By Randall Stukey
Below are the top five general purpose cheap web hosts selectedfor September 2005. All of the following hosting plans include aweb control panel, a cgi-bin directory, php, perl, and at least1 mysql database. Many offer a number of additional features.Our ratings are re-evaluated monthly, with a major re-evaluationof customer ratings every three months.
About the CWHR Rating: This number (from a low of 1 to a high of10) is a weighted average of customer ratings of the web host(80%) and the staff evaluation of the web host (20%). Customerratings are themselves weighted by the length of time the personhas been using their web host. Customers who have hosted with acompany for years count more than a customer who has hastedthere for a couple of months. As our rating is mainly determinedby customers of web hosts, our rating is less likely to be gamedby staff evaluators playing favorites or web hosts giving ourstaff special treatment. The CWHR Ranking determines the siteswe list each month and the order in which we list them. A CHWRRating of "NA" means not enough customers rated this host for ameaningful result. This rating is only found in the specialneeds hosting section.
Top Five General Purpose Cheap Web Hosts for September2005
#1 --
Price: 1m: $9.95 1y: $9.95 2y: $7.95 Setup: 1m: $49.95 1y: Free2y: Free Bandwith: 120 GB Disk Space: 2400 MB Mailboxes: 600CWHR Rating: 9.6
Special Features: 75 shell/ftp accounts, php4/php5/cgi/fastcgi/unlimited mysql databases, ruby-on-rails, zend optimizer,Frontpage available, host 3 domains and 15 sub-domains, 1 freedomain name. Excellent customer support (with public customerforum).
Comments: Dreamhost has long been -- and still is -- listed asthe best affordable web host for unusual content (as they willhost just about anything legal) in the Special Needs Hostingsection of this report. Improvements in their plans in the lastyear have made them very competitive in terms of bandwidth, webspace, and features offered for the price, and they areextremely well-rated by their customers.
New and improved features are announced in the Dreamhostnewsletter almost every month, for example, the June 2005newsletter announced the availability of PHP5 and MySQL 4.1 andthe July 2005 announced the availability of Ruby on Rails,FastCGI, Miva 5, the Zend Optimizer and bandwidth/disk spaceamounts that grow slightly every week you are with Dreamhost (by1 GB and 20 MB disk space for the account listed here).
Dreamhost's customer support is the best we've seen in the lowcost hosting industry. If you are looking for low cost, highquality web hosting with few content restrictions, trulyexcellent tech support, and very friendly people, check outDreamhost. Dreamhost offers a 97-day money back guarantee, seetheir web site for details. (The Cheap Web Hosting Report hostswith Dreamhost.)
#2 --
Price: 3m: $9.95 1y: $7.95 Setip: 3m: $30.00 1y: Free Bandwidth:40 GB Disk Space: 1000 MB Mailboxes: unlimited CWHR Rating: 9.1
Special Features: Storage can be increased to 3000 MB in steps,php4/cgi/1 mysql database, Frontpage available, host 1 domainand 15 sub-domains, Fantastico script library. JSP and ASPavailable for additional charge. Public customer forum.
Comments: Lunarpages has been in the low cost web hostingbusiness since 2000 when Add2Net expanded into shared hosting.While their customer rating fluctuates more than most hostingcompanies we list, it is alway high and long time customers seemvery loyal. Their support for controversial content is secondonly to Dreamhost among low-priced web hosts. Lunarpages offersa 30-day money back guarantee, see their terms of service fordetails.
#3 --
Price: 6m: $9.95 1y: $9.95 Setup: 6m: $30 1y: free Bandwidth:100 GB Disk Space: 8000 MB Mailboxes: 400 CWHR Rating: 9.0
Special Features: php/cgi/5 mysql databases, Frontpageavailable, host 1 domain and 5 sub-domains.
Comments: InMotion Hosting is an employee owned and operatedcompany founded in 2001. Their employees average over 4 years ofhosting experience while their senior staff average over 10years of hosting experience. This shows it their higher thannormal customer rating. The Power plan listed here is actuallyInMotion's intermediate plan. (InMotion offer an ever lowerpriced plan, Launch, but it lacks some features most peopleconsider critical, such as access to your web sites log filesfor traffic analysis.) The Power plan offers evey features mostweb sites need and comes with InMotion's reputation forreliability and toll-free telephone support. InMotion offers amoney back guarantee, although its terms are somewhat unclear --if these terms were not so vague, InMotion's CWHR Ranking wouldbe slightly higher.
