[dscot]

Hi,
I'm getting ready to buy my first website to advertise a small business I run. I came across Uk2.net and was about to buy a domain and basic hosting from them but I just came across this review: http://bit.ly/sKNWGx

Has anyone used them before?

Thanks

[RobbieD90]

dscot, on 30 October 2011 - 05:12 PM, said:

Hi,
I'm getting ready to buy my first website to advertise a small business I run. I came across Uk2.net and was about to buy a domain and basic hosting from them but I just came across this review: http://bit.ly/sKNWGx

Has anyone used them before?

Thanks

I've never used them before but all I can say is unless the reviews are from a reputable source then I usually take them with a pinch of salt. Plenty of people can do reviews to discredit companies mainly their competitors. Also, just because one person has a bad experience doesn't mean you will.
Obviously what I've just said doesn't mean they are good, just use your own intuition.

[dscot]

RobbieD90, on 30 October 2011 - 06:02 PM, said:

I've never used them before but all I can say is unless the reviews are from a reputable source then I usually take them with a pinch of salt. Plenty of people can do reviews to discredit companies mainly their competitors. Also, just because one person has a bad experience doesn't mean you will.
Obviously what I've just said doesn't mean they are good, just use your own intuition.

Thats a good point , thanks for taking the time to reply

I probably will end up going with them as I have also read positive reviews, I just wanted to post here just in case theres any truth behind that blog post.

Thanks

[wesh.co.uk]

dscot, on 30 October 2011 - 06:15 PM, said:

Thats a good point , thanks for taking the time to reply
I probably will end up going with them as I have also read positive reviews, I just wanted to post here just in case theres any truth behind that blog post.

Thanks

Before you do, ask them what there resource limit is, and REALLY push them to get an answer because they will not want to tell you... Then ask them what servers they are using for shared hosting, that they sell those huge amounts of resources on...

Then you will see why they get a lot of bad reviews.

From the complaints we here from customers coming over from them, those reviews seem VERY geniune..

I've asked them a few questions before, as above and they seriously did not want to answer, but when they eventually did, even I was surprised to learn what hardware they use and what the real limits are (1% is considered abuse)..

They told me via live chat, (Outsourced to India too by the way) that they were using SINLGE dual core, 2 disk RAID1 servers for shared hosting...!!!

Unlimited offerings really should be avoided, as they are just marketing scams, and very few will tell you what the real limits are.... As with most unlimited offerings, its great and works perfectly well, until the point where you actually want to use it.... lol... It really is the only way to profit, in selling so much for so little is to cut back on functionality and throw 8 times as much on each server..

Its simply economics...

If you charge far less to provide a service than what it actually costs, then something has to give, and in UK2's case, its Low grade servers, outsourced support and barely usable resource limits, although to be fair, that applies to all those selling "Unlimited" for next to nothing.

This post has been edited by wesh.co.uk: 30 October 2011 - 06:40 PM

[dscot]

wesh.co.uk, on 30 October 2011 - 06:36 PM, said:

Before you do, ask them what there resource limit is, and REALLY push them to get an answer because they will not want to tell you... Then ask them what servers they are using for shared hosting, that they sell those huge amounts of resources on...

Then you will see why they get a lot of bad reviews.

From the complaints we here from customers coming over from them, those reviews seem VERY geniune..

I've asked them a few questions before, as above and they seriously did not want to answer, but when they eventually did, even I was surprised to learn what hardware they use and what the real limits are (1% is considered abuse)..

They told me via live chat, (Outsourced to India too by the way) that they were using SINLGE dual core, 2 disk RAID1 servers for shared hosting...!!!

Unlimited offerings really should be avoided, as they are just marketing scams, and very few will tell you what the real limits are.... As with most unlimited offerings, its great and works perfectly well, until the point where you actually want to use it.... lol... It really is the only way to profit, in selling so much for so little is to cut back on functionality and throw 8 times as much on each server..

Its simply economics...

If you charge far less to provide a service than what it actually costs, then something has to give, and in UK2's case, its Low grade servers, outsourced support and barely usable resource limits, although to be fair, that applies to all those selling "Unlimited" for next to nothing.

Thanks for all that great info. Some really interesting points that I never would have thought to ask.

Do you think any of those issues would have a great impact for my use?

What would you recommend instead if I'm just looking for a basic package just to advertise my business and a domain?

I've used easyspace once in the past they seemed ok but a little more pricey.

