Hosting Company and Server Issues - Site Move Eminent

[ScottHalliday]

Let me begin by stating that I have not been impressed with our current hosting company since the day I took over for the following reasons:

1. They are WAY overpriced compared to any of the hosting accounts I currently manage, especially considering what they provide.

2. The hosting account admin panel is very poorly constructed. Matter of fact it is the worst one I have ever worked with and far worse than any of the hosting accounts I currently manage for my other sites. Absolutely pathetic.

3. Limited functionality in a number of areas including:

(a) no access to the .htaccess file which if I had, I could easily fix the http://bimmerclassics.net cookie issues on the site. On all other hosting accounts this access is provided. In addition, the host admin panel does not provide any method for me to implement a simple redirect that would also resolve this problem.

(b) Limited access to image upload utilities including ImageMagick which is far superior to GD2 which we are now forced to use because ImageMagick is not available.

(c) Size restrictions on upload file sizes which I have not been able to find a workaround for. I have A HUGE collection of BMW photos that I have been trying to upload to our new gallery however no matter what I try, I continue to run into file size restrictions. This is not being caused by the photopost gallery software but more of a server restriction.

(d) Would like to add more domain pointers to BimmerClassics.net however host account admin panel does not provide that capability.

(e) The file management utility provided with the hosting account is the worst I have ever used. It is some type of poorly written open source software which they obviously are using because it is free. It has very limited functionality and like the ftp account, does not provide access to files like .htaccess.

4. Lack of True 24/7 Support. As I found out when our site recently went off-line for no apparent reason, when I tried to contact mecca, they did not respond until the next day.

Hello Scott, Thank you for contacting Mecca Sorry for the inconvenience, unfortunately there was a hardware issue with the shared server. Our technicians were aware of this issue and had resolved it. Please try to connect to the account again. Once again we apologize for the trouble this has caused, if you have any other questions or concerns please feel free to contact us again. You may also make good use of our live chat system available through our website. Best Regards, Mecca Client Care Team

If I had not tracked down and notified the company they use to manage their websites, I have to wonder how long we would have been down.

Considering the problems I had to actually get in touch with Mecca (during normal business hours and when their site was not down) when I was trying to transfer the hosting account, along with the far from reassuring response to my inquires as to what 24/7 support they provide, I am now more convinced than ever that they do not and perhaps cannot provide any level of reasonable 24/7 support. One guy with a pager that may or may not get a beep does not cut it for me. My opinion of mecca is they have mickey mouse stamped all over them and also leads be to question what type of site backup support they are providing, if any.

5. Since taking over the hosting account with Mecca, I have already had to upgrade it and now once again, starting on September 25th and getting progressively more frequent, I am receiving connectivity error emails caused from limited bandwidth:

mysql_connect() [function.mysql-connect]: Can'tconnect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (11) /home/webusers/bimmerclassics/bimmerclassics.net/www/forum/includes/class_core.php on line 311

While it is true site traffic has increased, the upgrade options mecca offers, again in my opinion, is very limited and extremely overpriced.

At the time I purchased Bimmer Classics I had decided to leave the site on our current hosting account because (1) I did not want to cause any disruption with our member community and (2) I had far too much on my plate at the time that I did not what to tackle the move so I decided to just accept the additional costs.

With all of the issues I have with Mecca, in combination with my recent loss of income, it makes absolutely no sense to keep the site hosted with these guys and pay additional hosting costs for inferior hosting especially considering I currently own and operate a number of dedicated servers with a hosting company that does provide quality service and support on a 24/7 basis. By moving BimmerClassics to either of my 24/7 servers we will immediately eliminate all of the issues I listed above, plus unnecessary hosting costs while gaining unlimited disk and bandwidth. With absolutely NO income from BimmerClassics and the members seemingly 100% opposed to any form of revenue generation to support the site, it seems to me, this is the only logical decision.

Before taking any action I would like to know how you guys feel about changing hosting companies, and Anthony in particular, I would like to know your thoughts since you have been dealing with Mecca long before I came along.

[motoyen]

Mecca blows donkey balls. How's that for how I feel?

They used to be good 4 - 5 years ago when they were smaller but now they just suck ass as you have found out. As they have gotten bigger they have gotten greedy and more incompetent. If I were you I would flip them the bird and move the site.

BTW which hosting company do you recommend? I'm going to be launching a few new sites soon and I'm looking for a good host.

[ScottHalliday]

Currently have sites hosted with HostingZoom, HostPapa, JaguarPC, HostGator, and of course, Mecca. My primary hosting company is FastURL which currently manages a number of my dedicated servers, most of which are used to host AFM, which uses 6 dedicated servers, in a load sharing solution. Most of my other websites are also hosted with FastURL, on one of my other 247 dedicated servers I have with them. All of my servers use DirectAdmin, except for the AFM servers, which uses SiteWorx to manage the server farm. FastURL does not offer c-panel so if you are stuck on using it, you will have to look elsewhere.

Of these, FastURL runs all of my dedicated servers and I have no shared hosting accounts with them. They are not as large as some of the others however, they do provide good 24/7 support and a level of personal service I feel comfortable with.

