MediaTemple - thumbs up or thumbs down

[AndrewG]

I have been searching far and wide for an affordable host that can survive the digg effect. It seems so hard to find one. MediaTemple seems to be the best bet because a lot of big names are hosted with them like Mashable.com and Slashfilm.com. However I have been reading that their service has really gone down hill.

What are your opinions on them. I was thinking about mosso but $100 a month is just WAY too much right now. $20 is very reasonable.

Thanks for any reviews,

Andrew

 

[gigapros]

If you are really expecting a serious digg effect, then it's better NOT to host on a shared hosting. Go for a VPS or a low-end dedicated server. Just my 2 cents.

 

[AndrewG]

Yeah I'm expecting a serious digg effect. I know not to host with a shared hosting, because that's where I'm now and I get hammered when I hit the digg homepage. Media temple isn't shared though.

 

[nielsencl]

So how badly do you get hammered?

You might want to consider using multiple shared accounts, depending on your site. If you have static sites it would be a good option. Get two shared accounts, set them both up the same way, enter all 4 name servers where your domain is registered. The traffic should go to both and you can help this be choosing hosting on East and West coasts. This has the added benefit of keeping your site up should one provider go down.

 

[gigapros]

This has the added benefit of keeping your site up should one provider go down.

Unfortunately, it's not possible to create a "fail-safe" hosting environment by just using DNS from 2 different servers. That's because, the traffic is RANDOMLY routed to any of those 2 servers...and if any one server goes down, then about 50% of your traffic will experience the site outage.

If you want to get a truly fail-safe platform, consider using load-balanced servers to start with (which are not cheap to setup).

 

[nielsencl]

Well, to be sure it's not what I would call a "professional" solution. But my understanding is that if any one DNS server address fails, the others will be tried, so it would cause a delay in the browser, but not a 404 error. Am I mistaken about this?

 

[gigapros]

Well, to be sure it's not what I would call a "professional" solution. But my understanding is that if any one DNS server address fails, the others will be tried, so it would cause a delay in the browser, but not a 404 error. Am I mistaken about this?

Well...once the browser hits the failed-server, there's no way for it to know that there's another set of DNS sitting there with a good server. So, the browser will show you "server not found" error right away.

 

[AndrewG]

So how badly do you get hammered?

Anywhere from 20,000 to 30,000 uniques in a few hours. Now that's with a hosting company that crashes right away. So it could be 2 to 3 times as many visitors if I had a host that survived.

 

[nielsencl]

I'm real curious about what you are doing and what your site is...

But I would try the multiple host/name server idea, OR you could set up several "mirror sites and use a rotating re-direct script to send the traffic to other servers as well as keeping it local. Your main server would still get all the initial hits, but a small rotator would not use much bandwidth to spread the traffic around.

 

[AndrewG]

I'm real curious about what you are doing and what your site is...

Check out my profile and I'm sure you can figure out my site :P

 

[weblord]

have you considered looking into dedicated servers? these type of traffic dictates that at least with a huge bandwidth.

Anywhere from 20,000 to 30,000 uniques in a few hours. Now that's with a hosting company that crashes right away. So it could be 2 to 3 times as many visitors if I had a host that survived.

i don't see any url in your profile.

Check out my profile and I'm sure you can figure out my site :P

 

[Waiter]

Andrew, I do agree they are quite expensive. I would recommend trying to find something cheaper, but with the same offers. Look at simplehelix.com . They will be good for your needs as well as for your budget
I hope that is that you have been looking for

 

[AndrewG]

They seem pretty interesting. But I don't know if they can handle the "digg effect". Media temple has been known to and $20 a month is cheap for that type of traffic.

 

[name-cloud]

Just a personal testimony:
I've been with Media Temple for about 2 months now, and have honestly loved the experience. It's been the best web hosting experience of the last 4 years I've been involved in web design.

 

[AndrewG]

Just a personal testimony:
I've been with Media Temple for about 2 months now, and have honestly loved the experience. It's been the best web hosting experience of the last 4 years I've been involved in web design.

Thanks for your opinion. I've talked to a few of my friends who are hosted with
mt and most have said the same thing.

 

[~ServerPoint~]

AndrewG, that it is quite ordinary situation. Web hosting company can't satisy everyone. It is good for one people but it doesn't mean that good for other one. And that doesn't mean at all they are bad company.

 

[AndrewG]

AndrewG, that it is quite ordinary situation. Web hosting company can't satisy everyone. It is good for one people but it doesn't mean that good for other one. And that doesn't mean at all they are bad company.

Oh I know, sometimes it's a game of chance.

 

[-NC-]

I haven't used mediatemple.net, their offering does look good, but there is one part of their Acceptable Use Policy which could be interpreted as being a bit digg effect unfriendly.

An unusual spike in resource usage is detected by our systems resulting in an account far outstripping the allotted resources. To protect the customer, a site may be suspended in order to verify that this resource spike is legitimate.

Though, that does appear to only apply to "severe" situations, often involving non-legitimate traffic ( malicious activities ).

For those clients operating large scale web sites experiencing daily or infrequent traffic surges, GPUs allow you to host your websites without worrying about reaching an arbitrary limit before getting shut down.

Is it possible for my service to be shut down because of the GPU use and overages?
Yes. We have seen a very rare number of circumstances in which some customers have reached such "severe resource demands"

 

[AndrewG]

I've read up on bandwidth and resource overage and they usually charge you some more money, but they said it rarely every happens to even the big sites. I don't know the number but it was a very small percentage.

 

[Ultimatum]

Andrew, I do agree they are quite expensive. I would recommend trying to find something cheaper, but with the same offers. Look at simplehelix.com . They will be good for your needs as well as for your budget
I hope that is that you have been looking for

+1 for simplehelix.com. They do the same as mediatemplate but looks like much more cheaper.