Anyone heard of Netfirms?

sjt269

sjt269

sjt269

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I saw on another forum I visit that a company called Netfirms is offering an unbelievable deal on hosting for a year....$10 for 20Gb webspace for a year, plus a domain name of your own. I'm posting this thread partly to share this offer with anyone else looking for a host, and partly to ask if this really is as good as it seems. :o


The other forum seems to think it's legit, and several members have accounts there now. I want to get some hosting, that's a perfect solution for me, but I can't shake the feeling that there's a catch that I can't see. The biggest catch I can find is that if you don't cancel your hosting at the end of the year, $120 will be withdrawn from your account automatically for another year's hosting...but that seems to be it. :confused:


So, tell me...is this really too good to be true? :p
tTz



:ninja-edit:


A link might be helpful, eh? :o

http://www.netfirms.com/max


:ninja-edit2:

And I *have* checked the OC Host review linked to in the sticky, but I couldn't see Netfirms listed...maybe they're a new company?
 
I think this is just another host that are over selling, so if you use too much they will cancel account without warning :(

*EDIT* Hmmm seems as though that it is an offer with a pc mag? So maybe they dne some sort of deal together :confused:
 
It's a loss leader - they're hoping you'll renew next year at the full price. There's bound to be limits on CPU time used, databases created, etc so unless you need those ridiculous specs, I'd recommend just going for a 'normal' package from a reputable UK provider instead.
 
Adz said:
There's bound to be limits on CPU time used, databases created, etc so unless you need those ridiculous specs, I'd recommend just going for a 'normal' package from a reputable UK provider instead.
Click to expand...


Yeah, but can you see anything saying that there are limits such as these, and what would be the drawbacks of these limits if they were there (my knowledge stretches only as far as bandwidth, you've kinda lost me there? :o

And I don't particularly need the 'ridiculous specs', though it would be nice to know I wouldn't run out of space, but the main reason I like the look of that package is because it's really cheap, cheaper than anything I've seen from a UK host (or indeed any other host). I can't justify spending a lot of money on a website that I may never finish. ;)
 
netfirms are quite an old firm i vaiguly remember using some of their free hosting years ago so its probably a genuine deal but i wouldnt go for it if you need to have perfect up time and things like that
 
tTz said:
Yeah, but can you see anything saying that there are limits such as these, and what would be the drawbacks of these limits if they were there (my knowledge stretches only as far as bandwidth, you've kinda lost me there? :o

And I don't particularly need the 'ridiculous specs', though it would be nice to know I wouldn't run out of space, but the main reason I like the look of that package is because it's really cheap, cheaper than anything I've seen from a UK host (or indeed any other host). I can't justify spending a lot of money on a website that I may never finish. ;)
Click to expand...

They could limit your CPU usage, memory usage, number of domains/databases/email accounts. They need not disclose these limits if their T&C allows them to kick you off under any sort of 'fair usage policy'.

Basically you're sacrificing speed and latency by hosting in the US, quite possibly uptime, quite possibly quality of service to gain 20GB of webspace which you'll most likely never use. If $10 is your budget, fair enough but it's not what I would go for personally (obviously, with what I do for a living, it's not very likely that I'll be buying virtual hosting any time soon :p).

To quote a couple of common sayings: You get what you pay for and there's no such thing as a free lunch. If it sounds too good to be true, it surely is.
 
Adz said:
They could limit your CPU usage, memory usage, number of domains/databases/email accounts. They need not disclose these limits if their T&C allows them to kick you off under any sort of 'fair usage policy'.
Click to expand...


So what consequences would this have, would it mean that whatever I uploaded to them could suddenly go offline if I went over their limits?

As for domains, afaik sub-domains are umlimited, email accounts are limitied, but to 100, and I dunno about databases.


So, basically the view is that it's a genuine deal, but may have some hidden catches (which we still haven't determined yet :p)?
 
$10/month is a fairly reasonable amount for someone looking to host one or two personal sites. That's around-about in the middle of the range for personal hosting; not quite "I want everything for $3/month" and also not "I'm spending $20 on a host because they only use premium bandwidth."

Netfirms are a reputable company; they've been around for years (used to be well known for their free hosting), and they're not exactly going to take your money and close down the next day. There are a million other hosts out there in your price range, however, and you shouldn't go with a host just because they advertise the biggest disk space / transfer limits. You have to remember that the hosting industry is completely unregulated, and hosts can oversell as much they like (whilst retaining customers). Just because they advertise 20GB disk space, doesn't mean they'll have 20GB disk space allocated just for you. They're probably relying on the fact that 99.9% of their customers fail to break the 500MB mark, let alone 20GB. Judging by the fact that a .com domain costs about $6/year, they must be cramming one hell of a lot of people on their servers!

Do a search on the WebHostingTalk.com Forums. You'll get the usual "zomg [insert host here] stolze my moni!!11" posts, but you usually get a number of unbiased opinions too :)
 
For $10 you get what you pay for...I'd only trust Dreamhost or Site5 with my money because they're big, decent people.

tbh go for a host with specs you'll need and support who'll be helpful. Unless you can keep a backup of your account and it's pretty non-critical stuff :)
 
Okay than, thanks for all that info there. I'll have a think about it, and maybe a look at some other hosts as well.

Thanks
tTz
 
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