As for the other hosting companies I mentioned, all of these hosting accounts are shared and here's what I think of each:

HostingZoom - Good company with great pricing and support. I have a reseller hosting plan which, while not as good as having a dedicated server, it offers more than enough features to manage the five websites I have hosted there. Great support. They use c-panel and the hosting account is one of the better I have used.
HostPapa - Canadian based with great pricing. While I only have my personal website hosted with them, I am extremely impressed with their entire setup, especially their c-panel implementation. These guys are best in hosting a small or personal websites but do not offer higher end hosting packages which is what I think you need to host multiple websites. They have one basic package and you cannot have your own name servers or ip addresses. You have to use theirs and that alone is a show stopper.
JaguarPC -
HostGator - I have one automotive ecommerce website with them which they have completely destroyed when they performed a recent mysql and php upgrade, without providing any advanced notice, before doing so. As a result, the site's software was not upgraded to run the latest versions and is now 100% out of commission. I am now in the process of moving the site to one of my 247 servers at FastURL. Up until then, while I found them ok, I was already planning to move the site since they are a high volume, low service type of hosting company.
Mecca - Our current hosting company, these guys are the worst yet in every capacity. Incredibly overpriced, little to no service and support, and the hosting account itself is the worst I have ever seen or worked with. While their website looks great, everything else about them is incredibly sub-standard and mickey mouse. I would have moved this site the first month except I figured you and our members were comfortable with where the site was already hosted.

In short, FastURL if you are looking to host one or more dedicated server otherwise HostingZoom is the hosting company I would recommend you go with. Hope this is a help and good luck with your decision. After dealing with Mecca, you will find any of them top notch.

[Mark D.]

Scott

Why not contact a couple of the reputable BMW parts sellers like BMA or Pelican to see if they would be interested in advertiing on this site. Hell we all buy from them anyways. I alone spnt $2000 in the last year with BMA in CA. so what the hell? I dont understand the membership here opposing a couple of small banner ads from suppliers we all buy from. If we then link through BimmerClassics for our purchases it will only look good for your site. Currently I buy using the BMA site and I know Adam is a huge customer of Pelican Parts. Lets see what everyone says but IMHO this is your site and it has to py for itself as a minimum or hats the point of having it?

When Anthony owned the site I really encouraged the membership to contribute at least $10 or $20 per year to generate some $ for hosting, upgrdes etc. If no likes the banner ads then I suggest we all cowboy up some cash on a yearly basis to show our support.

Maybe this post hould be moved to a "sticky" so more people will read it

[320iCar]

i love this website. i like talking to locals. not just some people that are in texas or arizona.

as for adverts, if we need them, put them up. thats all there is to it. but i beg of you, keep it respectable! i dont like the ones that play videos, or have alot of movement. those slow down a website like nothing else. and absolutely, positively, NOTHING FROM SMILEY CENTRAL! i think we all feel the frustration of hearing "HHHEEELLLOOOOOooOOooOOoo" when we move the mouse without thinking ahead.

if it where sites that we use, or would be interesting for us (not just bmw, but any car in general, we're all enthusiasts) its no skin off our backs.

[M635]

It's not a problem with me if this website "upgraded". If a better host is needed, by all means go for it. It'll be helpful to all of us. At least this site would be better known throughout!

I agree with 320iCar though, keep the advertisements to a minimum, nothing too wild, no silly ads (Emote-ads).

[Al Canuck]

I'd have to speak with Karl about it, but I know that I wouldn't mind paying some cashola to run a small banner ad to The Euro Shop website(coming soon). I've been a long time member, and supporter of this site. It's done my business well, and I like to give back when I can.

Al

[Blackice]

How about opening a dealer section ?

A place for BMW related business, to sell there products.

[Poon]

Originally Posted by Blackice How about opening a dealer section ? A place for BMW related business, to sell there products.

It would be good if we had a Classifieds section with a couple subsections like:

Classifieds:
-Cars
-Parts
-Other

I guess craigslist wouldn't matter to much, as long as everything was in it's category?

[ScottHalliday]

Originally Posted by Poon It would be good if we had a Classifieds section with a couple subsections like: Classifieds: -Cars -Parts -Other I guess craigslist wouldn't matter to much, as long as everything was in it's category?

First I would like to concentrate on getting our site moved to improve our hosting services. Once completed I will look into adding an integrated Classifieds section but I think it will be difficult if not impossible to integrate a Craig's list feed..

With regards to a Dealers list, our new member's Bimmer Garage has some very cool features including a Dealer/Shop and Retail Parts Review Section but you need to first upload your car in order to postcompanies and reviews.

[ScottHalliday]

It took some time and more work than expected but it looks like we are finally all set for the move the site to our new hosting account which is now scheduled for this evening. FastURL will be doing the actual move with Chis and my assistance.

For those techies out there, Bimmer Classics will now have it's own dedicated IP address and dedicated name servers, unlike the current shared setup we have with our current host,

As for the move this evening, we are estimating the site will be off-line between 1 to 2 hours and while we are expecting everything to go smooth, there is always the possibility of unexpected problems arising. I will post an announcement before taking the site off-line so members will have some notice before we take the server down.

Cheers

~ Scott ~