On 25/10/06, Ed Lazor <edlazor@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi, I wanted to give some feedback on PHP 5 hosting in case it helps someone. I signed up with DreamHost last Thursday. I also signed up with OCS Solutions to compare the two services. I also maintain a server with CalPop. When I signed up with Dreamhost, I discovered that you have to fill out a form and fax it to them, along with a rubbing of your credit card. Personally, I found that part rather annoying. They say it's for added security, but I've never had to do that with any other online transactions that I've done. OCS Solutions had me pay for a year up front, which always makes me nervous when checking out a new provider, but they do offer a money back guarantee. Actually, both providers offered a money back guarantee. DreamHost's is 97 days. That's pretty good.
They require that you fax them a rub or your credit card?!? I certainly wouldn't do that!
Cost-wise, both companies were fairly inexpensive. I ran a Google search for "DreamHost Coupon" and found a coupon that eliminated a majority of the up front cost. Actually, I was pretty surprised. They give you a free domain registration that includes private whois for free. After the coupon, I paid $9.90 and covered the start-up fee (normally $45), the first month of service, and the domain registration. It feels like I paid for a domain registration and got free hosting for a month.
Nice!
My account with DreamHost was created on Monday. Technically, it took 5 days to get my account set up. That's the longest set up delay I've ever experienced with any host provider. OCS Solutions called me an hour after signing up and had my account setup shortly thereafter.
That's all it should take.
I also registered a domain when signing up with OCS Solutions. The whois was wrong. Somehow it ended up showing as registered to one of their employees, but I called and they quickly fixed it. The account was set up under the wrong username, but they fixed that quickly, along with problems with cpanel when it doesn't handle the name change correctly. Mistakes were made, but I was really pleased with how easy it was to get help and I was really happy with how much people obviously cared about helping out. After signing up with DreamHost, the domain that I'd registered with them wasn't working. I was exploring their control panel to figure out the problem when I came upon a DNS management page. The page automatically identified and fixed the problem. That was impressive. Also, I started exploring the DreamHost forums after signing up, something I almost wish I'd done beforehand. I found a lot of posts from very disgruntled customers. It sounds as if they've been running into problems lately on their servers. People complain A LOT about the lack of phone support from DreamHost... you have to submit a trouble ticket for everything. If your account subscription is high enough, they offer a limited number of call backs. The worst part was reading debates between the really happy and the really unhappy DreamHost clients. A lot of the discussions boiled down to verbal attacks between customers. I'm honestly surprised DreamHost didn't intervene. One last thing with OCS, the plan I started on turned out to be insufficient for my needs. I talked with them and they came up with a new plan that does everything I want and just charged me a little more to cover the difference. End result so far... CalPop: I've always had problems with the initial set up of servers at CalPop. Talking with their tech support on the phone is a nightmare; there's something wrong with their phone lines (seems like a really bad voice over IP solution). It usually takes way too many emails to resolve problems. I've also experienced a lot of hardware failures, which makes me wonder about the quality of parts they purchase. Once the server works though, everything seems to settle down until the next problem shows up. DreamHost: Best prices, low service. It seems like DreamHost is run by and tailored toward experienced techies. That's fine, I can work with that. I'm willing to try working with limited phone support. I'm really only concerned with delays I might experience when a problem shows up in something that's mission critical. Beyond that, there are a lot of features available here that aren't elsewhere. I'm getting great value for my money. OCS Solutions: Good prices, but you have to pay up front. Best customer service I've experienced from an ISP so far. I feel a lot more comfortable using them for anything mission critical.
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