Being the GRM forums...
I need some help with choosing a web hosting provider.
I am looking at 3 different sites, with spiky bandwidth requirements but for a majority of the time low traffic. The ability for one of them to have an e-commerce page and another that can take donations. These will all be mine and my wife's.
I do not care about free domain registration or privacy as I know that is controlled by my registrar which will not be the hosting provider.
There is so much bloody information out there I can't tell which is what and what is important. I trust you guys so I am here.
As right now none of these sites are self-sustaining at the moment, the price is a concern. 1 will be my wife's Autism blog, which will be transfered from blogger. One will be a NGO/not-for profit I am working on in the city and the other will be a political page. (flounder - not flounder).
I would prefer something that can handle all the sites under one account, but I am new to WP so this is a learning exercise too.
I have found the following sites that I like so far
Green Geeks only issue is this is a relative unknown and it renews at $10 a month.
Host Master located in UK and really don't know about them.
A Small Orange They are better known than the other two, but I am not sure how much bandwidth and online storage I need. I currently post all my images on Tumblr to share here but I notice after about a year they turn red X. That would be bad for legacy pages.
Google and Amazon cloud computing. They seem cheap upfront but if you have a spike in traffic they go to expensive super quick.
Bluehost, HostGator, GoDaddy are all meh and seem to nickle and dime you to death on the fees. A2 seemed great till you look at the out the door cost. Same with Wix and SiteGround.
Alright GRM what say you?
I've had good luck with Inmotion Hosting for my custom-built (err, "bespoke" 
) sites, they have auto-deploy tools for Wordpress with shopping carts too, although I haven't had to deal with any major traffic spikes.
I guess the big question is if you need Wordpress hosting, or if you need a machine to host Wordpress on.
Former gives you a pre-configured Wordpress setup and all you need to do is provide the content. The latter gives you a bare (usually Linux) machine that you have to install WP on yourself.
I tend to use Vultr.com for my hosting these days, although I still have some stuff on RootBSD. RootBSD is mainly "here's a VM, go nuts" whereas Vultr does have a one-click Wordpress setup. Haven't used the Wordpress setup, but overall I'm quite happy with Vultr.
Another GRM/DIY way would be a static site generator like Jekyll, and if you need comments use something like Disqus. It has a bit more of a learning curve initially (especially if you're not an IT person), but OTOH it can help cutting your hosting costs quite considerably.
GameboyRMH said:
I've had good luck with Inmotion Hosting for my custom-built (err, "bespoke" ) sites, they have auto-deploy tools for Wordpress with shopping carts too, although I haven't had to deal with any major traffic spikes.
Hah I see what you did there. 
Inmotion is a good host.
I never had any issues with Network Solutions.
https://www.pair.com I've been using them for years.
Time for more research thanks guys!
I have a reseller account with SiteGround and could probably hook you up with a decent deal. Shoot me a DM.
I have experience professionally with Wordpress on Amazon AWS EC2.
Boiling down my advice, I'd suggest letting someone else run your server - use hosted Wordpress services. A thing often missed with using a service like AWS EC2 is that they're responsible to securely getting you a machine. You're responsible for the security of that machine. You can quickly find yourself in directory permission hell (or patching hell, or backup hell) if you're not careful and up for it.
If you do decide to run your own cloud server, I'd suggest DigitalOcean over EC2 due to pricing.
Now, this isn't meant to shut you down, so no offense, I just TL:DR'd my usual advice here.
Outside of Wordpress, earlier Jekyll was mentioned. I've used Hugo. These programs create your whole site on your computer, and you just upload it somewhere. Your web server isn't actually running anything. For this, Amazon S3 actually sounds like a nice option.
Given my complete noob status i too would prefer someone else to run the servers on the 3 sites mentioned
Down the road i may setup a self hosted server to play with
I use 1and1.com for a personal site, a family photos site and I setup a WordPress blog for my father's cross country bicycle ride - haven't updated in a long time but they're reasonable..
I've heard bluehost is a good one, but I have no personal experience and I'm also in the market. I would like a domain included though.
Sporterizing.com (that I help to maintain) is on BlueHost, it is pretty good. Woudn't recommend the Sucuri option though...
BoxheadCougarTim said:
I guess the big question is if you need Wordpress hosting, or if you need a machine to host Wordpress on.
Former gives you a pre-configured Wordpress setup and all you need to do is provide the content. The latter gives you a bare (usually Linux) machine that you have to install WP on yourself.
I tend to use Vultr.com for my hosting these days, although I still have some stuff on RootBSD. RootBSD is mainly "here's a VM, go nuts" whereas Vultr does have a one-click Wordpress setup. Haven't used the Wordpress setup, but overall I'm quite happy with Vultr.
Another GRM/DIY way would be a static site generator like Jekyll, and if you need comments use something like Disqus. It has a bit more of a learning curve initially (especially if you're not an IT person), but OTOH it can help cutting your hosting costs quite considerably.
I have a system right now I am trying to do this on. I am holding off on the actual site till I feel a little more comfortable with Wordpress in general.
I am going to set up a little personal web server to practice on and see what I actually need. I have a feeling I am not knowledgable enough to ask the right questions.
Stay tuned.
Actually, another option if you're looking at a "static" blog site without comments would be to host on Amazon S3 instead of running your own webserver. Here's one blog post I found on this topic.
That would remove the need for a lot of infrastructure at your end if you so desire.
Word of caution, register your domain yourself. www.joker.com has great domain self-management tools.
Don't have a host register it and rent it to you, if you want to move the domain to a different host you will be forced to buy the domain name from the old host.
In reply to bentwrench :
I am taking your post to mean to not use the free domain service that web hosting providers have?
I have my domains separate from any hosting.
