Previously, I wrote about the hosting plans of Top Hosting Center, where I am currently hosted with their Speedy hosting plan. On this post, I’m going to take a peek of another web hosting company, ImHosted.com, and see if people will get the worth of what they will pay with the company’s hosting plans. So, let’s start inspecting their customer service — the foremost criterion anyone should consider before looking at “lovely” hosting plans.

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After the successive hits of their previous hosting plans in the previous months, the Rudolf and Speedy Hosting Plan (Linux), Top Hosting Center now comes back center-stage with a refreshed Speedy Hosting Plan running on Windows Server platform. This was released due to insistent public demand and the corporate’s decision to join the bandwagon of the trend of ever-increasing market share of Windows platform across data centers.

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EstDomains.com is one of Internet’s favorable domain registrars offering myriad of domain name services. For webmasters and hosting companies, it is one of the cheapest and most cost-efficient domain solution providers until lately. However, with their domain privacy protection feature down for almost three weeks now, even their avid customers and resellers are beginning to feel busted as worries increase due to privacy-related issues.
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It’s already been two months since John Raul dot Com (this blog) breathe to life. To celebrate the second month of existence, I decided to share with you a comprehensive review of the best hosting plan that I’ve ever seen on the Web specifically tailored for bloggers and webmasters – the “Rudolf” hosting plan from Top Hosting Center (THC). Please note that some links directing to the Rudolf plan may contain affiliate links. It does not, in any way, manipulate the truth, facts, and fair judgement presented on this article.

Rudolf Hosting Plan Overview

Rudolf hosting plan was released by THC originally as a Christmas promotional package for people who are eager to start running their own blogs or websites. There were 1000 plans available and the promo would end when all plans are sold out. Each plan, which sits over Windows or Linux, boasts lifetime ownership (yes, for life) of a hosting account with 250 GB disk space, 3000 GB unmetered monthly bandwidth, unlimited database, a free lifetime domain name, among other professional hosting features – all priced at $95 one-time payment. THC stressed through Rudolf that “customers will never have to pay for hosting again” – a statement that shocked many informed bloggers causing them to move from their old hosts to THC.

Below is a detailed comparison of THC’s standard hosting plan, the Top Hosting Special, priced at $4.95 per month and the special Rudolf plan priced at $95 one-time for lifetime ownership.

The recent Yuletide season saw a lagging sales of Rudolf though, there were still over 600 plans left during the end of December. However, during the first few weeks of 2008, there was a surge of customers who bought Rudolf plans and eventually the remaining plans plummeted below 500. According to THC’s sales representative, they predicted that the Rudolf plans will diminish this February but may still have the chance to extend more due to changing market conditions. It was renamed to “Rudolf Valentine” carrying a theme “We Love Bloggers” to match the season.

Rudolf Under Scrutiny

Signing up for Rudolf plan comes in two different tastes: Linux and Windows. It can be found on the on the product’s landing page with all the information you need. THC even provided a FAQ page in an effort to clear the doubts of skeptic customers about their current flagship product. I see this effort “good.” THC uses only two payment gateways for their signups: PayPal and 2CheckOut. The latter one is good for credit cards that are recognized internationally.

Instructions about domain name registrations and domain name transfers associated to the Rudolf plan are provided in one of the steps of the account signup wizard. It asks new customers to send their domain registration or domain transfer request to THC’s email support. It would have been more convenient if THC was able put domain registration forms as part of their signup the process. Nevertheless, domain name registrations are usually completed from two to six hours upon registration (it could vary though) while domain name transfers usually take five days to a week to complete (without downtime). Since each Rudolf plan promises a lifetime domain name, THC will be the one to pay for the renewal fees as long as the customer stays on THC.

The EasyApp, a collection of ready-to-use PHP applications tied with the H-Sphere control panel, similar to CPanel’s Fantastico, boasts a rich number of useful applications (CMS, blog platforms, e-commerce, support systems, etc). However, the current version used by THC, does not allow installation on root directory through the control panel. This is troublesome to customers, for instance, who wants to get their WordPress blog installed on the root for search engine-optimized (SEO) permalink structure. However, the workaround is to install the application manually to the root. Manual installation is tricky and could be difficult to people who are not very technologically-inclined.

Rudolf also offers unlimited database, domains and subdomains which perfectly match the 250 GB disk storage and 3000 GB monthly bandwidth. Other hosts usually impose a maximum number of databases, and varying domain/subdomain limitations for their hosting plans. THC broke them with its 1000 Rudolf plans; the generous resource lineups allow customers to put more information to their websites due to its increased database storage and bandwidth.

