I'm kind of bothered by the lack of review on some of the less known providers. SharkSpace is one such provider. To break that, I thought I'd start my own.
I saw SharkSpace's 40% off VPS offer [url] Before I signed up I searched the forum for any reviews. Unfortunately, none exist, or at least none recently. Regardless, I decided to give them a try.
This morning at around 10am I signed up. By 11am, the server was ready. (Actually, I did not know it was ready until 6pm because the welcome e-mail landed in my spam box. But, that's another story.)
I have been playing with the VPS since, have migrated all sites from another VPS, and changed the IP addresses on my DNS.
Thus far, my experience with SharkSpace has been pretty good. The server was set up quickly, the few e-mails I sent were responded to within a few minutes, and the sites run fast.
So far, so good! Am happy. I look forward to coming back in a month and hoping that I'd be able to say the same thing.
Now off to cancel my other VPS... as soon as the DNS propagates.
i no this a early review of my new host and bare that in mind.So far everything is going great.I have emailed them and went on their forum.everything has been great so far. SharkSpace_Alex
Administrator and SharkSpace_Scott Administrator have been really great to me.Their response to my issues that i may have had been are excellant. personally i think email is the best way to go or the forum take your pic.
Last week marked my second year with Sharkspace and I just wanted to say that I've got nothing but praise for them. I have absolutely no complaints about them.
The only technical problems I've had were caused by myself and Sharkspace was extremely helpful in getting me straightened out.
I sifted through this forum when I was looking for a host and found more complaints about hosting services than praise, so I was a little leary of every host I checked out. There are many great hosting services out there, it just takes some research to find them (this forum being the best resource for that). The people at Sharkspace were friendly and very helpful in getting my account set up. It was their attitude that made them stand out above the rest and I have no regrets.
I am looking for a host for a website I am working on.
It is for an association of about 200-300 members, and I do assume that not all of them will visit the site.
The site consists of mainly text, and one weekly podcast.
Considering this kind of usage, I have been looking around for hosting.
I first looked at JustHost and FatCow.
JustHost sounded great because of the price at 2.95/month and free domain for life, but if I decide to change host, I wonder what they will do to my domain. They also promise "unlimited features" and that is usually too good to be true. Although they have amazing reviews all around the internet, not only the biased ranking websites but I snooped deeper, I am not quite sure they are what I need.
Same thing for FatCow, but I do have a little bit more confidence in them because they have been in business for 10 years I believe where JustHost has only been there for a year. FatCow was at just under 5$/month. Plus, its 100% wind-powered...
Last option I found was SharkSpace.com. I found it, being a sticky in one of the forums here. I am interested in the Hammerhead Shared Hosting package. I believe they do not oversell, and its not UNLIMITED webspace and bandwidth. They have been in business since 2004 so its still longer than many other hosts. They also have amazing reviews, I have yet seen a negative one. And finding a coupon for 3.98$/month is also a really good deal for something that looks more reliable. But to that I will have to buy my domain elsewhere as it is not included. 10$/year = 4.81$/month.
Longest lasting business: Fat Cow, Also most expensive. What I believe is the most reliable: SharkSpace Cheapest Price: Just Host
If you know another host that you know is reliable, fast, and trustworthy, in the same price range. Let me know too.
I have narrowed it down to DowntownHost SharkSpace and StableHost.
Here's how they compare (Well they almost have all the same features so I'll jus compare space and bw
DowntownHost SILVER: 14 GB / 300 GB With 25% off coupon: 5.27777777777$/month
StableHost PLUS: 15 GB / 300 GB With 50% off coupon AND Free domain :3.64$/month
SharkSpace HAMMERHEAD: 20 GB / 500 GB With 50% off coupon: 3.975$/month
DowntownHost has a 99% off coupon.. but I dont understand and sounds a little bit sketchy. Would be like 12 cents per month.
So in terms of reliability, and SPEED, speed is important to me, which do you suggest. Downtownhost: Chicago Stablehost: Dallas Sharkspace North Carolina and Kansas.
NOTE: Sorry for the lack of formatting but I do not have those options as I am not a regular at WHT.
