My first post - so hello to everyone!

I've used a few hosts over the years for modest sites that don't require much - and I'm shopping for a new host again due to the frequency of downtime with my current host. My current host has a 99.5% uptime guarantee but from all the hosts I've experienced it has to be the worst ever, with intermittent downtime nearing a daily basis.

I'm looking for shared hosting for about 3-4 sites/domains but I'm primarily looking for recommendations on uptime/reliability this time round, and how useful are those uptime guarantees anyway?

Cheers,

Bill

What does the guarantee state?

Guarantees usually mean that if they do not meet the 99.5% uptime, you will be refunded your money. Sometimes you have to request a refund though - they're not going to do it automatically. If they do not take any action when they do not meet their "guarantee", then it is not truly a guarantee and that host is worthless.

Personally, I would not use any host which could not meet 99.5% or better. It doesn't matter if I'm being refunded every month, but I want uptime...even if hosting is free, I'm not going to take it if it can't provide enough uptime

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...some super-sweet signature

ps.. 99.5% uptime means you can have up to 4 days of downtime a year

I go more for 100% uptime like www.fluidhosting.com

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This is their policy: *** endeavours to have network connectivity available for HTTP access by third parties 99.5% of each month ("Web Site Availability"). In the event that there is no Web Site Availability, *** will credit the monthly service charge for the Service at the rate of 5% for every 30 minutes past 99.5% availability in a given month.

However, the downtime is only for a few minutes each time and probably doesn't come to 30 mins - but the fact remains that for each few minutes its down, is when visitors find the site down, and the more often that occurs the more likely they will not return.

Below is a list of times the site has been down since Dec 06 when I started recording them. They said they were having problems initially with a specific site so I gave them a bit of room for that, but looking at this list again I think I've been with them long enough and it's time to jump ship!

Thanks for the Fluid Hosting link - I will check them out

Dec 1, 2006 10:01 PM
Dec 12, 2006 6:02 PM
Dec 18, 2006 9:56 PM
Dec 21, 2006 8:29 PM
Dec 22, 2006 8:02 PM
Dec 27, 2006 11:06 PM
Dec 29, 2006 5:58 AM

Jan 2, 2007 7:58 PM
Jan 2, 2007 9:07 PM
Jan 3, 2007 8:29 PM
Jan 5, 2007 3:09 PM
Jan 12, 2007 5:07 PM
Jan 13, 2007 1:45 AM
Jan 27, 2007 7:31 AM

Feb 8, 2007 1:51 PM
Feb 15, 2007 5:50 AM
Feb 18, 2007 3:04 AM
Feb 19, 2007 10:14 PM
Feb 24, 2007 4:16 PM
Feb 28, 2007 9:33 PM

Mar 6, 2007 5:36 PM
Mar 14, 2007 5:03 AM
Mar 14, 2007 8:18 PM
Mar 16, 2007 4:53 PM
Mar 16, 2007 6:28 PM

The last 2 or 3 host I had b4 a friend suggested fluidhosting would have downtime and Every time they had some excuses. They did get creative, but after you hear 15 or 20 excesses as why the sites are down, you sorta lose faith in what their saying.

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