This post has been edited by dscot: 30 October 2011 - 06:57 PM

[RobbieD90]

wesh.co.uk, on 30 October 2011 - 06:36 PM, said:

Then you will see why they get a lot of bad reviews.

From the complaints we here from customers coming over from them, those reviews seem VERY geniune..

I wasn't trying to say that they were good or don't believe the reviews. I was just trying to say don't always take reviews at face value.

Like I said I have never used them.

This post has been edited by RobbieD90: 30 October 2011 - 07:27 PM

[Sogo7]

Well I'm normally dubious about any firm running from shared office space, but hey this is London and at least Google Street view does not show a terraced house bedsit.

However the 100% uptime claim always irks me though as when pressed for an answer many web hosts get very evasive about what actually constitutes as 'uptime' and often this means little more than the web server was powered up.. wether it was working as intended being another matter.

As for the 'Starter' package this is clearly a honeytrap and if I'm reading the TOS correctly has NO 100% uptime assurance and is missing several features that even the lowest rung of free web hosting are more than capable of providing.

This post has been edited by Sogo7: 30 October 2011 - 08:26 PM

[Spitfire]

dscot, on 30 October 2011 - 05:12 PM, said:

Hi,
I'm getting ready to buy my first website to advertise a small business I run. I came across Uk2.net and was about to buy a domain and basic hosting from them but I just came across this review: http://bit.ly/sKNWGx

Has anyone used them before?

Thanks

I'd be very sceptical of a hosting review from some 2-bit "get rich quick internet marketer", especially one that rates GoDaddy as a decent host. Looks like he's just flinging mud to try and get a bit of attention for his latest "amazing income" product. I doubt any of his claims about UK2.net are true.

This post has been edited by Spitfire: 30 October 2011 - 10:43 PM

[dscot]

Sogo7, on 30 October 2011 - 08:26 PM, said:

Well I'm normally dubious about any firm running from shared office space, but hey this is London and at least Google Street view does not show a terraced house bedsit.

However the 100% uptime claim always irks me though as when pressed for an answer many web hosts get very evasive about what actually constitutes as 'uptime' and often this means little more than the web server was powered up.. wether it was working as intended being another matter.

As for the 'Starter' package this is clearly a honeytrap and if I'm reading the TOS correctly has NO 100% uptime assurance and is missing several features that even the lowest rung of free web hosting are more than capable of providing.

Excellent analysis. It seems wise to stay away from that offer considering all the points made , what would you suggest I do?

I've come across tsohost and have only heard good things about that, there linux lite package seems ideal to my basic webpage needs? - http://www.tsohost.c..._webhosting.php

Thanks
Dave

[dscot]

Spitfire, on 30 October 2011 - 08:56 PM, said:

I'd be very sceptical of a hosting review from some 2-bit "get rich quick internet marketer", especially one that rates GoDaddy as a decent host. Looks like he's just flinging mud to try and get a bit of attention for his latest "amazing income" product. I doubt any of his claims about UK3.net are true.

Thats probably one of the issues that make searching for a web host on google really difficult, you never know what reivews are honest and which offers are really trying to trick you into something 'evil'. Thats whats so great about these forums

Thanks for the tip spitfire

[smoothonline]

I had a client who wanted to move two domains from them.

They charged him an excessive amount for the domains in the first place, charged to release them and then they don't actually do any of the work for you, you have to do every step of the transfer which was a very complicated process considering all he wanted to do a .com

I wouldn't say they were terrible personally I felt they charged over the odds for simple things.

[wesh.co.uk]

smoothonline, on 30 October 2011 - 09:17 PM, said:

I had a client who wanted to move two domains from them.

They charged him an excessive amount for the domains in the first place, charged to release them and then they don't actually do any of the work for you, you have to do every step of the transfer which was a very complicated process considering all he wanted to do a .com

I wouldn't say they were terrible personally I felt they charged over the odds for simple things.

Bonkers! Charging for releasing domains is just stupid, and somewhat overly cheeky... You wouldnt charge a customer in a shop, to leave after they have spent money, so why do it to customers online!

We have never charged anybody to release a domain, ever, nor do we oversell, nor have any "hidden" fee's, and we define uptime as "Your website being up and running and viewable on the internet publicly" with 99.9% uptime, that allows us 43 minutes a month of downtime should anything go wrong, but we havent had to use any of that in the last 12 months at all :-)

Its very simple maths really...