#4 --
Price: 3m: $11.95 1y: $7.95 Setup: 3m: Free 1y: Free Bandwidth:50 GB Disk Space: 1000 MB Mailboxes: unlimited CWHR Rating: 8.1
Special Features: php/cgi/10 mysql databases, Frontpageavailable, host 1 domain and unlimited sub-domains. 50preinstalled scripts.
Comments: Founded in 1999, HostRocket is a popular web hostingcompany that is well-rated by its customers. They greatlyexpanded their offerings in 1994 and are now very competitive inbandwidth, disk space, and features. HostRocket often runs verynice short-term specials, check their web site for details.HostRocket offers a 30-day money back guarantee, see their termsof service for details.
#5 --
Price: 1y: $9.95 Setup: 1y: Free Bandwidth: 100 GB Disk Space:2000 MB Mailboxes: 100 CWHR Rating: 7.8
Special Features: php/cgi/10 mysql databases, Frontpage support,two free domain names, free CD with NetObjects Fusion 7.
Comments: Founded in 1998, Netfirms rapidly acquired areputation for affordable, reliable web hosting. Although aimedat business hosting, Netfirms hosts sites of all types"personal, hobby, business, weblog, and more. Their NetfirmsAdvantage plan is full of useful features and should handlealmost any personal or small business web site. Netfirms offersa 30-day money back guarantee, see their terms of service fordetails.
Honorable Mention
The following web hosts also rated quite well in customerratings and might also be worthy of consideration: *
Special Needs Cheap Web Hosting
Fewer Content Restrictions
Comments: In an effort to avoid arguments and complaints, mostweb hosting companies are fairly restrictive on questionablecontent -- to the point that some will terminate a site fordisplaying a picture of a classical (but bare breasted) statuefrom ancient Greece. Dreamhost not only has an excellent, cheapweb hosting package but is far more liberal than most web hostson acceptable site content. Basically, if your content is legalin the US, Dreamhost will probably have no problems hosting it.
For more information on Dreamhost, see the description above.
Windows Hosting
Comments: Easy CGI provides Windows 2000 servers instead of thestandard Unix servers. Their accounts come with ASP and oneAccess Database. They are one of the most affordable and mostpopular Windows hosting providers. Customer service reports arespotty, however. Most people report excellent service butminority report major problems
Virtual Dedicated Server Hosting (Root Access)
Comments: Jumpline uses special technology to provide eachaccount with its own virtual server. You have your own Apacheweb server, your own email servers, your own database server,etc. and you have root access to the virtual machine runningthem. These types of accounts can be more stable and providebetter control, but are best used by Unix experts who understandthe ins and outs of running servers.
Dedicated Server Hosting
Comments: A dedicated server gives your site its own physicalcomputer as a server. The upside is that you have full rootaccess so you can install whatever software you want on it andhave very few restrictions on scripts (even if they hog CPUtime). The downside is that you have to maintain the systemyourself. ServerPronto has some of the most affordable dedicatedserver prices we have seen (and they often have sales that cutthe price of the setup fee), although there are many optionsthat can increase the monthly price or the setup fee. Windowsand Windows 2003 dedicated servers are also available at higherprices.
The information in this report was checked for accuracy onAugust 31, 2005. Web hosting companies, however, can changetheir pricing and plans at any time so the information may nolonger be accurate when you read this report. The Cheap WebHosting Report and its staff are not responsible for errors norfor what use you may make of this information. For updatedinformation, check The Cheap Web Host Report web site at
Looking for more information on designing, hosting and promotinga web site? Download a copy of our free ebook/newsletter, theCWHR Web Site Design Guide. This guide is updated monthly withadditional articles and the current edition of The Cheap WebHosting Report's current monthly report. Download it at
Notes:
The prices listed are the monthly price based on the shortestprepayment period offered (1m = one month, 3m = three months, 6m= six months) and for annual pre-payment (1y = annual rate)
The setup fees listed are for the shortest prepayment periodoffered and for the annual pre-payment plan.
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