More hosting recommendations?

Well...the new year looks to be off to a slightly shaky start for me! I got a few e-mails from my hosting provider (www.fluidhosting.com). The first was an announcement that their hosting plans changed and that I would have to upgrade to a different plan sometime this year. From the looks of it, it looks like the pricing of a plan that is nearly identical to mine is almost double what I’m paying now! Not good! On top of that, I received a few e-mails regarding an e-mail server outage that lasted almost two whole days as well as a maintenance announcement on my web server. This is due to the fact that they changed the location of their main data centers and, well, looks like they have a few bugs to work out. So...in the end, it looks like I’m in the market for a better hosting provider!

The two I’ve sort of narrowed down after a single day of research is these two:

Dreamhost (www.dreamhost.com)
I’ve tried them before but really didn’t want to mess with all the security stuff they implemented on their server. They seem pretty good but I’ve read some reports about how their database servers can be really slow during peak hours. That could be a deal breaker for me!

Media Temple (www.mediatemple.net)
What’s funny about their site is that it appears that a few other sites have actually ripped the design! Guess they did something right with it! I’m pretty impressed with the presentation...simple, clean, and very professional! The control panel is the same used by Fluid Hosting so it would be a snap to get used to them. However, the main thing I’m highly concerned about is the use of MySQL 3.23.58 instead of a 4.0.x version or higher! All my databases are running on 4.0.x so going backwards doesn’t set well for me at the moment. This could be a serious deal breaker too!

Guess what I’m wondering is if others have used these two and what you seriously think about them. Also, are there some other hosting providers I should consider? What I really need is a provider that would allow me to host at least 5 domains (with subdomains as well!), at least 10 MySQL databases, a good control panel (Plesk or H-Sphere prefered! I hate CPanel!!), and a solid reputation for reliability, speed, and uptime. Cost shouldn’t be a problem since my budget is around $30 a month or so.

Dreamhost is great, but their control panel is a bit awkward and home-grown. Mark uses Media Temple and loves it. As does Shaun Inman and several other "web gurus" floating about.

I continue to be impressed with the speed, service, reliability, and pricing of 1&1. I’ve got a few accounts that are 2 years old there and have been solid. Getting ready to merge a few clients under the "developer" package there also. Quite a deal. Can’t say enough good about them.

I’ve heard nothing but good things about 1&1, which was what surpirsed me when I saw this post about the guys behind SiteVista.com’s experience.

The more I read and browse around the Media Temple site, the more I like them. I’m still worried about the MySQL version though. I e-mailed them about it. Hopefully they’ll have something good to say about it.

Regarding 1&1, I looked at them...but to be honest, I don’t feel comfortable going with them. Just too many bad reports about them on webhostingtalk.com and other sites.

Hmm...considering that alot of the gurus like Media Temple, I might go with them regardless of the MySQL version thing....guess I’ll wait and see what they have to say! But keep the comments and stuff rolling!

Quote from: jaredc at Jan 03, 2006, 01:24 PM

I continue to be impressed with the speed, service, reliability, and pricing of 1&1. I’ve got a few accounts that are 2 years old there and have been solid. Getting ready to merge a few clients under the "developer" package there also. Quite a deal. Can’t say enough good about them.

Wow!!!
SOLD!

Thanks for the tip. I am switching to 1&1 this weekend.

re-regards

-sD-
scotty Delicious

Quote from: Bravado at Jan 03, 2006, 01:34 PM

Regarding 1&1, I looked at them...but to be honest, I don’t feel comfortable going with them. Just too many bad reports about them on webhostingtalk.com and other sites.

Interesting. I’ve not had any problems. And on the several times I **thought** I was having a problem with their service, it turned out to be... user error. Doh! Goes to show you can’t necessarily go by one or two opinions. I’ll have to check out that review site and see where the problems were.

Wow!!!
SOLD!

@sD-
If you have my experience you’ll be happy. But looks like Bravado has given just cause for caution. Look before you leap!

I am digging up as much dirt as I can on them as we speak.

@bravado: Can you point me to a negative 1and1 review (or several)

@jaredc: Can you point me to a positive 1and1 review (or several), and share your personal experience with their service in regard to setup time, transfering domains, account manager (I heard it’s slow as sh*t), tech support, likes & dislikes.

thanks
-sD-

Media Temple has been great in the 2 or so months that I’ve been with them. They are EXTREMELY FAST! We are talking less than 0.01 second average for uncached pages! They seem to be pretty solid and I haven’t had a problem with the older mysql version.

Quote from: ScottyDelicious at Jan 03, 2006, 02:00 PM

@bravado: Can you point me to a negative 1and1 review (or several)

Here’s a few sources of both positive and negative reviews:

http://www.webhostinghandbook.com/db/1and1/

Look at both the Our Review and User Comments sections. The main review was largely positive for the most part. However, one thing is for sure...support could definitely be better! That’s pretty much the number one complaint I’ve seen.

http://www.webhostingtalk.com

Do a search for "1and1". You’ll get back a ton of posts from people who have used them. Again, alot of the posts that are negative are about the lack of support. However, there are some that deal with downtime too. What’s interesting is that the downtime seems to be something pretty recent. Anyways...hope these help!