Finding the Right Hosting - Secure, Cheap, Fast, Safe

[SplitIce]

A unique article for KWWHunction.

Finding the right hosting for sites in this niche (hereby referred to as linking sites) can be hard. People have to weigh up the options of Server Security, Cost, Speed of Server and Connection and also the safety in regards to DMCA Takedown notices.
Ill break this article down into two sections security and location.

Location
Safest
Netherlands (Ecatel), Hong Kong (#1?), Czech Republic, Russia

Moderate
Netherlands (Others), Luxemburg

Unsafe
Germany (All), USA (All), Australia (All), Netherlands (Leaseweb, Worldstream)
For anyone in this category a reverse proxy solution is a MUST!

*Note*
Notify me of more and Ill add them, howeaver as always it depends also on the datacenter.


Packages
Shared
Cost: Cheapest
Security: None to Little
Performance: Can be quite poor.
Notes: Very little server control, only suitable for really small sites. An entry level product although for people with any server knowledge I would recomend to start with a small VPS.
Companies Recommended: None. I dont recomend shared hosting.

VPS
Cost: Moderate
Security: Lots more than Shared, A little less than dedicated
Performance: Decent, although be wary of overloaded VPS servers.
Notes: Server control, scalable (entry level->large VPS), Power Reset and OS Reload control.
Companies to avoid: ScopeHosts/VPS9
Companies recomended: hetzner (DE) with Reverse Proxy (CHEAP!), server.lu (LU) with AND without (smaller sites) Reverse Proxy, NetDirekt (DE) with Reverse Proxy, XSLTel (NL), wrzhost (RU, at this stage im only recommending RU)

Dedicated
Cost: Most
Security: Best, you are responsible for it (or if managed service they might be)
Performance: Best, depends on the hardware you choose of course
Notes: Most control, Best performance, Most expensive, Doesnt scale down to entry level -- for larger sites.
Companies to avoid: Leaseweb
Companies recommended: hetzner with Reverse Proxy (CHEAP!), server.lu with AND without (smaller sites) Reverse Proxy, NetDirekt with Reverse Proxy, PRQ, Ecatel



Reverse Proxy
I couldn't decide which section to put this in, so I made it its own.
A reverse proxy can decrease your hardware costs and increase security and safety on your server and also give good SEO benifits if you have lots of sites on your server.

Security
Security is increased because the end user (User accessing your site) doesnt know the actual address. They are only accessing a 'stepping stone' that takes their response, filters it, and gets the response from the server to give to them. Because of that they never receive the real server IP and as such are never exposed to any insecure services running on the backend server.

Performace
Decrease:

• Extra delay caused by connection from Proxy Server -> Backend Server. Expecially when crossing countries or oceans. This delay is usually quite small although, especially in Europe (<10ms).

Increase:

• Keep alive is handled by proxy server, meaning no connection over head and no threads need to be kept open for this on the backend server. If running apache this is a HUGE improvement.

Security
Being that no one knows the original server location this can be great for hosting sites in places with cheap hardware but arent suited to your type of sites. Of course you need to obey the law and im not encouraging you to break it in any way shape or form.

A good combination commonly used with my reverse proxy service is the Hetzner EQ6 & the NL reverse proxy option. Its about 4x cheaper than a similar server at Ecatel (not their fault, they offer a unique service)

SEO - Search Engine Optimization
Because each service on a reverse proxy gets its own IPs you can have multiple IPs from different countries pointed at the same server. This can trick google into seeing links between these network sites as being from vastly independent sites and as such more important even if some content is shared.



Special Notes on Hosts.
Leaseweb - Great networking and connectivity, bad DMCA handling. 15 minute notifications frequent (15 minutes until nullroute), quite often DMCA notices are for the entire site not infringing material. Not Safe. Great for running behind a reverse proxy (ping of 2ms!! OMG). As for support, slow and sometimes can be quite unhelpful unless you purchase an expensive SLA.
PING www.leaseweb.com (83.149.80.111) 56(84) bytes of data.

64 bytes from www.leaseweb.com (83.149.80.111): icmp_seq=1 ttl=60 time=1.98 ms
64 bytes from www.leaseweb.com (83.149.80.111): icmp_seq=2 ttl=60 time=2.16 ms

Stuck when choosing a host? Try one of these threads for Small Sites, Medium Sites, Medium-Large, Large Site (Dedicated)

SplitIce Reviewed by SplitIce on 21st Jan 2011. Finding the Right Hosting - Secure, Cheap, Fast, Safe A unique article for KWWHunction. Finding the right hosting for sites in this niche (hereby referred to as linking sites) can be hard. People have to weigh up the options of Server Security, Cost, Speed of Server and Connection and also the safety in regards to DMCA Takedown notices. Ill break this article down into two sections security and location. Location Safest Netherlands (Ecatel), Hong Kong (#1?), Czech Republic, Russia Moderate Rating: 5

[r@liablehost]

Great sharing .. But man I am wondering about leaseweb.. You said it is unsafe ??

[GoPantheoN]

Nice Information, thank you.

[SplitIce]

Leaseweb has great networking, bad DMCA handling. 15 minute notifications frequent (15 minutes until nullroute), quite often DMCA notices are for the entire site not infringing material. Not Safe. Great for running behind a reverse proxy (ping of 4.3ms!! OMG)

[r@liablehost]

Awsome information ... Thanks. Well my I always like and trust on Ecatel excellent hosting .

[SplitIce]

Ecatel is the best in NL, just expensive for powerful hardware. (Hence why we use them for the NL part of our reverse proxy)

[faku]

You could add worldstream/vpsfactory to unsafe in netherlands.

[SplitIce]

Done, thanks.