• Mood: cranky

Chapter 80 - Evan Decides To Get A New Web Host

Interesting that this coincides with holyhippie's fried DSL modem server crash (corrected 5/12/04), but I've decided to get a new host for my websites. I've been with my current host, in keeping with the code names, I'll call "Host,"* for almost a year with my Dr. Eldritch site, and I chose Host because their website said they had a 99.9% uptime guarantee. They were inexpensive and I didn't need fancy databases or a shopping cart function, but I did want availability. Well, I noticed a number of times when I'd try to go to my site, and it couldn't be found. Usually I could wait ten or fifteen minutes, and it would be back. Then there was one time when it went down hard (so hard I should have been able to hear the crash all the way up in Alaska), and I had to reset my DNS and reload the whole site.

Well, when it came time to leave my dial-up ISP, I decided to move evannichols.com to Host as well. This site has had even more problems and downtime. I went out to Host's website, and danged if the 99.9% uptime guarantee hadn't been replaced by disclaimers saying essentially "We try, but we don't promise ANYTHING about uptime." I must not be the only one to have noticed problems.

I started logging a trouble ticket each time I notice it's down. Of course, by the time the tech gets to it, it's back, and I get a response saying "When I tried it, your site came up," and sense the technician thought I was too stupid to be able to find my own website with two hands. I was quietly fuming about it and realized: "I don't need to put up with this!" There are many other hosts out there, and I'm even willing to pay more to have it WORK. So I'll move Dr. Eldritch when it expires next month, and then evannichols.com when its year ends.

I mention all this because I can struggle along with something that doesn't work right if it costs too much to fix it, and sometimes overlook the ones that CAN be fixed or replaced. And if I can save anyone the frustration I experienced with Host, so much the better!

* I won't say their name, but one might find them in an alphabetical list between DdataRack.com and FDataRack.com.