I'm getting ready to buy hosting and in the past i didn't need to worry about host specifications. But I found one I like for 3$ a month that offers everything I need in a server but I wonder if its enough space. Basically the host offers 30GB and 1000GB data transfer for that price and my site is going to have possibly a few hundred images, 30+ small movies and flash animation.

What does the 1000gB data transfer look like in terms of numbers and visitors>? I have a feeling that 30gB maybe cutting it short and that I should go with Inmotion hosting instead and spring for the 5.95$ a month package. What do you people think?

Beware of cheap hosting, you get what you pay for. Most small hosting operations are set up by some kid in his basement renting a server from someone else.

With that out of the way. How much bandwidth will be consumed by your users is subjective at best however, just for a very vague reference. Last month for my stock image site I saw 421 unique visitors with 20815 hits. this resulted in about 184MB's of throughput. This though, isn't counting the nearly 304MB's used by robots, crawlers and other stuff like that.

In most cases you'll probably need much less space and transfer than you expect - a lot of hosting providers keep pumping up their figures to make it sound impressive, knowing full well that you're not going to be using anything like that (i.e. overselling).

As Republikin has already stated, if you get what you pay for - if you want your site to be reliable and quick, and know that you have a dependable support team available to assist with any problems that you may encounter, you'll only get that through paying an appropriate price.

As a guideline, it's useful to consider the cost of renting a reasonable spec. server (and additional costs from things like staff/backups etc.) - the easiest to account for is the server (anything $200/month upwards I would suggest is a good ballpark to consider). This may get you something like 200GB of disks, and 1TB of data transfer.

So now consider that you're the hosting provider - if you're charging $3/mo then how many do you need to cover the cost of the server alone (no backups, no staff!)... You'll notice that obviously you run out of space/transfer before making enough money.

I'm probably going for 72$ a year at 300Gb and 3000gb transfer from inmotion hosting which showed up as the top link in some host review sites followed by bluehost and lunar. Thanks for your help. I would never consider 200 a month, in fact i've never seen any offers that high.

He was referring to the average cost of a good dedicated server, which most small hosting companies buy and then rent out. I think he was essentially saying that those small companies pay so much for their servers they have no choice but to over fill them and provide poor service.

Hmm those prices seem extremelly low for what your getting, i would do some google searching on this provider or at least check out some of the best well known hosting directories for reviews on these guys. No sense in making a future pitfall because of $$ difference. Support/reliability are a must..

The prices you have stated are really very low but don't always trust those things that are cheap.

I would agree with republikin on the point of staying away from small hosting companies as they disappear in a matter of time buy making a quick buck. One should always consider the price they are paying for the service and what they are getting in return as well as the age and market reputation of the particular hosting company.

Originally Posted by highanddry

I'm probably going for 72$ a year at 300Gb and 3000gb transfer from inmotion hosting which showed up as the top link in some host review sites followed by bluehost and lunar. Thanks for your help. I would never consider 200 a month, in fact i've never seen any offers that high.

I would not trust the review sites. Most if not all of those sites are bias. They were created by an affiliate marketer. Those 10 ten hosts are the hosts that pay the affiliate the highest commission so when you click on them and purchase an accounnt, the affiliate marketer (the comparison site) earns a commission.

Also, the other 1/2 of review sites are also misleading since they are basically ad networks. Hosts bid on there position. The top 10 hosts you see on those sites are at the top because they bid the highest to get listed at the top.

As for your traffic, ready the Acceptable use policy for any host you decide to sign up with. The host that offers 30gig for $3 I bet limits the type of content you can host. For example I bet you cannot host image libraries and/or 90% of your image files need to be links from an html page or no more than 1/2 your traffic can come from your images. Read the AUP carefully.

Also, typically if your site was using 1000gig of traffic it would probably be using more than 25% of system resource which is against most host's policies.

My advice, read the AUP & make sure there is a money-back guarantee.

By the way, what review site did you use to find inmotion?

What i would advise is to get a host that offers you decent space and bandwith for a decent price. Dirt cheap just spells problems