Well, I will admit I am not a regular at WHT.com, but I returned after wanting to find some information out about Go-Daddy (my friend needs a website and registered a domain name with them) Naturally I had bad thoughts because of all of the things I have heard about Go-Daddy. Before I switched my friend to Sharkspace, I just wanted to be objective and see if Go-Daddy was still all that bad. Well my assumptions were reinforced and I continued to initiate a domain transfer, and had my friend sign up with Sharkspace Hammerhead hosting.
I should mention I had my friend use my affiliate link banner, which I had literally signed up for and put on my website minutes prior because I wanted to take advantage of the 50 dollar payout! (I will not get this money until 70 days from now, which I am totally fine with because I will be using the money to pay for my hosting anyways, and understand Sharkspace's need to ensure customers that sign up through one's affiliate banner are there to stay for a while at least).
IN A NUTSHELL
At any rate, this experience today made me want to do a follow up review of Sharkspace, 12 months later from my first (ok) review here: http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showth...04#post5269604
Let me get to the point for those who don't feel like reading the rest...SHARKSPACE IS AWESOME. There are other good hosts out there for sure, but Sharkspace is fabulous, no regrets.
IN DEPTH
The experience which I will be talking about revolves around my following activity with sharkspace... This is including domains and hosting packages I have signed up for personally, and that I have helped other people sign up for (who are not familiar with hosting or domains), and that I continue to manage/deal with.
- I have registered 9 domains
- I have registered 7 hosting accounts (2 Great Whites and 5 Hammerheads)
- I have transferred 2 of the 9 domain names from other registrars (Go-Daddy and another one I can't remember)
First and foremost, all hosting accounts were ready to go the next day, no problems (domain name propagation took a little bit longer obviously). All websites have experienced 100% up-time to date.
THE CLIENT AREA
The client area is wonderful, whith a direct link from Sharkspace’s home page. Log in and all the management options are accessible from this page. Click to access the knowledgebase, submit a ticket, view your account details (which are also displayed on the sidebar at all times), as well as manage services (which is their way of saying hosting packages), domain settings, ticket history, affiliate information, as well as a page that shows all the emails that they have sent you, in case you deleted them from your inbox!
My favorite is the “My Domains” link, which I use a lot. It brings you to the domain management page which initially shows you all of the domains you have with Sharkspace, color coded by status (pending, active, terminated), with “edit” buttons next to each domain name. When you click on the edit button it takes you to a simple page that has everything you need to know or get to as far as domain name management is concerned. Nameservers, Lock/Unlock, DNS Management, Contact Info, etc… is all there.
I have had experience with Yahoo, Bluehost, Go_Daddy, and Servage and can say that I had to go through multiple screens in order to get access to all of the domain management options I needed. Sharkspace gives you one screen where you choose the domain name you want to manage, and then a management screen for that domain name where you have access to anything and everything you would need to change.
I love the uniform layout and appearance where you are not bombarded by different display layouts that can be confusing. I was informed that the Sharkspace website was going to be redesigned at the end of the month, but I assume it will only get better. Another plus is that Sharkspace is not a postmodern advertising whore so to speak. What you see on the website is related to Sharkspace.
CPANEL
The cpanel is pretty standard. Easy to use and lets me add domain names and subdomains, also includes Fantastico which lets me conveniently automatically install a wide variety of scripts including my favorite, Wordpress.
SUPPORT TICKETS
Over the past year I have never waited more than 15 minutes for a support ticket reply. I should mention that most of the tickets were responded to in less than 10 minutes. I should also mention this is 24/7. They are easy to submit and I always get the problem solved the same day. I also really like the feature they included that automatically updates a list of knowledgebase topics LIVE while I am typing my concern/question in the support ticket window, so before I send the ticket I might realize that the answer might already be in what they call their Knowledgebase. (I am lazy and submit tickets but this feature is great so it does keep people like me from submitting tickets all the time.
LIVE CHAT
The live chat feature is awesome as well. It is available 8AM-5PM Monday-Saturday | Central Time (US & Canada)
Live Help can be used for: Pre-sales Questions Technical Questions (except in-depth elaborate technical questions), which you can just use the ticket system for.
I normally only wait for about 20-30 seconds for someone to come on to the live chat and start answering my questions.
