After the fiasco I experienced with my sites being taken down I am now starting to realize that I need to get my sites moved to a different provider. I have begun research to try and find a new hosting company. A hosting company with servers that are a little more robust and technical support that is a little more technical and a lot more available. The problem I am finding is that a lot of the places I am finding do not offer the level of hosting that IX Web Hosting does. I have their Unlimited Pro plan which allows me to have an unlimited number of domains on my account. I am also given unlimited data transfer and unlimited disk space and 16 dedicated IP addresses. I'm not naïve to believe I am actually given unlimited anything but for what I have there have been no complaints when I consumed 11.5 GB with a couple of photo shows I did online. Most of the plans I am finding from other service providers they allow only 4-6 IP addresses and other restrictions that could be difficult for me to live within. I am beginning to think that shared hosting may not be the answer.
By lifting the restriction of a shared my choices have increased but the prices have also gone up substantially. Instead of $12.95 per month I am now looking at low end packages starting at $110 a month. That is a lot especially since very few of my sites even offer ad space let alone subscriptions. I am afraid that if I am going to justify a dedicated server I am going to need to get a lot more serious about site marketing and I'll be honest I am not good at that. I'm a technical guy that mostly does these things as a creative outlet to get away from things. When I start having to make them a business I am not sure I am going to be able to deal with that.
One unexpected benefit to this line of thinking is also a potential negative. With a dedicated server I would be responsible for much of the things that I now utilize my hosting company for. If I want a back-up or a change to some module I just create a trouble ticket and wait. With a dedicated server I am on the hook for that which means that a lot more of my time will have to be devoted to maintaining the system than is currently being required. It's not that I can't do it; it is just that I had not anticipated the additional time this might require. It would also require me to have a test server where I would be able to try things out before going into production. Timing of course is everything. Just a couple of days ago I donated an old computer because I had no use for it now I am looking for a new box. The good thing about it is this gives me an opportunity to try out some of the new hardware that has been released. I am seriously considering creating a Small Form Factor computer such as a Shuttle that I could use to create the caliber of server that I would probably be using. This would give me a test bed from which to try various items and also make the server semi-portable so that if I had to I could move it from room to room creating a small sub-network in the house if needed. Most of the computers I build are fairly large desktop units so this will be a big change.
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