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webjoe
regular
Reg'd: Sat
Posts: 315
Loc: Preston
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Hello,
Hope there is somebody out there who can help? I have a few questions regarding hosting and bandwidth.
I am having a classified ads site built by a company who is going to use an off the shelf software package and amend it to my specification. The contractor is also offering me hosting via a section of a server he has rented from another company. This would be ok apart from what seemed to be an off the cuff statement that he would charge £25 a month for the hosting which seemed a little more than expected. I have asked the contractor to issue full details of costs and bandwidths before I make the decision of who I want to host my site.
The first question is how do I find out the bandwidth I need. I have studied various information from the web giving generally similar calculations with the first criteria being finding out the average bytes per page of my web site.
I have made a draft of the site in Frontpage but because there are a number of pages I can only get the size of the whole site file therefore I have uploaded one of the most common pages in to my browser and checked the page size from there, is this correct? The size was stated as 102531 bytes.
The second question: If my contractor uploads my site on completion to a server of my choice from his PC, will he have any control over any of the hosting contract. For instance, if I wanted to move to another server would the hosting company require confirmation from my contractor as he has uploaded it to their server? I am aware that I can change the access password to the site so that the contractor could only access it with my permission but is there any other issues which I should be aware of if uploaded from the contractors PC?
Third question: What kind of charges do hosting companies make if you exceed your monthly bandwidth:
Last question (for now): Which are the best hosting companies for this type of classified web site bearing in mind security, reliability and cost?
Sorry for the long questions but as you will appreciate it is better getting as much information as possible before making an important decision so any advice is welcome.
If you cannot help, thank you anyway for taking an interest.
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ianm
regular
Reg'd: Fri
Posts: 347
Loc: Colchester
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Sounds like the person doing this has what is called a reseller account, he will have a control from which he will create an account on the server and upload the site to this, if your site allows image upload then this could require a large amount of storage for the images and maybe bandwidth however for a new site specifically the type of site you mention these tend to be very slow getting off the ground so I would ask for a smaller package and increase the size should the site require it, prices vary a great deal but I would not pay even half that per month for a new site.
The size of your pages depends on what people upload, I am presuming you have one of these classified adds scripts modified and these store all information in a database apart from the images that get uploaded to a folder, the pages with text wont take up much bandwidth but will use it is the images, you can probably but a limit on the MB size of uploaded images to help with this or at least the php scrpits I have played with allow this but once again it really depends on how busy the site gets, as an estimate I would try about 5 to 6 gig bandwidth and maybe 1000MB of storage, just for the 1st month, extra bandwidth should cost about £1.50 per gig if you go over but again this varies a great deal.
If you take out your own hosting then you have total control over this, the fact that you have given the ftp details to allow him to upload makes no difference, however to upload the site he will also require database access and depending on the type of script depends on the type of server, php scripts normally work on linux and asp on windows as a guide. Whatever you do dont go with a very cheap host offering unlimited bandwidth they most certainly wont be good with slow servers down time and poor customer service just my advice up to you on that.
Also there are a great of people offing services like script customization so shop around you may get a cheaper deal for everything there are no end of people who can do this.
The host I use is these mostly for their customer service, their site is in Spanish but email and they speak perfect English, tell them what you after and they may even install and customize a script for you for a fee.
Hope this answers a few questions.
Cheers
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Dunx
regular
Reg'd: Tue
Posts: 142
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hi webjoe,
1. Bandwidth
Depends on two things, the size of your pages and the number of visitors. You can calculate the page size, but if nobody visits that page, bandwidth = 0. Without putting it online it's hard to assess.
I'd choose a hosts smallest account to start with, you can always upgrade if the need arises.
2. Moving to another host
If the contractors uploading on his own (or rented) server, he'll some control. He could suspend the hosting account.
You'll be given a Control Panel from which you can control many aspects of your site. Most common is cPanel, others include Plesk.
If you want to move your site to a new host you have no obligation to inform your contractor. Just move it, update the nameservers and then cancel the contractors hosting.
3. Exceeding bandwidth.
Varies from host to host, the worst ones will suspend your site. But any decent host would simply charge for the additional bandwidth.
One site I run with 5 others is going to come close to it's limit this month. I've asked the host what'll happen if it exceeds the limit.
Here's their reponse:
Quote:
But, what happens when you exceed your bandwidth or disk-space limit?
Absolutely nothing.If your site receives a large amount of hits one month you would be charged an overage at the specified rate, for the amount over your limit. Thus, your site would not be shut down / suspended. The overages will be listed on your next month's invoice.
Finally, we also have a 10% rule: If exceed your account limits by up to 10% you will not be charged an overage.
The 'overage' is 30p per Gb.
4. Best host.
Monte Carlo Hosting
Servers are really fast. They are in Canada but I've yet to find a forum using the same software as my site that runs as fast on shared hosting, even here in the UK.
Support is brilliant and they will help you every step of the way if necessary. They will also install your site and any scripts it needs if you want them to.
Avoid resellers, they offer huge bandwidth and space for very little money. But you'll have your site suspended, with one excuse or another, long before you reach even 10% of what they offer.
All the best - Duncan
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bolitho
Under One Roof
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webjoe
regular
Reg'd: Sat
Posts: 315
Loc: Preston
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Thanks for the replies,
Is there any way I could check the bandwidth and site size on server of simalar classifed ad sites?
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