Looking for a new host

[Gavin Hanly]

I'm currently with tsohost - but I've had regular problems with them which take days to fix. The latest has happened during one of the biggest traffic days for us - so was a bit of a disaster. So I'm looking to change.

We have a VPS with them - and a Joomla based site, with about 200K monthly uniques.

Can anyone recommend a good alternative, speedy host with good customer care/help?

 

[jacobc]

Hi Gavin,

Do you have an idea on diskspace usage / resources required?

Thanks

Jacob

 

[arnydnxluk]

I assume this is a managed service, in which case I would recommend https://www.freethought-internet.co.uk for managed hosting.

If unmanaged, I would strongly recommend DigitalOcean for your use case.

The latest has happened during one of the biggest traffic days for us - so was a bit of a disaster.

You need to ensure the new provider is aware of your peak traffic so you're on the right service rather than a service suitable for your usual day to day traffic.

 

[Gavin Hanly]

Managed for sure - I'm not that technical. I've built the website, but I'm banging up against the limits of my understanding.

Diskspace circa 30-40gb (5-6 on the SQL server alone at the mo).
Bandwidth circa 700GB - but with room to grow.

Re peak traffic - fair point, but the problems started happening before the traffic kicked in, and have persisted.

 

[WESH.UK]

Can anyone recommend a good alternative, speedy host with good customer care/help?

Hi Gavin..

Happy to have a chat if you like?

A VPS however is far from suitable for 30 to 40GB of disk usage and 700GB of monthly database driven traffic.

That's asking for problems. A managed dedicated server would be far more suitable.

 

[HostXNow]

I would use an enterprise hosting type of service which is a shared hosting plan that performs more like a high-spec VPS. You then get the benefit of other software extras that you would not get with a VPS unless you paid extra for that software. For example, LiteSpeed, Imunify360, Acronis Backup etc.

But you may stick with VPS for various reasons if it is needed.

It seems you just need to choose a smaller provider who offers better personal support. You will not be the first or last to move from TSOHost due to the constant problems they have. It is a shame as they used to be good.

Feel free to contact us if you like to discuss more.

 

[ukbf0001]

I can recommend my hosting Co, instant response, 247 etc - I would also recommend some improvements re speed / content delivery and caching - to long to discuss here but feel free to DM me

 

[arnydnxluk]

A VPS however is far from suitable for 30 to 40GB of disk usage and 700GB of monthly database driven traffic.

Thats asking for problems. A managed dedicated server would be far more suitable.

That's a daft thing to say.

A huge amount of workloads and websites of all sizes run on VM's these days.

Virtualisation itself has barely any adverse effect on performance. Therefore the performance all comes down to other variables such as the underlying hardware, the amount of resources assigned, how many VM's the hardware is shared with, whether the VM has dedicated or shared CPU threads, etc.

There are also great advantages to VM's - snapshotting, live migration, ease of scaling.

OP - your website is perfectly suited to virtualisation, like most websites. You just need to work with a provider who knows what they're doing and provides a truly managed service instead of installing cPanel on a server and reacting to issues which crop up later.

 

[webhostuk]

Managed for sure - I'm not that technical. I've built the website, but I'm banging up against the limits of my understanding.

Diskspace circa 30-40gb (5-6 on the SQL server alone at the mo).
Bandwidth circa 700GB - but with room to grow.

Re peak traffic - fair point, but the problems started happening before the traffic kicked in, and have persisted.

I assume its managed Cpanel VPS Server, if its VPS fair amount of optimization is possible to avoid the problem you are facing, have you already switched?

 

[Gavin Hanly]

It is cpanel managed VPS. Haven't switched yet, going to take my time on this.

In the meantime, they've added more processing power and that seems to have alleviated the problem (more money, of course). I still don't understand why it became a problem when we had more traffic earlier in the month - but no issues. I just don't think they're terribly helpful at diagnosing problems, when throwing processing power at it does the job...

But thanks for all the replies everyone - I'll be digesting the recommendations before making a decision as moving is likely to be quite the task.

 

[webhostuk]

More processing means some module or plugin might be taking those resources.. if diagnosed properly you can get permanent solution.

 

[EddyRock]

Vultr should be a good choice. With $20/month you have a 80GB SSD of storage and 3000GB of bandwidth.

 

[gpietersz]

That's a daft thing to say.

Agreed. Rather worrying to see such nonsense from someone who provides hosting services.

I would seriously consider a dedi if it was another order of magnitude greater resources as dedicated server pricing gets comparatively better with greater resources and it does give the strongest guarantees against noisy neighbours etc. IN practice I have had no problems with multiple VPS providers.

@Gavin Hanly the problem with asking questions like this is that they attract a lot of answers from people who have something to sell and therefore an axe to grind.

You might want to consider finding someone to manage the VPS as needed rather than paying monthly for a managed VPS. If you set up automatic updates and reboot occasionally there is very little to do unless something goes wrong so that higher monthly fee adds up to a lot for what you get over time.

 

[Gavin Hanly]

More processing means some module or plugin might be taking those resources.. if diagnosed properly you can get permanent solution.

Hi - just picking this up again (more problems). A plugin may well be the case - but what's usually the best way to investigate? The current host doesn't seem to be able to give me any pointers.

Edit - while I have managed to stumble my way through creating the site, my php/database knowledge is near nonexistent, alas.

 

[gpietersz]

The easiest way is to disable the plugin.

Do not expect too much from a host. There job is to keep there systems up, not to troubleshoot your site, unless you are paying for a package that includes the latter.

My experience is that they rarely do a great job of it even if you are paying for it. I have dealt with a few managed VPS/dedi providers (including TSO host before they went downhill) and its usually a cookie cutter approach and doing the least work necessary.

 

[Gavin Hanly]

Fair point. If I wanted to get someone to go through and troubleshoot the site for me - are there any recommended places to try? I think I just need someone who knows how to do it properly. Can't afford a permanent dev, unfortunately.

 

[gpietersz]

You might find one here. Take a look at the Joomla forum and see if there are people who you like the look of.

Otherwise Google searches and freelancing sites.

 

[Gavin Hanly]

Oops. Didn't see there was an actual Joomla forum here..! Thanks!