Free or Commercial Hosting. Which is Best?

Alex DeBarros

Free
or Commercial Hosting. Which is Best?



Once you have created a Web site, whether it is a personal site or a business
site, you will want to put it on the World Wide Web, right? But where? You want
the best service at the lowest price and you've been seeing free hosting advertisements.
Free is good, but is it good for your website? FInd out now if a free hosting
plan is a viable option by considering these facts;

There are two main types
of web hosts.

• One is a free web host
  - a company who offers free space on their servers to post your pages and
  is usually used for personal Web sites.


• The second type of Web
  host is a commercial Web host - a company who charges you for Web space on
  their servers where you can post your pages and are usually used for business
  and professional Web sites.

Most people think that you
need to get your Internet access and Web space from the same company. Most Internet
Providers otter Web hosting but your site does not have to be hosted by your
provider. Shop around at different providers and host companies to find the
features you need at a competitive price. Depending on what type of Web host
you are looking for, there are some main things to look for and be aware of...

Choosing a Free
Web Host

Advertising

The main drawback to free hosts is that you will most likely have to display
their advertisement banner on your site, or an advertising pop up window appears
ever time a page is loaded. This is done to cover the costs of providing your
site with tree Web space.

Your Files

A very important issue is the host's method of creating/uploading a site. Now,
many of the hosts offer templates and user-friendly methods for creating and
uploading files for your site. If you do not have any HTML or design experience,
this is the way to go.

Amount of Space

Make sure that the host offers an account that will provide you with enough
space for your site. Your need for space will vary depending on how many and
how large your graphics are, whether you have audio or video on your site, any
large databases, etc.

Reliability and Speed

This is another important factor. Make sure that your site won't experience
long amounts of down time and slow loading when visitors try to access your
pages.

Choosing a Commercial
Web Host

Reliability
and Speed

A site that is frequently down or slow will always loose visitors. Make sure
you host has a fast connection to the Internet (T-3 lines are a must) that guarantees
a minimum of 99 per cent uptime.

Space

Be sure that your hosting package allows you enough space for your site. If
you have a large Web site or many Web sites that have numerous pages, images,
audio files, video files, animation, databases or scripts be sure to have at
least 100 MB of space. The same goes for bandwidth.

Technical and Customer Support

I cannot stress enough how important this issue is. Make sure that its technical
support functions 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Test them out by seeing how
long it takes them to respond to e-mails, call the tech support line on weekends,
late at night, etc.

Features

Look for a host that provides features for your site such as a CGI-BIN for scripts,
SSI, a secure server for secure items or online orders, FTP access, POP e-mail
accounts, a Control Panel where you can view you account stats, Telnet etc.

Price

This is perhaps the most important element to consider when choosing a host.
Cheaper is not always better. There are many companies that seem competitive
and often unbelievable prices, but end up providing unreliable uptimes, slow
delivery of your site to visitors and slow support response times. Invest into
a hosting provider that offers average prices, chances are the higher prices
are committed to support functions such as a 24/7 support staff.



About the author:

.