OTHER
One time I transferred a domain, but forgot to OK it on the other end, and so it got cancelled, but I went ahead and initiated another transfer with Sharkspace, paying another 10 dollars because I am an idiot, this time I remembered to OK it on the other end though. A week later I decided to see if I could get that 9.95 back and submitted a ticket telling them what happened. He replied “I just credited your account 9.95” which got used to pay for my hosting, which was totally fine with me. It was great.
Earlier today I was on Live Chat about their affiliate program because I needed to log out in order to create a new account for my friend, but they do not have a logout button! It is kind of funny that that was overlooked but the representative on live chat told me the site was going to be redesigned at the end of August 2009 (this month).
THE BOTTOM LINE
When you deal with Sharkspace you deal with reasonable people who deal with each of their customers on a case by case basis. I’ve had nothing but an excellent experience with my hosting or domain name management at Sharkspace. They continue to provide awesome service and do not pack their customers on servers like sardines. I get true 100gb space, and true bandwidth. I have yet to reach the 1TB limit/month, which I never will, but I have to believe with a track record like theirs you could safely presume that you actually get a true 1TB/month transfer limit. Their prices are extremely competitive and if you are worried about a couple dollar difference with another host, its safe to say you won’t regret choosing Sharkspace.
BONUS DEAL
Their promotional code which gets you 50% off for life is an AMAZING deal as well, I will not put it in this post because I don’t know if they like that kind of thing, but if you search the WHT forums you will find the promotions that Sharkspace representatives post.
Thanks for reading! I hope this changed some minds and helped those of you who are intimidated by the tons of hosting companies. Among the other good hosts out there, Sharkspace should definitely be on your list of options!
I am a music producer who will need hosting for my official site, music files playing off links from my myspace page, podcasts, downloadable mp3's/DJ promo MP3's, flash movies/animated gifs. It might even be a Flash Site altogether. I will also probably want to have an artist design me a whole new myspace page that will have flash movies in the design, and will look like a totally independent web page. I'll want things like a section on my myspace for my "Top Tracks" in my current DJ sets that would play (clips) by clicking on them (even though they'd be hosted on my server space), and probably doing things like that, where I'd post files in other places (Facebook, etc). All the myspace artwork, banners, files, etc. will need a host.
I will also be planning on utilizing email for marketing purposes, and will be building a never-endingly lengthy email list.
Later down the road, I do see myself creating a company (already have the domains purchased), that will involve commerce (paying for mp3's etc.), and possibly a "community environment" that would involve profiles, interaction, etc. But that's, indeed, step 2 (I'm sure my life will involve a dedicated server at some point).
I definitely want speed! I've seen some music artists with the overhauled myspace pages that look like websites, and it takes forever for the page to load... I'm thinking "great design, slow host".
I do see 2 companies, SharkSpace and iMountain, that have impressed me with their primarily positive reviews. Many people say (about iMountain) "Oh their servers are FAST!", but I don't see any actual stats on bandwidth. And they're not cheap. Also, all of the "featured sites" on their site seem to be nothing "dynamic".... just some blogs. SharkSpace has their bandwidth (data transfer) listed as "1TB (1,000,000MB)", which I'm not sure tells me the "bandwidth", just the monthly transfer limit? They do have the 50% off specials I see on here
Do I need any type of "specialized market" host company? Do some hosts do better with Flash? It seems whenever I look at examples of websites using any host I read about, it's like a quiet website where someone posted some jpgs and a bio. I'm guessing my needs will be more than that.
I'd estimate my site and myspace will have about 100 people coming to each a day (I do have fans, just not a site.) I should be about to achieve about 100 visitors/day on my site (about 200 plays/day on my "myspace player", so I'm guessing when people get to my "DJ section" those hosted-clips could get around 200 plays/day as well).
i was wondering if sharkspace offer free domain reg? I don't seem to find it explicitly stated on their website but when signing up, they offer to register a domain.
i will be hosting a portfolio website so i need a lot of diskspace for photos, videos, and other files of the sort. i think bandwidth is pretty important as far as video watching goes, and i would like to have fast upload speeds.
Narrowed down my choices to these companies. My customers will mainly be in Asia and for that reason I am thinking of going with Sharkspace and choosing their West Coast server option.
Anyone have experience with 3inetwork? They seemed geared towards Vietnamese customers (where I am at the moment) but can't find many reviews.
