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  1. #1

    Thumbs down My Hostgator Review

    Hey guys,

    Im fairly new here, just Registered. I usually stop by to read some Hosting reviews. I want to tell you guys my Story with Hostgator.

    Im a Hostgator Customer for over 6 months now. I purchased the Business Shared plan. Im running a vbulletin forum with a few members that post on my website. Im also running dedicated servers which use the MySQL database remotely. I was satisfied with Hostgator for about 3 months. After that period the problems began. Somebody DDOSed my Site and of course Hostgator suspended me immediately saying that my index would use too much resources. I was on vacation and got phoned by one of my moderators that we got suspended. So I called the Hostgator support. They told me the same thing, they e-mailed me. So I asked him to activate my page again since its nearly impossible that I can jump from maybe 100 visitors a day to over 1000 visitors in a second. Well the connection broke up since I was walking in the woods but they activated it. About 2 weeks later the same thing happened, they suspended me again. I went into the chat this time and they told me that they dont think that it's an DDOS attack. I told him the same thing again, like I did to the guy on the phone. They activated it again. Everything was fine until 1 month ago. The Site was unavailable for me and many others. I went into the Hostgator chat and they told me that somebody is using a script that is overusing resources making everyone's content on the server unavailable. He said he will look into it and open a new ticket for me. After 1 hour I got suspended. They said that my Shoutbox is using too many resources and that I need to remove it. So I renamed my Shoutbox folder to deactivate it temporarily. I have been running this Shoutbox since the beginning and I/they never had problems with it. So recently the server where my webhosting account is on keeps restarting or crashing for some reason. They told me that Apache keeps crashing and that they are working on it to get it resolved. I was fine with it, but it kept happening. So to get to the end, I have been in the Hostgator chat 6 times today already since they still didnt fix it. Im really starting to think that there will be more and more problems, so Im already looking for another webhost where I can host my Website. I barely use 100GB of Bandwith and I really dont think that Im using much resources running a simple forum.

    I also talked to the support many times about their maintenance frames. I think they really should inform the customers by e-mail if they shutdown the server for maintenance or warn before they start working on the server if it will affect the availability of Websites.

    Overall Im not happy Customer of Hostgator anymore. Im really impressed how they are forcing me to leave. I was always nice to the customer support since I already worked in the same branch so I know how you feel when a customer is yelling at you.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Aug 2002
    Location
    Seattle
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    5,525
    If you're using substantial amounts of resource or receive any kind of DoS/DDoS attack you should look into a VPS or dedicated server.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Dec 2007
    Location
    Indiana, USA
    Posts
    19,196
    The problem is that a shoutbox can cause thousands of access/requests per second which is why it's against the HostGator Terms of Service and could very easily cause you to use too much resources in a standard shared environment.

    If you want to run a shoutbox you would need to go with a semi-dedicated/high end shared at the least or a VPS.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Sep 2008
    Location
    Dallas, TX
    Posts
    4,568
    James,

    I'm agreeing here with MikeDVB and IRCCo Jeff. You were using substantial resources, getting DDOS'd, etc. All of those are reason for suspension. It looks like Hostgator was more than patient with you during those events over the last six months.
    Jacob Wall

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Aug 2004
    Location
    Earth
    Posts
    8,154
    So I renamed my Shoutbox folder to deactivate it temporarily. I have been running this Shoutbox since the beginning and I/they never had problems with it.
    Looks like that might have been the cause of the problem all along. Shoutboxes are huge resource hogs.

    I barely use 100GB of Bandwith and I really dont think that Im using much resources running a simple forum.
    What your concurrent users online at any one time? A simple forum can be really resource intensive especially on a shared server depending on how large the database is. Perhaps you should try optimizing your database, and try to remove plugins from your forums one at a time to see if any one of them could be the culprit in your case.

    This is one of the very few negative reviews I've seen of Hostgator.

