February 14, 2004

• I signed up with 1and1.com when they had their free three years promotion and have been very happy. They have a business account package that meets your requirements for $9.99/mo.
• I have a 1and1 account too. For a free service it's nice, but the time for updates is a bit annoying compared to pay for service hosts. Dreamhost has a $9.95 plan and good service. I know a number of people that are using them and I'm going to switch when my current contract is up.
• I work for a webhost and am pretty proud of our product, but not comfortable linking in this context unless asked specifically. I can also recommend dr2.net, whom I use for a side project that I don't care for my employer to have any control over. 150mb, 5gb, php, cpanel, fantastico installer, etc for $40 a year.
• Using ICDSoft here. Decent. But will switch to Dreamhost next time.
• kuro5hin.org always has tons of textads from webhosting companies.
• I recommend dreamhost too. They're not the cheapest, but the give you everything - plenty of space, decent bandwidth, telnet access(!), mysql + loads of other stuff I'll never use.
• I use dreamhost and am extremely happy with them, but http://www.globalservers.com/vps_1.htm has a much better deal. I don't need that stuff, but 2 gigs of storage for $14 a month! Can't beat that.
• And do all of these have MySQL? That's my most important criterion; I have no idea whether that's considered 'standard' on most web hosting packages or not.
• I use lunarpages.com which was nice. 800 megabytes, php, mysql, 40 gb transfer for only 7.95 a month. only thing is that you have to pay it all up front for a full year.
• Mfpb, it's totally a standard these days to have some sort of database. Your current hostng company is really out of touch, and ripping you off for making you pay anything extra at all.
• Mfpb - I had looked into domain hosting about a year ago, and decided that once my current host notices that they are giving me free service (they have not billed me for over a year and a half), I would have to switch. I dislike my current host enough to switch, but I'm not complaining if they're going to give me free service. Once of the hosting companies that I looked into was Blue Box Internet. They have a plan that you would like, for $9.95 per month (less if you pay quarterly or annually) http://blueboxinternet.com/web-pro.php
• Thanks guys. These are all MUCH better alternatives. Greatly appreciated!
• I just switched (two months ago) to OnSmart.com's shared hosting plan, and it's nothing short of brilliant. $11.50 monthly, $7.50/mo yearly -- my MySQL queries return faster, unlimited databases/subdomains/etc. Perhaps the greatest thing is 24-hour live chat tech support. No one mentioned it here, but there were a few votes for phpwebhosting.com in a similar Ask Mefi thread a week or two back -- I just switched from them because I'd been having tons of trouble (db crashes, tech support request form crashes, and so forth).