cihost or site5?

[doron]

Anyone have experience with cihost and vb? They have a niffty new promotion deal, and was wondering if it is too good to be true.

Thanks

[Rick Horwitz]

I tried CIHOST with vB for one week and got my money back. They couldn't keep their mySQL server running for more than 5 minutes at a time. I was on two different machines in that week and neither was working properly.

My board works great now that I'm on a good server.

[JimF]

I have one site on Site5, and I am not impressed. Granted, it is not running vBulletin, but the general responsiveness of the site is much slower than that of the host of my vB, FutureQuest.

I strongly urge you to check them out: http://www.FutureQuest.net

They don't give you as much for your money as some "other" hosts, but they make up for it in their technical support and responsiveness. "Trouble Ticket" is a 4-letter word with them.

I had the opportunity to have my site hosted for free, but opted against it because I feared lacking the technical support of FutureQuest. Between their e-mail support, Automated Help Desk, and Community Forums, you can solve any problem virtually instantaneously. I have never waited for more than 24 hours for a response and/or solution.

They may not give you 100MB of storage, but trust me: IT IS WELL WORTH IT!! I wouldn't recommend any other host. Plus my server ahs had 99.9% uptime the past two months, the only downtime occuring with system upgrades, which they warned me about beforehand.

If you care about your site and your visitors, I would strongly suggest contacting them ASAP.

I still haven't talked to a single HUMAN at Site5... funny, isn't it?!? :)

[Dragon]

CIHost blows chunks. Trust me.

[Shoe]

I was with this company for 3 days and dropped them. They are very bad in terms of technical support and insulting in the way they treat users. Go elsewhere!

[Nutcase]

Having used both cihost and site5, I strongly reccomend site5. They give you TONS for the money (500mb, 20gb transfer, 5dbs, etc) and are expandible cheaply.

Their support is ridiculously good. I have had some serious issues with the server & vB, but they have been with me every step of the way sorting them out. Now vB runs fine on their servers.

I really dont have much to complain about. their network connection is being switched from 1 oc3 to 4 ds3's on 4 different networks, for redundancy. Unfortunately, this has lead to some downtime recently as the connections switch, etc... The downtime is sporatic and brief. It should stop completely by the end of the week. I will let you know then my final verdict.

[JimF]

Ever notice how their "support forums" are password protected? Wanna know why? Because there is NO SUPPORT THERE. I haven't spoken to, or communicated with, a human once in the month I've had a site there.

[rjav8r]

JimF.

Just went to futurequest and I'm very impressed, like the speed of your site. Tell them they've got a Platinum service member on the way :) If you can geta discount for your service I'd be happy to plug your reference when I sign up .

[Nutcase]

you are absolutely right... the site5 support forums are a ghost town. Wanna know why? because they arent needed. When i have a problem i chat with their tech support guy via ICQ and get it solved then and there. If that isnt possible, the helpdesk is actively monitored, and ususally gets solved fast. But it doesnt get any better than firing off an icq to the support guy, and getting a message back in 5 minutes saying "fixed" or answering the question. :)

[doron]

how's site5's speed and reliability? Support I heard is good, it's the tech stuff I am more isnterested in.

[JimF]

Originally posted by rjav8r
JimF.

Just went to futurequest and I'm very impressed, like the speed of your site. Tell them they've got a Platinum service member on the way :) If you can geta discount for your service I'd be happy to plug your reference when I sign up .

Hey, no problem. I'm sure you will be very happy there, as I have been, and will continue to be. I promise you that you will not be disappointed. I don't get any perks for the reference, except for the satisfaction that I have helped them out (ask Brian about that one...;)).

I'll see you over on the FQ forums! :)

[Nutcase]

Doron:

The speed at site5 seems fine with me. Everything we have loads quickly at 56k, and the sql is plenty fast. It is more than adequate for our needs (at this point).

I would point you to our site, but we are currently using it as a dev server only (until our new stuff is ready, when we will switch the domain...)

I would suggest you find others on site5 and check out their site... I know Mafukie is on site5 but dont know the url....