    I also talked to the support many times about their maintenance frames. I think they really should inform the customers by e-mail if they shutdown the server for maintenance or warn before they start working on the server if it will affect the availability of Websites.
    Some times administrators need to perform emergency maintenance or something of that sort where the user cannot be notified ahead of time. Unfortunate events of downtimes can occur with shared hosting, you will not find 100% reliability/uptime with any shared hosting provider.

    Best of luck

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jan 2003
    Location
    Texas, where else?
    Posts
    1,571

    Cool

    Quote Originally Posted by IRCCo Jeff View Post
    If you're using substantial amounts of resource or receive any kind of DoS/DDoS attack you should look into a VPS or dedicated server.
    I'd have to second that idea. You would be on your own IP's and you would have full configuration for your forums if there was something there causing your shoutbox program that might be "fixed" with the VPS set-up or config options..
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  7. #7
    Join Date
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    I think your needs are beyond a shared account. I would recommend a vps.
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  8. #8
    Join Date
    Apr 2001
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    Quote Originally Posted by JixHost View Post
    I think your needs are beyond a shared account. I would recommend a vps.
    A VPS for a forum would be an step down instead, you have a lot let resources available than in most shared box.
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  9. #9
    Join Date
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jedito View Post
    A VPS for a forum would be an step down instead, you have a lot let resources available than in most shared box.
    If HostGator was suspending his account multiple times for excess usage, then how would you suggest to continue on his shared account rather then go to a vps?
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  10. #10
    Join Date
    Mar 2009
    Location
    India
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    Bandwidth and server resources are not the same. Bandwidth can be typically considered "network resources", though 100GB bandwidth for any normal forum is huge.

  11. #11
    Join Date
    Jul 2009
    Posts
    95
    I would like to tell you that hostgator still is hosting too many forums and most of them have shoutcast/shoutbox for sure..... and still there site is running without any problem....

    Either there would be some other problem with your site and that is why they suspended your site..

  12. #12

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Apr 2001
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    Paradise
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    Quote Originally Posted by JixHost View Post
    If HostGator was suspending his account multiple times for excess usage, then how would you suggest to continue on his shared account rather then go to a vps?
    I don't know which are his resources usage, however, a VPS tipically have 512 MB of RAM to start or even less, that wont be good enough to run a busy forum.
    A VPS is not necesarilly a step up.
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  14. #14
    Join Date
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jedito View Post
    I don't know which are his resources usage, however, a VPS tipically have 512 MB of RAM to start or even less, that wont be good enough to run a busy forum
    Are you suggesting that he can use more than 512mb of ram consistently in a shared hosting environment?

  15. #15
    Join Date
    Dec 2007
    Location
    Indiana, USA
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    19,196
    Quote Originally Posted by Jedito View Post
    I don't know which are his resources usage, however, a VPS tipically have 512 MB of RAM to start or even less, that wont be good enough to run a busy forum.
    A VPS is not necesarilly a step up.
    A 512MB ram VPS with 1gb+ burst wouldn't be a bad thought. Realistically if the VPS is optimized well enough it should be able to handle a shoutbox. What is nice I guess is the isolation of the VPS that would allow a high resource user to use the VPS well without really affecting others on the server much if at all.

    Quote Originally Posted by dyna! View Post
    Are you suggesting that he can use more than 512mb of ram consistently in a shared hosting environment?
    Interesting point for discussion
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  16. #16
    Join Date
    Jun 2008
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    205
    You should protect the search feature on your forum. It can take a lot of resources to do just one search. A lot of people use a CAPTCHA. Look into it.

    You really need to learn how to diagnose heavy resource usage, how to read logs and never depend on someone else to do it for you.

  17. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by dyna! View Post
    Are you suggesting that he can use more than 512mb of ram consistently in a shared hosting environment?
    Not constantly, and probably can't do it on a VPS either, however it can burst it at some point and in a VPS you are probably limited to a lot lower value, same does happen with the CPU.

