Need new hosting / email provider -- suggestions?

[Jeff Kilgroe]

OK, need a new hosting and email provider ASAP. MediaTemple just totally failed me, a few words in a forum post can not explain. Have been thinking of switching anyway since their email services are complete shit and it's one constant issue after another. Now they have totally screwed the pooch, potentially lost me an important client, and this might blow up into something big that I don't want to deal with.

I'm not looking for small-time personal web site hosting. I need BANDWIDTH and I need robust email with good database and config options, multiple site/domain hosting. Also not looking for a generic C.Panel based provider where they all have the same cookie-cutter back end and no real support. I want the good stuff.

Being a hosting provider is hard -- been there, done that. But I can't believe there isn't anyone out there that can do it right. ...still looking.

[KETCH ROSSi]

Oh oh, I have just switched to them...

[Bob Gundu]

I guess I don't need power crazy solutions but I've been ok with Powweb.

[Alex Frausto]

I use Geovario. Excellent customer support. They host some VERY high traffic sites. They are big on 1st amendment protection as well.

http://geovario.professionaledgellc.com

[Elsie N]

Haven't used them for quiet a few years and I'm not even sure this is still their name, but C I Host seemed like a pretty good outfit to me. They had capabilities WAY above what I needed, so I left them for a less expensive webhost, Hostmonster.

[Louis Maddalena]

I use dreamhost and love them.

[William Schultz]

Check out JustHost. I've been using them for quite some time. Really great service.

[Gavin Greenwalt]

I use http://dixiesys.com/ but their billing system is terrible. But they're absurdly cheap. Good for just parking a domain with a simple website. I wouldn't trust them though with an eCommerce site or anything like that.

Have you considered just running an Amazon S3/EC2 server?

[Jeff Kilgroe]

I guess I don't need power crazy solutions but I've been ok with Powweb.

Used them before, never again. I supposedly had "unlimited" bandwidth and plenty of GB of storage. However, they complained about what I was doing and actually shut my account (and 5 web sites with about 30 email users) down on more than one occasion for silly things like having files that were "too big" or using more than xxxGB of bandwidth in a month (on an unlimited bandwidth account). Let's just say we didn't see eye to eye and then for a while there I had terrible email issues which they took weeks to identify and then subsequently refused to address the problem because of the amount of resources involved to fix it. So that was that. Yeah, not a fan of the Powweb....

Prior to Powweb, I ran my own servers and charged clients for hosting. But I quit that when my work with the datacenter I was using changed capacity to a continuous maintenance and installation type contract. I didn't want to be a host anymore and deal with all the bandwidth allegations, negotiating for bandwidth and IP blocks and constantly keeping servers up to date with the latest software and whatnot. I have a small IT company that manages hardware infrastructure for this local datacenter on a contract basis. But we don't touch people's systems, we handle the routers, cabling, etc.. And we maintain a few large RAID units for one of our clients there. There is one hosting provider within this datacenter and I've tried using them too. Nice guys, but they don't offer what I need...

I went from Powweb to InMotion Hosting to MediaTemple. Also tried BlueHost and DreamHost before MediaTemple, but didn't use any more than their demo periods. At the last time I was shopping around a couple years ago, most of the "unlimited" plans out there were not truly unlimited. They usually were capped at 20, 30 or 40GB per month when you read the fine print. Looking around now, some still seem to be that way.

I've put up with the absolutely shitty email system from MediaTemple for going on 3 years now because their actual web hosting has been rather good. They have had some major glitches in the past 6 months, including a security issue where some accounts got hacked and used for spam and subsequently nearly every one of their mail servers and associated IP blocks were de-listed or black-listed by other major ISPs as a spam source. The way MediaTemple handled that event, even though getting it *mostly* cleared up after several months, didn't strike me as the proper way to handle it.

Media Temple always gets glowing reviews... They have been nothing but mediocre since I've signed up there. Overall I really like their site management console system and how everything works. The hosting aspect is probably the best I've run across. But the email... Man... I'd almost be better off to use GoDaddy or Google for mail services and just map my MX records somewhere else like that.

I was going to bitch about their support times lately being 20~30 hours. And I haven't been having much luck today getting ahold of anyone there. But they're on top of my issue now. I've got my email back up where I can check and it seems that all my hosted clients do as well. The other big issue that happened hasn't been resolved yet... Waiting to see how that turns out. I finally got to talk to someone about it over the phone. It's apparently a much larger issue and there was a real sense of panic and urgency in this guy's voice. Glad I'm not him.

If they can find a way to put the shit back into the horse on this one within the next few hours, I'll probably stay. ...Mostly because I know if I go anywhere else it's just going to be more of the same, or worse. Looking around, I'm not seeing too many other options out there with the level of features I'm getting here. At least not without going to a full-on dedicated server plan, but if I'm going to do that, I may as well just build a couple of my own and install them in the local datacenter where I have people looking in on a regular basis.

[Joseph S.]

How much bandwidth do you use per month?