Another Opinion Among Many

I wasn’t sure whether to do this post this soon or not, but I have some good things to say, so here it comes.

This is a mini review of my new web host, Friendlier.com. In response partially to a comment by Macbros, I write this post to give a decent idea of what my web host offers. Here’s what you can find in plain site on the front page of the home page:

FRIENDLY PLAN

• 100 GB Disk Space!
• 1000 GB/mo Traffic!
• 99,9% Server Uptime
• Free Domain for Life*
• 30Day Money-Back
• 24/7 Support
• No Set-up Fees
• Free Site Builder
• $4.95/month.

That’s the short list. I’ve colored the parts that I like the most. Honestly, after the uptime issues that I’ve had with XMGFree.com (which they’ve not really resolved - even now, over a year later - sorry Eric, I like you) and DSTInternet.com (you guys were unresponsive and slow to help - you get what you pay for), my priority is for uptime. After seeing that Friendlier.com had a good uptime record (via a site that showed various sites and their uptime), I was already interested in their service. I had already signed up at DSTInternet.com for a year’s service beginning at the end of April 2007. I am giving this hosting up and writing that purchase off. Sometime you get what you pay for and $2.95USD/mo is a good indicator of a cheap site (cheap on support).

You’ll notice that there are plenty of web hosting solutions presented to you via various ratings sites that fall in the $4.95-$7.95 per month range. I don’t think that there has to be a significant difference between hosts in that range. I do prefer to pay less, as most reasonable people do. The difference is that Friendlier.com (or Friendlyr.com) offers their wares at the lower end of the price scale with the features at the higher end.

By the way, the great uptime stats that I found out about may be attributed to the fact that their hosting is purchased from The Planet, which is the “number one privately held, dedicated server hosting provider in the world.” Many companies get their hosting from The Planet, as its got what it takes to host the largest, most demanding companies.

I must say that the generous disk space and the large bandwidth allotment is a good draw for me as well, but I doubt that I will ever need to worry about approaching my limits.

I like the fact that Friendlier.com uses cPanel. I missed that when I got my hosting with DSTInternet.com. I also like the fact that they have SSH access. SSH is one of the features that most hosts disable (except for the ones who pay a lot extra) it so that they won’t have to secure against it (which is just lazy). Its just so much more powerful when you want to maintain a website.

One thing that I like more than I thought that I would is the “chat” function of the support desk. Friendlier has a support staff that actually seems to know what they are doing and when you ask a question that is beyond the scope of the present support rep’s ability to answer, they tell you so and they advise that they will get someone who is qualified to answer your question to send you an email with an answer. How great is that?

I actually used the chat function before I signed up, as I was trying to find an alternative to my host at the time. The support person (I wish that I could remember - sorry) was free with answers to my questions.  I liked that they were automatically ready to answer my questions despite my not being a customer.

Things haven’t changed as far as that goes, as well.  I’m still getting great service.  I get to use cPanel, FTP, and SSH to access my site.  The pages load with blazing speed.  I’ve got lots of grow room, and best of all, the staff are still friendlier!

As any regular visitor to this site knows, I’m not big on advertising on my own site.  I’ve not felt the need to promote any particular product or company.  Occasionally, you’ve seen a widget go up temporarily when I was helping to beta test, or a plug for a site or cause that I wanted others to know about - without any intention of compensation for the plug.  This is going to remain true.  I will only promote what I believe in.  So, you may notice an affiliate link show up on my site for my new web host soon.  It will produce a small hosting compensation if anyone clicks through and decides to go with Friendlier.com

I will end this post here.  In case you didn’t figure it out from the above, I recommend that you consider Friendlier.com as your web host when you’re shopping around.