Finally, with all the benefits Rudolf bring, THC placed a price tag of $95 to each plan. Of course, it is cheap and very affordable – a 12-month regular hosting would cost around $60 (excluding the domain name registration and renewal). I personally remark that it was “aggressively priced” which could be a risk to THC if their goals are not met and efforts backfire. However, I believe that the company is well-funded and that they have pre-calculated well the Rudolf plan. Hopefully with the Rudolf’s release, it would bring good returns to their investments in parallel with their generosity.

Rudolf Over Linux

I read from many blog testimonials that customers who acquired Rudolf hosting plans over Linux platform are overjoyed with the performance of their websites. Honestly, this did not shock me as Linux has always been the king in terms of web hosting regardless of hosting company.

PHP and MySQL combination in Linux platform is superb. Similar performance is also achieved by PostGreSQL database engine.

So while the rest of Linux features are excellent, there is only one apparent shortcoming I have to mention – domains on Linux can only run PHP version 4. This means applications meant for PHP version 5 may have problems running on Linux platform for the meantime. THC cannot be blamed for this, however, as the limitation was brought about by the current H-Sphere version. Future H-Sphere control panel upgrades foreseeable this year, are expected to wipe this out.

Rudolf Over Windows

Though in many ways Linux outperform Windows in the web hosting department, Rudolf over Windows platform is powered by multiple core Intel processors (same as Linux) to ensure a fast, stable and responsive website environment.

The H-Sphere control panel over Windows works a bit different than that of Linux. It offers support for ASP and ASP.net languages backed by MySQL, PostGreSQL and optional MSSQL databases. Currently, PHP is implemented as CGI on Internet Information Services (IIS) 6.0 available in two different and switchable versions for domains that run on Windows platform: version 4.4.7 and version 5.2.3. In all other aspects, Windows offer similar features with Linux.

However, personally I prefer getting a Linux plan (unless I need Windows-specific features). But generally in terms of web hosting, I trust Linux more than Windows.

Top Hosting Center: A Good Hosting Company?

Let’s make the article I wrote previously, “What Good Companies Are Made Of,” as a basis of judging the reputation of the company that hosts Rudolf: Top Hosting Center, a Montreal-based hosting company.

• Products competency over pricing. The specifications of Rudolf hosting plan and Top Hosting Special, in particular, passes the 200 GB disk space and 2000 GB monthly bandwidth competency requirement which I deemed sufficient for most hosting needs nowadays (though bigger is always better). Both plans are fairly priced except some would interpret Rudolf hosting plan as a bit “overselling.” However, I don’t believe because it’s just a limited offer and it is good while supply lasts. THC uses H-Sphere for web management for their hosting customers. H-Sphere is a highly sophisticated control panel developed by Positive Software Corporation that works similar but not graphically alike with other control panels, CPanel and Plesk. H-Sphere features EasyApp, a collection of ready-to-use PHP scripts which include content management systems (CMS), forums, blogs (e.g. WordPress), image galleries, and a lot more.
• Server performance, reliability and security consistency. THC’s CEO, Eric Vanier asserted in his blog that the servers behind their hosting plans, never experienced downtime for almost two years. However, seemed like a devil’s luck, it was followed by another post stating that they experienced an unexpected database issue when they applied a security patch requiring server reboot in the evening of January 11th. It broke their consistent uptime record but rather reasonable since unexpected downtimes usually happen when a new software is introduced during upgrades or if there are changes in its configuration (like the application of security patches). It was however resolved in timely manner and oddly brought server improvements that are assumingly expected to bring improved server performance and assured stability to all platforms. Other than that, THC also does nightly backups and imposes strict security rules to assure a secure environment to all its users (no SSH access on shared servers, etc).
• Support and management reachability. THC currently offers only three different modes of support: live chat support (which can be initiated on THC’s official website), e-mail support and trouble ticket support (an in-built feature in the account’s control panel). These are available 24×7, which means help is ready anytime you need it. I particularly liked the chat support system. Their chat representatives are real people and very friendly and responsive – good for product inquiries, problem reports, and basic technical assistance. They should, however, think about offering phone support (as other hosts do) to be completely competent in this part. However, they said such service is still not a “need” as of the moment as their existing support methods still suffice.
• Employee satisfaction. Just like what I mentioned in my previous post, employee satisfaction is tantamount to service and product excellence. Upon chatting with one of THC’s representatives, I learned that they are indeed very eager to deliver quality services toward customer satisfaction. This underlines the statement found of its CEO’s blog post “I Love Competition, So Do You.” I’ve also discovered that THC has partnered with Pamil-Visions, a Germany-based online marketing company that only promotes products they feel confident for.

Rudolf Plus Value-Added Services

Rudolf customers can also enjoy other THC value-added services: the THC online community forum, the THC corporate web hosting blog, discounted SEO services for their websites, and exclusive free website directory.

