Hi Everyone,

I've have some very specific hosting requirements and I can't find anyone that offers what I am looking for.
If anyone could suggest a company that offers everything I am looking for below I would be grateful.

Apologies in advance if this is not the correct place to post this kind of message.

Here's what I need:

Shared Unix Hosting
Server must be physically located in the UK
Dedicated IP address
PHP/MySQL/CGI/SSI etc,etc
Apache server with mod_rewrite enabled
No .htaccess restrictions - ie I need to specify url rewriting, custom errors, process .html/text files as PHP etc.
I need to be able to access the site on the IP before the domain is transferred.
The 'host' must not be a reseller
About 5 gigs transfer/month, quality service, high uptime etc.

I'm not looking for a 'cheap' host - I'm looking for a quality service who can offer me what I need, and preferably someone who's been around for a while with a good reputation.

If anyone can suggest a company that can offer me this, please let me know.

I don't know anything about UK hosts, but ever heard of SitePoint? One of the admins there, Sparkie, is a Brit and she'll probably have some good Brit hosts in mind. :) I dunno, I haven't tried searching, but I do remember her pointing stuff out :)

Hello,

If you want a uk host i can only recommend one and thats http://www.kdawebservices.com/ ive been hosted with them for 15 months and the service has been out of this world. Shame the director supports scunthorpe :D They are very friendly and chat with you and get to know you and same with them. Its the best your going to find!

Technics,

Thanks for the reply, but I already know of alot of good hosts in the UK.

I need somebody that can specifically provide me with what I need as per my first post.

Anyone else got any suggestions?

I'm sure KDA Webservices can - I'll point Karl to this thread.

Ed - Watch it. I know where you live :)

Clio - Sherice (Sparkie) is from the USA as far as I am aware. Maybe you are thinking of Nicky.

Unfortunately we don't actually have any servers located within the UK, but these days it really doesn't mak emuch difference unless you want to host game servers.

why don't you go to www.hostsearch.com go to their UK website and search what you need and before regist with any company, take a look at their review and the rate that they got
Monchai A.

>> it really doesn't make much difference

It does for this site.

Search engines (Google in particular) are distinguishing where a site is located to determine if it shows in both the UK and Global search database for instance.

I have a .org domain but need to host it in the UK for this reason. I could achieve the same thing with a UK domain but the .org domain is crucial to this site.

There *must* be a host in the UK who can offer me what I need? I've scanned all the message boards and index sites to try and find something but I'm still at a loss.
:rolleyes:

http://www.hostsearchuk.com/s_power_u.asp

Give Vibus.net or Netrg.net a try, they both have servers in the UK. We could have offered you all you wanted except the servers in the UK part.

Monchai,

Thanks for the link but I've tried looking there already.

I can barely find a host who offers a static IP in the UK let alone having mod_rewrite enabled on Apache.

I really do not want to have a dedicated server just to host this single site.

I'm still open to suggestions so if anyone knows where I can host this site, I'm all ears.

http://www.dsvr.co.uk offer what you need, their VS750 (http://www.dsvr.co.uk/virtualservers/VS750.phtml?) sounds like what you're looking for, £70/month or £700/year gives you a server with what you need. The support is very good via online support form, telephone or email (I think they do email, never had to try).

The server is like a dedicated server, I can't remember what it's called but it's a shared unix server which seems like a dedicated one.

You're better going to look at thier site as I'm not very good at explaining but I do know that they're very good, they're not cheap but they're worth it ;)

And yes, they're based in the UK, Manchester Telecity (http://www.telecity.co.uk/manchester.htm) to be exact

tpsinger,

Very intersting link - they may well be my answer.
Thanks :)

Hello
You will have difficulty getting a unique IP in the UK because of the RIPE rules.
We do it for accounts with anon ftp (at a push).
I am not convinced that anyone needs a unique IP address anyway.

However the mod rewrite thing is unusual.
It is not normally supported on shared server due to the potential load and security issues.

Gordon

Originally posted by Judder
tpsinger,

Very intersting link - they may well be my answer.
Thanks :)

np, let us know how you get on

To GordonH:
DSVR give you a unique IP address and mod_rewrite, I'm not connected to them at all, I just like them :)

Before signing with DSVR check their bandwidth charges.
Last time I checked it was £24 per GB plus VAT

Gordon

Well it looks like DSVR is not a viable option either.

VS300 - 3GB traffic, only 30 concurrent connections
VS750 - 7.5GB traffic, 75 concurrent connections- Expensive.

I sent them a list of questions and they were not very forthcoming with their replies.

I specifically asked what happens with more than 30 concurrent connections and all they said was "30 browsers can simultaneously retrieve data from the virtual server at exactly the same time"

I didnt get an answer about what would happen if more than that accessed the server, and it's not clear whether only 30 users can be *on* the server or actually requesting a page etc at the same time before becoming a problem.

.. This is for the VS300 package which supports 300 domains.
If I had 300 domains on the server I'd be sure that I'd have more that 30 concurrent users most of the time, and if I had the server loaded with 300 domains I'd know that there would be more than 30 people making requests at times as well.

I have many hosting accounts scattered around and I've never run into anyone telling me how many people I am allowed on my site in the past.

I can't justify the cost of a dedicated server for this site yet, and I'm really struggling to find somebody who can host this for me.

RE: Dedicated IP
I run alot of websites that are virtually hosted. I have many problems with search engine spiders getting themselves confused about which site on the server they are accessing.


Does anyone else have any suggestions to my problem?
Thanks in advance.

I have many hosting accounts scattered around and I've never run into anyone telling me how many people I am allowed on my site in the past.

Are you sure they don't mean the number of concurrent apache processes?

There is always a limit because of memory and processing issues.

On the unique IP issue I am surprised there has been any problem.
I can only speak from experience (having put 2000+ sites on the one IP and none of them seems to have any problems getting spidered).
The spider goes to the URL not the IP and indexes the contents of the pages that are delivered at the URL.

Gordon

GordonH,

Yes I've had this alot of times with search engine spiders getting themselves confused about which site they are accessing.

I believe it has something to do with alot of them making a request in http 1.0 to see what they get, then making a request via http 1.1 afterwards. This happens more with aggresive spiders such as Googlebot from Google.

Googlebot is also known to crawl via a cached IP address and I have observed this when changing hosts/IP etc with the old site being crawled long after moving.

I think I am going to abandon my original plan, and hunt for a quality host in the UK with everything else APART FROM mod_rewrite - this seems to be my biggest problem but I'll have to do some custom error page trickery to accomplish a similar task.

So, my next question is, can anybody recommend somebody who can offer me my 'new' requirements list:

Shared Unix Hosting
Server must be physically located in the UK
Dedicated IP address
PHP/MySQL/CGI/SSI etc,etc
Apache server
No .htaccess restrictions - ie I need to specify custom errors, process .html/text files as PHP etc.
I need to be able to access the site on the IP before the domain is transferred.
The 'host' must not be a reseller
About 5 gigs transfer/month, quality service, high uptime etc.

I sincerely appreciate all the help I've received so far, and I apologise for 'dragging' this thread out so much!

Hopefully, my requirements now may not be so bizarre and somebody will be able to recommend a suitable host for me.

Thanks again in advance.