The cheaper you can buy more for, the less your actually going to get..

Smooth: Really nice website you have there too, very nice... Why host it in the US though if your target audience is the UK?

dscot, on 30 October 2011 - 09:01 PM, said:

Thats probably one of the issues that make searching for a web host on google really difficult, you never know what reivews are honest and which offers are really trying to trick you into something 'evil'. Thats whats so great about these forums
Thanks for the tip spitfire

Not wanting to blow our own trumpet, but have you seen our web hosting?

We do the exact opposite of firms like the one mentioned... You wont find any "unlimited" offerings or blown up fee's for simple things, just realistic pricing for hassle free service, and no "outsourced" employees or overloaded servers with silly resource limits...

This post has been edited by wesh.co.uk: 30 October 2011 - 10:14 PM

[Sogo7]

Well I can only vouch for those I've had personal dealings with, those to definitely avoid in the UK are BT webhosting and Fasthosts I' won't bore you with the litany of reasons but suffice to say if a major telephone exchange was on fire or server farm underwater then frontline support would still say it's my fault and tell me to clear my browser cache. God forbid you have a technical query with either of them.

I'm presently with Hosgator since March 2011 and they have been pretty good answering any technical points and been very tolerent of my pet code projects, so normal users should be more than ok.

For those on a budget taking a look at what's available with free web hosting providers may surprise you and several will allow the use of a top level domain with a free account such as X10 Hosting. BTW: If you have not purchased (rented is more accurate) a domain name yet then visit GBBO.co.uk because they are still giving away free .co.uk names.

[dscot]

wesh.co.uk, on 30 October 2011 - 10:09 PM, said:

Bonkers! Charging for releasing domains is just stupid, and somewhat overly cheeky... You wouldnt charge a customer in a shop, to leave after they have spent money, so why do it to customers online!

We have never charged anybody to release a domain, ever, nor do we oversell, nor have any "hidden" fee's, and we define uptime as "Your website being up and running and viewable on the internet publicly" with 99.9% uptime, that allows us 43 minutes a month of downtime should anything go wrong, but we havent had to use any of that in the last 12 months at all :-)

Its very simple maths really...

The cheaper you can buy more for, the less your actually going to get..

Smooth: Really nice website you have there too, very nice... Why host it in the US though if your target audience is the UK?


Not wanting to blow our own trumpet, but have you seen our web hosting?

We do the exact opposite of firms like the one mentioned... You wont find any "unlimited" offerings or blown up fee's for simple things, just realistic pricing for hassle free service, and no "outsourced" employees or overloaded servers with silly resource limits...

Thanks I'll check it out

[dscot]

Sogo7, on 30 October 2011 - 10:38 PM, said:

Well I can only vouch for those I've had personal dealings with, those to definitely avoid in the UK are BT webhosting and Fasthosts I' won't bore you with the litany of reasons but suffice to say if a major telephone exchange was on fire or server farm underwater then frontline support would still say it's my fault and tell me to clear my browser cache. God forbid you have a technical query with either of them.

I'm presently with Hosgator since March 2011 and they have been pretty good answering any technical points and been very tolerent of my pet code projects, so normal users should be more than ok.

For those on a budget taking a look at what's available with free web hosting providers may surprise you and several will allow the use of a top level domain with a free account such as X10 Hosting. BTW: If you have not purchased (rented is more accurate) a domain name yet then visit GBBO.co.uk because they are still giving away free .co.uk names.

X10 Hosting seem to only allow you to end in one of there domain names with the free account eg/ mysite.x10.mx

[smoothonline]

wesh.co.uk, on 30 October 2011 - 10:09 PM, said:

Smooth: Really nice website you have there too, very nice... Why host it in the US though if your target audience is the UK?

My business partner took the contract out on our hosting which expires this month.

We're looking for new hosts.

Actually, I charge to release domains because I provide them free with all hosting accounts (1 domain free only) so if someone changes their mind about our hosting I'm out of pocket.

But there are clear t&c's before people sign up not hidden somewhere.

[Sogo7]

dscot, on 30 October 2011 - 10:55 PM, said:

X10 Hosting seem to only allow you to end in one of there domain names with the free account eg/ mysite.x10.mx

They don't widely advertise this feature see here and as such is one of the Internets best kept secrets.

[wesh.co.uk]

smoothonline, on 30 October 2011 - 11:09 PM, said:

My business partner took the contract out on our hosting which expires this month.