What Others Have To Say About Rudolf

I’ve done a Google search to find some customer reviews or any article related to the Rudolf plan. Here is the list of what I found (and there’s more out there):

• Affordable Lifetime Web Hosting Service
• THC Webhosting: Why It Is An Easy Option For Me
• Kinks Working Out At Top Hosting Center
• Brand Your Blog And Catch Rudolph Before He Is Gone
• One Time Charge For Hosting???
• First Impressions of Top Hosting Center
• Rudolf Hosting Plan Less Than 500 Left, Countdown Begins
• THC Rudolf: Globally Competitive Hosting Plan
• THC Unveils Lifetime Webhosting Account For $95 One-time!
• Why Is Rudolf The Hosting Plan You Need

Grand Conclusion

Now that I have uncovered Rudolf in most dimensions, it is now clear why it is one of the most amazing hosting plans I’ve seen on the Web. Where can you ever find a reliable host that offer 250 GB disk space, 3000 GB monthly bandwidth, a lifetime domain name, along with other standard hosting features – all subject only for one-time payment of $95? THC only rolled 1000 Rudolf plans (of course, they will lose their business if they dare to offer more) and those are meant for lucky people who are seeking for the right host.

Perhaps I didn’t tell in the previous paragraphs, but Rudolf bears one catch that could derail you from your decision of getting one: if you are dreaming of setting up an adult site for Rudolf hosting plan, forget Rudolf. THC strongly follows code of ethics and does not allow any illegal files to reside on their wholesome servers.

So, if you want to run your own blog or move your existing site to a Rudolf plan, you should do it now. Though their sales representatives won’t disclose the exact figures of remaining plans, I was informed that the numbers of Rudolf plans are rapidly diminishing. This is a threat for you.

Whew! Go get your own Rudolf hosting plan now and if you want to thank me for the great information, you can express it by putting this site in your blogroll or by simply subscribing to this blog through email or RSS.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Sometimes, reading only web hosting reviews don’t suffice in your search for a good web hosting company that can provide your hosting needs at an affordable price. Those plain review articles are way too limited for you to have a firm decision.

If you want to gain credible advices from experienced people in the web hosting industry, then there are no other good places than web hosting forums. There you can ask almost anything and get relevant answers from different people.

Even the people from hosting companies participate in forums to share their hosting experience, offer hosting solutions, and market their respective hosting plans and services.

Here is the list of the top three most useful web hosting forums that you can find on the Web. I strongly recommend that you register an account to all of them (yes, ALL) and participate with the hosting discussions. Do you know other great web hosting forums? Leave the links at the comments.

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The previous hosting-related article I wrote might have opened your eyes to the reality of web hosting reviews. That is good that you are never so naive when you look for hosting solutions. I want to make a clear point that some hosting reviews are reliable, I was just emphasizing that some web hosting review websites make their writings look “unreliable” and “casts doubt” on its credibility especially to advanced readers who knew how to dug the codes behind the pages.

In this article, I will discuss to you what a good web hosting company is made of – and should be made of. This is truly significant – there are traps out there that will make you lose your money’s worth, your digital assets, and break your site’s revenue potential if you are too gullible in hosting your files everywhere. Deriving from these consequences, I came up with a realization what a good hosting company is made of.

A good web hosting company is built from the ground with the following qualities:

Robust, competitive hosting features versus price.

Expensive hosting may give security to some people and assurance about the quality of hosting – but this isn’t really true at times. You have the chance to overspend your hosting allowance to an expensive hosting plan where in fact, there are almost myriad small to medium-sized hosting companies on the Web that offer similar hosting quality features and customer support excellence at lower prices.

A good hosting company would offer plans that the masses can realistically afford. If you are new to hosting and you want to start running a site (especially a blog or a forum), a shared hosting plan with at least 200 GB disk storage, 2000 GB monthly data transfer and a domain name is well suited for you – unless of course, your proposed website has “special needs.” Choose hosting plans that use CPanel, H-Sphere or Plesk, as the web management software. In addition, the hosting network should be running at 100 Mbps speed. A standard hosting plan should cost from $4 to $6 per month, and should come along with other hosting features.

Typically, hosting companies sell shared hosting plans, virtual private servers or VPS hosting, reseller hosting and dedicated server hosting solutions. They may also optionally have domain name registration services and other hosting-related services.

Ask your company where their servers reside. It is a good warning if you found out that they are running their servers at home and not within a datacenter’s server farms.

Consistent server uptime performance, security and stability.

It’s very common to read on hosting companies’ sites that they guarantee 99.9% uptime – but trust me it’s more like a part of their blurbs. Downtimes normally happen (even in large hosting companies) usually after server patches, control panel upgrades, and reboots. However, these “critical upgrades” rarely happen every six months.

