As loyal readers (yes, both of you) may have noticed, the site’s been down a lot lately. That’s because it’s still being hosted on my PC at home, and we continue to have problems with our connection. On Sunday, I talked with a tech who gave the impression that he actually looked into the problem and he deduced that there’s a problem with our connection! Woo Hoo! He offered to send a tech out without even making any dark threats about possible charges if it’s a problem with our equipment, so I have an appointment tomorrow morning.
Anyhoo, all the problems lately have been making me think that I should actually get the site hosted somewhere else. Anyone have any particular thoughts? I’m looking at Dreamhost and 1 and 1 right now; I know some of you are using GoDaddy, and that seems decent as well. Dunno. Maybe. Someday. Eventually. I suppose.
Hope they fix my problem tomorrow so that I can forget about looking for a host again . . .
Loonmagnet 
Hey Ick…
I REALLY like GoDaddy. Both Fi’s and my site are hosted there, as well as the soap factory’s site (’cause of Fi.)
They’re cheap. They call occasionally just to “check in.”
(I kid you not.)
They also look at your bandwidth, and call up and ask if you want to go with the CHEAPER plan, as you’re not using all the bandwidth you’re paying for.
That’s right. They actually seem to CARE about customer service.
I admit I was a bit freaky about using a hosting company that is mainly a big website. But they’ve assuaged my fears.
There’s my $.02
Smiles,
Tuck
Tuck –
I was biased against GoDaddy because when I was working in Information Security I spent a lot of time trying to take down phishing sites that were hosted there.
I suppose it’s not really their fault if someone sets up a malicious site on their service, so long as they take it down when notified. To GoDaddy’s credit, they were actually pretty prompt and responsive whenever I contacted them about a phishing site.
I guess my reservations with them were just one of those irrational guilt-by-association things.
So, it’s good to hear you’ve had a good experience with them. I actually kind of preferred what they had to offer – particularly the fact that Java and Ruby are available. I’m not using either right now, but I may want to tinker with them later.
Anyhoo, thanks for the $.02.
Hey Mr. E,
I don’t have any hosting suggestions for you, but after your May 11th post, I thought you must have pissed of Comcast for the last time because your site was clearly dead.
A few years back I was having intermittent and slow connection problems with them (they were Time Warner at that time) that went unresolved for weeks. It turned out to be a bad buried cable between their box and my house. They eventually got it fixed but it sure was a hassle.
-d
Well, the tech was out today and apparently determined that the cable between the house and the pole was bad. He’s replaced it and now time will tell if the problem is gone.
When I get home I’ll run a speed/QOS test and see how things look. I know you’re all dying to know the results.
My (late) two cents as well…
Don’t forget that Comcast is finishing (hopefully) a big overhaul of the TimeWarner network to get it all connected.
We had those problems when Comcast moved in on AT&T Broadband, and those problems eventually settled out.
It wasn’t over night, it wasn’t a week… I seem to remember a month.
Who knows what they’re going through with the TimeWarner bit? TimeWarner was better on speeds, but what did they lack in? What do they have to do to replace old systems with compatible systems?
Like I said, just two more pennies. 🙂
I didn’t begrudge Comcast the connection problems so much as I resented the lousy support, especially considering that our bill went up by ten bucks within a couple of months of Comcast taking over from TimeWarner.
Things happen; lines get old, squirrels chew on them, etc. I understand and I’m OK with problems like that — it’s not like I’m paying 99.999%-uptime-SLA prices. I just didn’t like being threatened with big dispatch fees when a little troubleshooting would’ve disclosed noise on the line. If I would’ve talked to the third tech first, I wouldn’t have posted much more than, “Sorry the site’s been flaky; we’re having a tech out tomorrow to look at our connection problem.”
That said, TimeWarner’s support was lousy as well. More than anything, I’m irritated by the fact that it’s a duopoly with cable and DSL (which is really lousy in our area) so no one really has any motivation to do things right.