I own a website at

http://www.Aquari*umFish.net (remove the *)

and need a new web host.

Yesterday, January 14, 2001, my site had 3021 unique visitors, 10814 page views, 71702 hits, and 698 MB of data transfer. I estimate that during the month of January 2001 the data transfer will be about 20 GB.

My site occupies 19 MB of disk space including 2 MB of FrontPage extensions. My site receives about 25 or 40 emails per day.

I wrote this site using FrontPage, and it's mostly just text and images.

Perhaps a web hosting company would be willing to tailor a hosting plan in return for a button, text link, or something else appropriate on my site.

I'd prefer not to pay more than I should, but I want visitors to have a good experience on my site.

Tom Bailey
General Manager
Aquari*umFish.net (remove the *)

http://www.tera-byte.com :). They are cheap - reliable and one of the few hosts u can trust :).

I am hostme.com fan. I have been using them for nearly one year. Though no one seems to know about them.(I posted a topic about hostme.com and no one replied.)

Hi,
You can find a list of hosts that post to this board here:

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?threadid=3053

You might try
http://www.hostrocket.com
to....Hostrocket and tera-byte are the 2 providers that I know of with the largest amt of transfer on their plans.
Good Luck!
tera-byte also has dedicated servers which you might be interested in.

More about hosting for my website at

http://www.Aquari*umFish.net (remove the *)

This website does not now have a shopping cart, but I plan to add one in the next couple of months.

StoreFront (www.StoreFront.com) is a highly recommended plug-in for FrontPage. I just called StoreFront Software (LaGarde) and they said my site must be hosted on an NT server to use StoreFront.

It seems that hosting on Unix servers is generally less expensive than NT servers, and perhaps much less expensive for a website like mine with 20 GB of data transfer. Is this true?

My site has doubled in the amount of data transfer every 2 or 3 months for the last 8 or 9 months. If this growth continues for another 6 months, the data transfer will increase to something like 80 GB.

Should I move my website to an NT server with a StoreFront shopping cart, or move to a Unix server with another shopping cart?

Tom Bailey
General Manager
Aquari*umFish.net (remove the *)

in that case go with hostrocket.com if u need a shopping cart at some point.

Maybe you should looking into a dedicated server....?

Tom, if NT is needed just for the cart, you can later get a small NT account and run it as a subdomain (shop.aquariumfish.com or something similar). This way you get most of the traffic on the cheap linux server, and just the orders go to the NT server.

Wazeh,

Thank you for your suggestion to put just the subdomain for the cart on NT.

Above I asked if the linux (Unix) server was cheaper, and haven't gotten an answer, but it looks to me like linux is cheaper, and that is the premise of your suggestion. Right?

Would I look for one web host that could give me both the linux for AquariumFish.net and the NT for the subdomain, shop.AquariumFish.net?

Could this be reliable solution for me? Is it used by other websites doing eCommerce?

Thanks again,

Tom

Jim (Rotohost) and other hosts-

If someone posts a plea for a host in this forum (the Advertsing Forum), asking:

Perhaps a web hosting company would be willing to tailor a hosting plan in return for a button, text link, or something else appropriate on my site.

-it is acceptable (if you have something that matches his request) to offer your services. Often hosts prefer to email the potential client directly, but I just wanted you to know that the rules for this forum differ from the rest of the board (in case you weren't aware).

Long way of saying: If you got it, you can post it here.

[Edited by Chicken on 01-16-2001 at 10:58 PM]

Originally posted by Tom
Wazeh,

Thank you for your suggestion to put just the subdomain for the cart on NT.

Above I asked if the linux (Unix) server was cheaper, and haven't gotten an answer, but it looks to me like linux is cheaper, and that is the premise of your suggestion. Right?

Would I look for one web host that could give me both the linux for AquariumFish.net and the NT for the subdomain, shop.AquariumFish.net?

Could this be reliable solution for me? Is it used by other websites doing eCommerce?

Thanks again,

Tom

Howdy Tom,

Sorry I didn't get back to you earlier (I've been out all day and haven't been e-mailing at my usual prolific rate). I see the others have been able to answer your questions or at least provide further food for thought.

In regards to using an NT host/subdomain/shopping cart, there's absolutely no reason why it can't be done (with a bit of manipulation to the DNS it's very easy) so if you are going to seriously pursue StoreFront then it's certainly worth considering.

In regards to *nix vs. NT, yes you are reasonably correct - *nix hosting tends to be cheaper due to the licensing costs of NT/2000, as well as the ease of automation + free software on *nix.

Have you looked at Ultraspeed USA (http://www.ultraspeedusa.com) they offer 32Gb (I think) with their top linux plan and they also do NT hosting as well.

Hi BC,

I need to transfer my web site to another web hosting company by Monday, 1/22/2001.

I've found good *nix hosting plans (for example, Terra-Byte's plan #6 for $27.50 with 40 GB of data transfer) and good NT/StoreFront plans (for example DataPipe's StoreFront Standard for $35.00 with 10 GB).

If I could put both of these two plans together, I'd have a solution. Wouldn't I? But I haven't been able to find a host with both.