As far as reliablility, I cannot give you a straight answer. Over the past few weeks, I have had crazy downtime. The server I was on wasnt adequately cooled, and the motherboard burned up. They rebuilt it immediately into a case w/ 6 fans, a new mobo, 2 new processors, 712mb of ram, etc... the only thing the same was the harddrive. Because of all that downtime, they refunded the entire months charge for everyone on that server.

Other downtime has been very sporatic, and very brief, as the site where the servers are hosted has updated its connection from a single OC3 to four ds3's (pointing at different backbones) so its link would be redundant.

Over the past 5 days ALL downtime has stopped, and the server has been great. I expect the trend to continue, but i am not 100% sure the network stuff is done (I havent asked matt... the tech support dude)

As I am only using it as a dev server at the moment, I agreed to alpha test their new control panel (out in a week or two) - It is impressive.... it does just about everything... or will when it goes live. So that is something to look forward to. :)

I am happy with site5, and the few problems i have had have been more than made up for by the support. I suggest you try it, and if you don't like it, you have 30 days with no obligation, and you will get a full refund. And you can't beat their pricing. :)

[Susan]

It's good to hear that Site5 is improving on their uptime!! When we were there, we were down at least 2 hours a day almost every day from the end of February until the end of April. The longest we went with no significant downtime was 7 days in late March which kept us there for another month. The tech support is wonderful. I can't say enough good things about Matt...I'd ask him to marry me if I wasn't already married. :D Seriously...he went above and beyond the call of duty many times and will still answer a "Hey Matt, I have a question." ICQ from me. (He took me by the hand into telnet and told me what to do once I got there!!) I think my negative Karma fried the server. I hated that thing with a passion. It caused me more grief than any machine in my life. If that server can stay up for a month or so straight, I would feel great about recommending them. You for sure can't beat the price!

Susan
The Signatureless

Susan

[Edited by Susan on 06-08-2000 at 04:59 PM]

[TechTalk]

Well I have been with cihost now for 2 years on 3 of my websites and I have no complaints......

[Dragon]

Even last December? You must have the patience of a saint.

[wajones]

I was with them for 2 years, stayed thru the "incident" as it's called, lost our DNS servers for 3 days I think. Then just recently I lost my email for over 2 weeks with no response from tech support, despite many tickets and calls. They are very liberal with their many options.

I changed to http://www.webaxxs.com a division of OLM about a month ago. I like them so far, the tech support is very fast. Their cheap... $15.95 for 400 meg and 8 gig of trafic per month, 4 MYSql databases and PHP4, you do have to tell them up front you want PHP4 or they will put you on PHP3??? Tech support told me that as long as you don't go over your 400 meg your MySql database can be as big as you want.

I'll let you know how it goes.

Disclaimer.... I'm not affiliated with OLM or Webaxxs, I'm just the Dad of Chris (Not any of the vB Chris') at least I don't think so?

[Mas*Mind]

I'm for about 2 months with site5 now and I'm very unhappy. The speed is worse than at my old host (pair) and the last days my server is constantly down. They've also a new kind of support system wich is very unuserfriendly IMO. You can't email them directly anymore, but have to report everything through that system. If this stays like this I'll be gone soon :mad:

[slinky]

Originally posted by JimF
I have one site on Site5, and I am not impressed. Granted, it is not running vBulletin, but the general responsiveness of the site is much slower than that of the host of my vB, FutureQuest....They don't give you as much for your money as some "other" hosts, but they make up for it in their technical support and responsiveness. "Trouble Ticket" is a 4-letter word with them.
I looked at FutureQuest and when you say you don't get as much for your money you weren't kidding. Paying $20 for 25MB or $30 for 50MB or $40 for 75MB is way too little space and far too much for anything less than mission critical hosting, IMHO. At that price they better establish a sentinel next to the web server! At OLM I pay far less and, with many other hosts, I've found uptime to be in excess of 99%, usually 99.5% which is very acceptable for your typical business.

I thought I saw a 24 hour guaranteed turnaround from site5. Perhaps you should bring this up with them. They seem to be very familiar with their legal language.

