for now... $5/month is nothing!

Thanks again for the recommendations.


Expect to see me around these parts more often, with further silly questions on site design... ;)
 
XIII

XIII

macrumors 68040
Aug 15, 2004
3,449
0
England
If you decide that the small plan works for your/your sister's needs, you may want to email ASO (they will reply within, say 3 hours), and ask them to bill you every 3 months, or every 6, or whatever.. as because they are in the US, your credit/debit card company here in the UK will charge you £1.50 or so everytime you pay to them, as a fee for changing currencies I believe. Seeing as it was only £2.70 or something a month (when I was with them), it seemed silly to me to be paying an extra £1.50 a month on top of that.
 
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dcv

macrumors G3
Original poster
May 24, 2005
8,021
1
Oh really? I didn't think of that. Thanks for the advice XIII.
 
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