    There are many sites that in a shared host are working (abusing of the server resources, yes) that in a VPS wont do it.
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  18. #18
    Well Im really a freak when it comes to Forum protection. We are protected against any kind of spam bots etc. We have captchas on every form and search you can do on our forum as a guest. The DB size is currently at 20 MB. Im not sure but if it comes to DDOS attacks arent Hosters supposed to have a protection against this? I mean this can happen to anybody. I probably get hit 2 times a year with a DDOS attack. My shoutbox is not with AJAX. It's a simple shoutbox you have to refresh each time to get updates.

    In my opinion 100 GB is not much if you have a few members that check the site on a daily basis and some visitors. I thought my bandwith usage is normal but if you guys tell me different I will also accept that.

    Well let me explain how I get to 100 GB per month. People upload and download Game Maps on my forum. If 100 people download that 5 MB map, you can obviously see where Im going. We have unique maps posted sometimes so some people grab them before I move the link to an external host. We also have automated File Backups every month(ca. 2GB) and every 2 days the database will get backed up.

  19. #19
    Join Date
    Dec 2002
    Location
    texas
    Posts
    1,333
    Hello,


    What is your ticket number with us? Based on what you said I'm very surprised how many chances we've given your site. If you're having this problem in our shared environment you're most likely going to have this problem anywhere you go.

  20. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by hostgator.com View Post
    Hello,


    What is your ticket number with us? Based on what you said I'm very surprised how many chances we've given your site. If you're having this problem in our shared environment you're most likely going to have this problem anywhere you go.
    NGR-12676692

    No worries, Im moving this coming month. Oh and I talked to some of my friends who I recommended to hostgator.com. We made a deal to all move to a dedicated server. We have 5 websites.

    Can you guys recommend me some good dedicated server hosters and some good specs? I been running my Game Servers on a Linux box but I dont know what I should look for if I want to host a couple of websites on a dedicated server.

  21. #21
    Join Date
    Dec 2002
    Location
    texas
    Posts
    1,333
    I reviewed your tickets and we did make the right call taking action against your site. There's no question your site in each instance was the culprit crashing the server as shown by the logs and server load we provided you with.

    I took a look at your traffic stats and on most days you would have around 10,000 page views but then there were some days with over 120,000 views. It appears these were the days your shoutbox was being slammed with thousands of hits a second. The ips we provided you with were all legitimate so if it was some type of attack it would be close to impossible to tell a good ip from a bad. If you were able to permanently take down your shoutbox it would most likely solve your problems.

  22. #22
    Quote Originally Posted by hostgator.com View Post
    I reviewed your tickets and we did make the right call taking action against your site. There's no question your site in each instance was the culprit crashing the server as shown by the logs and server load we provided you with.

    I took a look at your traffic stats and on most days you would have around 10,000 page views but then there were some days with over 120,000 views. It appears these were the days your shoutbox was being slammed with thousands of hits a second. The ips we provided you with were all legitimate so if it was some type of attack it would be close to impossible to tell a good ip from a bad. If you were able to permanently take down your shoutbox it would most likely solve your problems.
    Well I dont think the recent crashes of chillsoft or apaches were my fault since my shoutbox is disabled for days now. Im not eithen using a chillsoft script so I couldnt crash that. I didnt open a ticket each time I had problems with the site since I simply feel more confortable in a chat but you should have a history on that as well since Im like a daily chatter on your support chat. So please check the chat aswell since you will probably see tons of more stuff.

    Oh and please specify a date, since Im not sure which incident you were talking about. There were so many.

  23. #23
    Join Date
    May 2009
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    Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
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    If he goes to a vps he will not be suspended for excess usage (fair usage) so thats one less issue to deal with. HostGator is probably one one the most leniant hosts as far as allowing for abuse so I would imagine he would continue to have problems if he migrates to another shared host account.
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  24. #24
    Join Date
    Nov 2009
    Posts
    59
    I got booted off HostGator for using too much of the servers resources. There is no point in offering unlimited disk space and having a limit on inodes or other system resources. I wonder why hosting companies don't show these limits on their homepage.

    Lesson is don't buy into "unlimited".

  25. #25
    Join Date
    Aug 2002
    Location
    Seattle
    Posts
    5,525
    Unlimited typically means "we won't pay attention to your utilization," just make sure you don't wake the dog.

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