I still haven't talked to a single HUMAN at Site5... funny, isn't it?!? :) That is what bothered the hell out of me with them. While their owner is rustling up a storm on webhostingtalk to solicit new clients, they still haven't answered my perfectly legitimate question and comment about how reputable companies don't hide their contact information and site5 provides you with no contact information whatsoever. Their service may be excellent, I don't know, but we don't do business that way. I have also seen messages where people get booted there for excess usage levels without any prior warning even though legally site5 can do that to them provided it is reasonable.

I'm hoping that more site5 owners can provide me with some good feedback instead of the feel-good "go with my host so I can feel better about my choice" advice but I'll be testing venturesonline, who don't have the setup fee or several months of up front minimum like site5 and may stick with them and OLM...

[Nicholas Brown]

I have had numerous conversations/dealings with Matt and Vince and they are always very helpful.

I can not vouch for speed as i dont have an account with them, but if you go to http://www.webhostingtalk.com/search.php?s=&action=showresults&searchid=40654&sortby=lastpost&sortorder=descending you'll see there are some very positive comments about them.

They are located in NAC - which could be what the speed issues are, but Im sure if you contact Matt, he will answer you asap with some insight. ( Contact him on mlightner@site5.com )

Of course, going with Site5 gives you the advantage of NetAdmin and BillAdmin :)

[MattLight]

Originally posted by slinky

I looked at FutureQuest and when you say you don't get as much for your money you weren't kidding. Paying $20 for 25MB or $30 for 50MB or $40 for 75MB is way too little space and far too much for anything less than mission critical hosting, IMHO. At that price they better establish a sentinel next to the web server! At OLM I pay far less and, with many other hosts, I've found uptime to be in excess of 99%, usually 99.5% which is very acceptable for your typical business.

I thought I saw a 24 hour guaranteed turnaround from site5. Perhaps you should bring this up with them. They seem to be very familiar with their legal language.

That is what bothered the hell out of me with them. While their owner is rustling up a storm on webhostingtalk to solicit new clients, they still haven't answered my perfectly legitimate question and comment about how reputable companies don't hide their contact information and site5 provides you with no contact information whatsoever. Their service may be excellent, I don't know, but we don't do business that way. I have also seen messages where people get booted there for excess usage levels without any prior warning even though legally site5 can do that to them provided it is reasonable.

Slinky... you seem to bringing up old Site5 threads all over the place. ;) This thread was from last September. Needless to say, we have improved quite a bit since then. Also note that we are no longer on the same network as we were previously.

As far as not getting any responses from our support team - I find that hard to believe. We generally reply to all inquiries within 24 hours (usually much quicker) unless it requires escalation or code modification, in which case it may be longer.

I believe I addressed the "excess usage" questions that you had at this URL:
http://webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?threadid=7595

One important note: I am not the owner of Site5, and never have been. My job here is not to solicit new clients... but rather to ensure that our current customers are satisfied. Moreover, I am an on-staff programmer for Site5. I am also a member of the Darkorb Cpanel development team, as well as the creator of the BillAdmin web host billing system (which Nicholas Brown is certainly familiar with ;) ).


I'm hoping that more site5 owners can provide me with some good feedback instead of the feel-good "go with my host so I can feel better about my choice" advice but I'll be testing venturesonline, who don't have the setup fee or several months of up front minimum like site5 and may stick with them and OLM...
There should be quite a few Site5 customers here who would be able to provide you with feedback on our service now as opposed to ten months ago (which will certainly be much more relevant in your case). You may want to take a look at this thread at Web Hosting Talk:
http://webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?threadid=13022

At any rate, I hope you find the feedback that you're looking for. If you have any further questions, feel free to email me (a real live human being) directly at mlightner@site5.com, or you can simply email our sales department at sales@site5.com.

From reading your posts here and at WebHosting Talk, you seem to be quite uneasy about signing up at Site5 - for whatever the reason may be. If that is the case, then my only advice to you would be to find a host that you are comfortable with and go with them. Unfortunately, we can't be the right host for everyone. As you said, Ventures Online may be more suitable to your needs at this time, and if that is the conclusion that you come to, then there's really no reason to try Site5 based on customer recommendations alone. You need to get a "feel" for a host, and it looks like you don't "feel" good about Site5 at this time.

Hope that helps.

