Greetings fellow members of ciao!
Thanks for your interest in reading my review. I have updated it with the latest information.
Company Profile
Company Name: Hostonfire.com
Established Since: 2000
Official Website: http://www.hostonfire.com
Customer Support Site: http://www.propersupport.com
Members Login Page: http://www.supremecenter.com
No of Employees: 50-100
Headquarters: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Other Locations: London, United Kingdom; Perth, Australia; and Shanghai, China.
Services: Web Solutions, Web Hosting
Data Centre: HostCentric, USA
Web Hosting
There are two hosting packages offered which are the business plan and corporate plan. The plan does not include domain name registration which can be bought separately at a great price. You also have the option to use your existing domain by modifying your DNS records to point to their servers. The features of each plan are as follow:
- BUSINESS PLAN - USD 5.00/month
-1200 MB Hosting
- 30 GB Transfer
-1 Domain hosted
-100 POP3 accounts
-100 Email aliases
-10 SubDomains
-1 MySQL database
-
- COORPORATE PLAN - USD 9.00/month
-2000 MB Hosting
-50 GB Transfer
-3 Domains hosted
-Unlimited POP3 accounts
-Unlimited Email aliases
-30 SubDomains
-4 MySQL database
+Previously Business Plan only had 400 MB Disk space with 5GB Transfer and Corporate Plan had 600MB Disk space and 10GB Transfer. All existing customers receive the free upgrade like I did with my account.
All accounts are hosted on stable Linux on Apache servers. All account features PHP, Perl and Microsoft Frontpage extensions support. You can have flash designs and stream real video or real audio. This is very useful for high skilled web designers that want to showcase their talents.
24/7 Support
"Providing quality, cost effective products and services is the obligation of every business. Our affordable web hosting is just a small part of the service we provide. The other part is our focus on fast 24/7 support. If you are unable to find the answer to your issue on our FAQ pages, please feel free to open a new ticket and contact our support department. When you need help or have a problem we will respond within 15 minutes of your request/ticket submission." extracted from hostonfire.com. The support really works. There is also a live chat support offered. So far, they have responded within 1 hour to my e-mail enquiries although the website states a 6 hour respond time.
Control Panel
The control panel is a custom one unlike Cpanel or HELM. However, it has a similar feel to it. This is the central management center of your account. You can create additional e-mail accounts, subdomains, newsletter, view traffic stats and create custom error pages. It is a very user friendly and you will get used to it quickly. A demo of the control panel is available on the website.
Website Builder
"No skills needed, no HTML, no scripts... New advances in internet technology have made it possible for anyone to create a website without any programming knowledge." extracted from hostonfire.com. This is a website builder wizard that can be easily used. It has a similar interface like the compose mail function on your free yahoo e-mail account. They have prepared a huge number of great templates where you can just customize yourself to create great websites. You do not need to know any web languages like HTML. This comes bundled with every hosting account.
Domain Name Registration
The domain name registration only costs USD6/yr if bought together with a hosting package. A real bargain indeed as it is the cheapest I have ever bought a domain. They accept domains like .com, .net, .org, .biz and .info. E-mail them to receive a list of other offered domain names. They do accept .co.uk and .org.uk and other country code domains.
Web Design
You will need to e-mail sales@hostonfire.com to receive a custom quote. A complete website design with one domain and one year hosting costs only £100.00. You can receive one year free maintenance.
Data Center & Server
Your website will be powered by Dual P4 (Xeon) 2.6 GHz servers with 2 GB of memory, 5x36 GIGs SCSI hard drives, the Linux OS, and a 100 Mbits connection in Fremont/CA - USA. This ensures that your web site will load quickly for your customers wherever they are in the world.
Money Back Guarantee
They provide 15 days money back guarantee. If you are unhappy with the service within the first 15 days, you can receive a full refund. You will be refunded for your hosting account but not your domain name registration. This is not refundable because the registry does not refund any money. So far, I have never known anyone who claims a refund within the guarantee but I believe it can be done via the support website.
The Prices
There are two hosting packages which are business and corporate. The price of hosting is USD 5.00/month and USD 9.00/month respectively which are fairly cheap. You have to pay it annually. You can buy additional bandwidth and disk space if required.
Payment Method
They accept any standard credit cards. My friend managed to arrange to make the payment using paypal. Their paypal account should be sales@hostonfire.com. I personally paid with VISA for my account.
Typical Set up Time
My account was setup instantly after registration. I was able to access the control panel soon after completing the order. However, it took about a day for my domain name to settle with the servers. The site became accessible by visitors within 24 hours.
Rating
This company has received high ratings across the internet. They are currently ranked no 1 on totalreg.com and are highly recommended by most hosting review websites. Visit the site for a list.
Website Rating:
Layout 4/5
Design 4/5
Speed 5/5
Navigation 4/5
My testimonial
I am currently hosting bennyong.com which is still in development with them and have recommended most of my uni mates to sign up for their great service. I think they should start paying me commission to do so. Well, let's see how it goes. It is just me, if I find a good service; I will share it with the world.
I look forward to receiving feedback and comments on my review. If you have any questions, please leave them in my guestbook and I will get back to you as soon as possible.
I hope this helps!
Have A Nice Day!
Benny Ong
http://www.bennyong.com
me@bennyong.com
Pictures of hostonfire.com
by (63%):
by (38%):
01.01.2005 13:32
Quite a comprehensive report f your experiences. Thanks. I have used several hosts over the years and found a huge range in how effective they are. I also find that once you know what you are doing you discover that you are paying a truckload of cash for things you can easily do yourself. I find a lot of people seem to think they are getting bargains when there are really good hosts out there offering very competitive pricing. I now use Eyebrow Raised Designs - web hosting is $8.95 (about 5 quid) a month for 2,000Mb of space and 100GB of traffic per month - plus a range of really useful extras - scripts, email accounts, etc.... Domain names are under $10 (about 6 quid)
13.10.2004 13:10
Oh my comment looks just like James' comment... not fair.... lol
13.10.2004 13:10
Good review.. well written... Cheers Dave