We're looking for new hosts.

Actually, I charge to release domains because I provide them free with all hosting accounts (1 domain free only) so if someone changes their mind about our hosting I'm out of pocket.

But there are clear t&c's before people sign up not hidden somewhere.

Hmm, that sounds like it might be better, reworded, so rather than it being a release fee, its more of a "Domain name repayment" :-)
Sounds more friendly that way, me thinks :-)

Our new website and new prices should all be online by the end of the year, however if you want to have a peek, and offer any feedback then let us know, could use a fresh pair of eyes lol...

Funny how that "GBBO" is all American hosted... Google state that the country of your website does affect your rankings, so now they want to host UK sites in the USA? lol... Ironic...

This post has been edited by wesh.co.uk: 31 October 2011 - 04:58 AM

[dscot]

Thanks guys for all the input

What type of bandwidth should I look at if I want to try and get cutomers looking at it regularly for special offers? Would 5Gb be enough?

This post has been edited by dscot: 31 October 2011 - 07:38 AM

[Sogo7]

wesh.co.uk, on 31 October 2011 - 04:58 AM, said:

Funny how that "GBBO" is all American hosted... Google state that the country of your website does affect your rankings, so now they want to host UK sites in the USA? lol... Ironic...

Be that as it may it's still a useful offer. BT are punting the cost of domain registration and Google's involvement is merely window dressing as their free hosting service is very limited & bloody awful to use. (no CSS, no FTP, server side scripting and javascript both heavily restricted and the WYSIWYG builder makes 'Mr Site' look positively high tech)

PS: Will trade you ironic for mind boggling.. did you know all BT webhosting is provided by US servers?

[rallport]

smoothonline, on 30 October 2011 - 09:17 PM, said:

I had a client who wanted to move two domains from them.

They charged him an excessive amount for the domains in the first place, charged to release them and then they don't actually do any of the work for you, you have to do every step of the transfer which was a very complicated process considering all he wanted to do a .com

I wouldn't say they were terrible personally I felt they charged over the odds for simple things.

Be careful, that sounds like an opinion

[MikeChipshop]

rallport, on 02 November 2011 - 10:44 AM, said:

Be careful, that sounds like an opinion

[wesh.co.uk]

Sogo7, on 31 October 2011 - 09:00 AM, said:

Be that as it may it's still a useful offer. BT are punting the cost of domain registration and Google's involvement is merely window dressing as their free hosting service is very limited & bloody awful to use. (no CSS, no FTP, server side scripting and javascript both heavily restricted and the WYSIWYG builder makes 'Mr Site' look positively high tech)

PS: Will trade you ironic for mind boggling.. did you know all BT webhosting is provided by US servers?

Consider me boggled... I didnt actually know BT hosting was in the US as we didnt actually know BT still tried to offer hosting anymore, thought they gave that up years ago and settled for their "FAIL" BT Tradespace.....

I know what you mean with the GBBO website builder, it is terrible though, my builder tried using it and ended up with something truly bad, he was gutted because the domain he really wanted, is now stuck with them, and constantly nags me about how he isnt getting any traffic lol...

DO NOT get us started on "Mr S*ite" lol... Website in a box my assss...

The first one of those I saw was our local pet swimming centre where I took my dogs for a swim/wash/groom and the site was really bad... I did have to tell the owner, no site at all is better than one that makes you look bad... Peoples imaginations are better than this, so take it down (She was asking me about websites and SEO stuff)

Needless to say, my poor doggy came away with an eye infection that day, and she still has that god awful website....

Karma huh...

This post has been edited by wesh.co.uk: 02 November 2011 - 02:51 PM

[smithmr8]

I've had a couple of VPS's from them, and never had a problem.

[kree8or]

smoothonline, on 30 October 2011 - 09:17 PM, said:

I had a client who wanted to move two domains from them.

They charged him an excessive amount for the domains in the first place, charged to release them and then they don't actually do any of the work for you, you have to do every step of the transfer which was a very complicated process considering all he wanted to do a .com

I wouldn't say they were terrible personally I felt they charged over the odds for simple things.

I've just had a simular experiance. My client had already purchased a domain name from UK2.net. The client wanted to move the domin name to her hosting account (against my advice I hasten to add) to "keep things all in the same place". So I contacted UK2.net on her behalf and they told me that because the client had the domain name less than a year, there would be a £12 "release fee". Madness.