Best Regards,
Matt Lightner
mlightner@site5.com

[slinky]

Ahhh.. I see. Since I didn't have phone numbers I took the word of mouth! Fortunately these people can give you a feel for what it's like to be hosted for several months. It's a tough decision and, while I respect what you are doing and can appreciate that someone is as diligent as you, the lack of contact information has me a little spooked.... but again... thanks. It's tough being on the other side peering in...

[MattLight]

Originally posted by slinky
Ahhh.. I see. Since I didn't have phone numbers I took the word of mouth! Fortunately these people can give you a feel for what it's like to be hosted for several months. It's a tough decision and, while I respect what you are doing and can appreciate that someone is as diligent as you, the lack of contact information has me a little spooked.... but again... thanks. It's tough being on the other side peering in...
Like I said... nobody can make the decision for you. When it comes right down to it, you're the one that's going to have to live with this decision and deal with the company on a (somewhat) day-to-day basis. It looks like you've done quite a bit of research, and have narrowed your choices down to some of the more reputable hosting companies (in this knack of the wood anyway). I'm pretty sure that no matter which you choose, you're going to get great service, and be pretty darn happy with your decision.

Best Regards,
Matt Lightner
mlightner@site5.com

[JimF]

I've learned over the last year, that there is no comparison between cihost & site5. All comparisons of these two companies always come out very clearly in the favor of one of them. It was for this reason, that I did not open this thread, since I figured the original question would be answered swiftly and accurately, like all others before it. This is bad moderating on my part, for a variety of reasons.

Not the least of which being the discovery of some things that I said over a year ago, which were untrue then, and are even more untrue now. While trying to remember why I would have said some of the more negative things I said about Site5 on the first page of this thread, the only reason I can think of is that I was accentuating some of the bad points of one company in order to make the good points of another look better. This is unfair of me, and to be honest, very wrong of me.

Not to knock Site5, but FutureQuest is a great host, and I would highly recommend them to anyone seeking premium hosting services.

To make this point, I feel I painted an innaccurate picture of Site5, which I know is not true. This message is to serve as an open apology to Matt & Site5, because I feel my comments in this thread may have led to the loss of many customers for reasons that are simply untrue. Additionally, it seems Matt has had to defend his company due to some of the things I said, and for that I apologize as well.

To any prospective clients of any of the aforementioned hosts, I want to make it very clear that the support of Site5 is fast, concise, and accurate. They exhibit a personal interest in their clients, as indicated by Matt's participation on this and other webmaster communities. His posting in these places, by the way, is not out of desperation of getting new clients, but is largely in part to misrepresentations of Site5 which get started by innaccurate comments like the ones I made.

Site5 has one of the best reputations in the webmaster community for value, quality of service, and quality of support. By hosting with them, you are only going to be happy with their service.

Again, I'd like to apologize for the defaming comments I made towards Site5.

-jim

[Voltron]

I cannot say enough bad things about CIhost. They gave me the run-around on the phones for hours one day when I was trying to fix something with my server. They have a good like and that 2GB unlimited bandwidth package got me... I left 2 weeks later because the support was so bad.

My advice is to avoid them!

[tamarian]

My current host leased a few machine on site5, and my machine happens to be one of them. Since I moved to site5, it's been nothing but trouble, daily problems, slow response.

As I write this email, my site has been down for over an hour. The system is hung, and just needs a reboot. My host (HostingMatters) has been paging Site5 for a simpl f***ing reboot, since everything is hung, including SSH, and they're still not responding.

Other than that, they're o.k. ;)

[yakov]

Read this: http://www.badwebhost.com/

[Site5Sucks]

Folks, this is basically how it works, others will have different variations, but in a nutshell.

Shared Hosting with Site5.Com cheap offers only attracks a certain type of people, LOW INCOME/LIMITED KNOWLEDGE!

Hence, these idiots caters to idiots, who screw up their freaking server, causing the god damn crap to take a dump every freaking day or 2!

The morons at site5.com tries to get the world of customers, but the world of idiots go to them, only to get their damn site offline for days! Try contacting them, yeah, good luck!

Enough said, site5.com is the WORST! You'll always get what you pay for. In the beginning, they were good, no doubt, but now, they suck like hell! :mad:

[Steve Machol]

No need to dredge up a thread that is over 5 years old.