A good hosting company understands the significance of server uptime especially to their customers who earn through ads and services. It provides solutions towards greater consistency of server performance and stability.

In shared hosting department, where customer accounts and their files reside in a single server, a good hosting company would implement necessary software configuration to wipe out vulnerabilities and protect the server from exploitation. Some functionality of scripting languages normally would be disabled to leave no chance for hackers of intruding the system.

Excellent channels of communication to the management and support departments.

Personally I like a hosting company that features proactive customer support service (though some find it irritating). I feel secure if I am able to communicate with real people from the company than being answered by machines. For me, a hosting company is a minus if they offer excellent hosting plans but fails to respond in timely fashion their customer’s hosting support needs.

A good hosting company should be able to deliver at least two different methods of support: email support, live chat support, trouble ticket support, and telephone support. This ensures customers that they would be able to get help whenever they need it. Support from live chat and telephone should be instantaneous for basic inquiries. For more technical problems sent through email or trouble ticket support, a good hosting company should be able to make a reply in less than 24 hours and should be able to come up with a solution or a follow-up in less than two days (this may vary though depending on the severity and scope of your problems).

What about outsourced customer support? If you ever found out that a company’s support is being outsourced outside first-world countries (or North America), don’t worry much but still remain highly skeptical. There are many others countries in the world such as India and the Philippines that boast a vibrant population of globally competitive IT professionals. If your concern is the language barrier, reach their management and inform them so it will be addressed. Discovering that their servers reside on those countries would sound more “alarming” than their outsourced support. So, remain wary and skeptic.
The company’s “hosting engine” is constituted of people happy with their jobs – not just mere high-spec machines.

How to know: If you have found a prospective web hosting company that lets you feel initially confident with their hosting features, try accessing their live chat support and throw a number of questions to the support representative regarding how he/she feels about the company’s management, products and services. If the representative is happy, it is a good a sign. Companies with satisfied workers usually translate to excellence in their products and services.
Good reputation, positive feedbacks from existing and previous customers.

A good hosting company that has been around for more than a year with a good reputation usually validates their legitimacy claims.

The most common method to do in finding out the reputation of a hosting company is doing an online search (preferably Google). Finding reviews of hosting company that has been around for years should be fairly easy. Never rely on feedbacks done by customers through the hosting company’s own forums and testimonial pages – unless you can personally vouch that they stand firmly in bringing “honest” reviews to the quality of their hosting.

I suggest that you use this Reverse IP Domain Check utility to find out the websites/blogs hosted on the hosting company’s web server. From there, you can experience the actual web hosting performance of the hosting company and it may also provide clues on contacting a real, existing customer for better advice.

Personally, I don’t trust much the reviews made by “hosting review websites.” I prefer reading blogs having independent reviews and participating web hosting forums in getting reliable advices from experienced webmasters. There you can throw comments or questions about a certain company and people will give you relevant responses. In the future, I will make a post about the best hosting forums I knew.

The demand of web hosting products continually rose to new heights since the advent of Web 2.0 years ago. Web hosting products sales, usually constituted of shared hosting plans, virtual servers hosting and dedicated server packages soared as innovations on the Web recaptured worldwide audiences’ interest. The combined popularity of new-age websites like blogs, social communities, video streaming, and social bookmarks sites, along with the healthy growth of online advertisement marketing, invoked people to set their own ventures on the Internet.

People’s first stop to join the Internet bandwagon is to find a good hosting company. Normally, most of them would consult Google (or any search engine) to find “reliable” hosting review websites. Given the thousands of sites that appear on search engine results page, not all review sites are reliable. People need to be careful else they could end up putting money on fraudsters’ pockets than enjoying its worth.

Honest web hosting review websites are expected not to accept money from hosting company clients for their opinions. Being an affiliate of the products they review, though actually allowable and legal, still certainly can cast doubt on the truthfulness of their say. Though many would defend that they are only paid by their writings, obviously it is some sort of advertisement and could influence the outcome of the review. Web hosting companies participating on these sites are willing to pay a good amount just to have a good spot on the page – shame on them for fooling people.

I recently found an interesting YouTube video on how to spot fake, biased hosting review websites. It shows that identifying biased reviews are not that easy to spot for normal Web users. Watch the video below and you’ll learn the hints and see the reality behind web hosting review websites. You will realize how “trustworthy” they are.

I fully credit the person who made the video. If you benefit the advices of this post, and you’re one of those people who are looking for a good web hosting company, don’t get scammed! You may contact me directly and I will let you know a good host that I trust, and you can trust. Don’t worry, it’s free and unbiased. My judgments are based on my experience.