I got several emails from WHT members. One suggested that there are good eCommerce packages for *nix servers, and perhaps I should consider one of them instead of StoreFront, which will only run on NT. StoreFront is touted as being able to maintain the look and feel of a FrontPage website, which is important to me.

Incidentally, will my FrontPage website really run well on a *nix server?

Lastly, I hope my first posting at the top of this thread did not sound like I was looking for free hosting in exchange for a "button, text link, or something else". I thought such an exchange might get me a discount.

I appreciate the helpful advice that this forum has given me.

Tom Bailey
General Manager
AquariumFish.net
http://www.AquariumFish.net


[Edited by Tom on 01-17-2001 at 08:25 AM]

Originally posted by Chicken
Jim (Rotohost) and other hosts-

If someone posts a plea for a host in this forum (the Advertsing Forum), asking:

Perhaps a web hosting company would be willing to tailor a hosting plan in return for a button, text link, or something else appropriate on my site.

-it is acceptable (if you have something that matches his request) to offer your services. Often hosts prefer to email the potential client directly, but I just wanted you to know that the rules for this forum differ from the rest of the board (in case you weren't aware).

Long way of saying: If you got it, you can post it here.

[Edited by Chicken on 01-16-2001 at 10:58 PM]

Bouncing around the board...forgot which topic I was in. :)

Originally posted by Tom
Would I look for one web host that could give me both the linux for AquariumFish.net and the NT for the subdomain, shop.AquariumFish.net?

One host on here that could offer you both unix and NT plans is http://www.hostroute.com

As a side note, I was jumping around your site. I'm impressed with the selection. How long to ship to NJ? For some reason, it seems strange to me getting live fish in the mail :)

Hi Jim,

Really I wasn't trying to sell anybody here a fish.

One of my problems is that it's been the coldest winter in the U.S. since 1895. Too cold to ship fish to most places including NJ. So my site doesn't have any income now. Ouch!

But I need a new host soon.

Tom Bailey
AquariumFish.net

Tom, sorry I haven't answered the original question. Yes, Linux tends to be cheaper, and more popular than NT. But the good news is, you need not have both NT and Linux accounts with the same host! You can get the best Linux deal that suits you, and the best NT deal you find. They can be completely different companies and it would still work fine. We can set it up for you if you like and customize a linux plan for you. Email me if you like.

Originally posted by Tom
Really I wasn't trying to sell anybody here a fish.

One of my problems is that it's been the coldest winter in the U.S. since 1895. Too cold to ship fish to most places including NJ. So my site doesn't have any income now. Ouch!

Suuuuure you weren't Tom. First off, we don't believe you. We all know your intent was to come here and sell us all fish, so please don't pretend otherwise. I didn't even want a fish, nor knew I could order them via the net before you came (what can't you get via the net these days?).

Well, this seems to have worked. I now want a fish for my classroom. Something to distract the kids while I teach. If possible, big enough so that I could threaten to throw them into the tank when they misbehave. Something with teeth would be nice. Big teeth.

Also, since it is too cold to ship fish the ol' fashioned way, I suggest expanding into the frozen fish market. If you were to rename your site, 'Gordon's AquariumFish.net' it might confuse enough people. I suggest packing them with tartar sauce so that the customer will be able to choose between pet, or dinner.

Just some suggestions...

Maybe it's just me, but I find ordering some fish and getting them delivered strangely compelling. :) I envision myself hesitating before opening the box...Are they really alive?....
I can see this working...LOL

Originally posted by RotoHost
Are they really alive?

If not, I suggest using the tartar sauce option.

Originally posted by Chicken

If not, I suggest using the tartar sauce option.

Would using that option depend on how long they've been dead?:)

Anyone from this forum who is interested in hosting, email me at paul@hunthosting.com.

If you sign up for our services, i will give you package #4 for the price of package#1 and no set up fee. see http://www.hunthosting.com to check out the packages.

I decided to go with Tera-Byte's shared hosting Plan #6 with 40 GB/month of data transfer.

Steve Keyser, of Tera-Byte, was helpful. He recommended the 4WebSpace dedicated RaQ3 server with 100 GB/month but without tarter sauce for $99.00. I think this might be an ideal solution to my needs.

I had to move my website within a few days, and thought there might be a snag in my learning the control panel for the RaQ3 in such a short amount of time. Steve insisted his young children could do it, but I went with the shared plan and will probably upgrade to the dedicated plan soon but without the pressure of a deadline.

Originally, I had planned to run StoreFront's shopping basket on my site, but it must have an NT type server. So I'll need to find another shopping cart that can run on the RaQ3, or run StoreFront in a subdomain on a different host. Perhaps DataPipe's StoreFront Standard Plan for $35.00/month with 10 GB xfer.

But I think I'll try to find a shopping cart that will integrate into my site and run on the RaQ3. I used FrontPage to write my site, and I'd appreciate advice about which shopping carts might work.

Well I came to this forum to solve a problem. I think I've made progress, and I thank everyone, who helped by responding here or by sending me an email, and even the usual tarter sauce jokes weren't as bad as usual.

Tom