reccomend asp.net 2.0 hosting + SQL2005

pinkaardvark · 9 May 2007 at 14:39

I know it's been asked a few times recently but the search seems out of order. Anyone got a recommendation. Just for personal usage not commercial so needs to be reasonably priced. Can live with SQL express but do need 2005.

Stelly · 9 May 2007 at 15:07

I use hostinguk.net which seem very good and not too dear... but you will pay no matter what with MSSQL server as they have to pay licencing

Stelly

pinkaardvark · 9 May 2007 at 15:11

Stelly said:
I use hostinguk.net which seem very good and not too dear... but you will pay no matter what with MSSQL server as they have to pay licencing

Stelly

SQLExpress is free

iceman911 · 9 May 2007 at 15:13

I use : Pipeten for my asp.net hosting and they are pretty cheap, have a good control panel and have a great support team.

ice

Stelly · 9 May 2007 at 15:13

but is that because you are only allow two connections to the SQLexpress database at one moment in time? so that means if you are getting multiple people accessing your website your a little screwed?

Stelly

thedazman67 · 9 May 2007 at 15:25

I'm with UltimaHosts great customer service and good prices, fully featured.

http://www.ultimahosts.net/

thedazman

elkdanger · 9 May 2007 at 15:31

pinkaardvark said:
SQLExpress is free

You also can't use it for live websites, and for multiple connections it will be very slow.

You can get a MySQL .Net Connector for ASP.Net, which has been a good experience so far. I've found that many hosts provide .Net hosting with a MySQL database for just as cheap as PHP/MySQL hosting.

pinkaardvark · 9 May 2007 at 15:38

elkdanger said:
You also can't use it for live websites, and for multiple connections it will be very slow.

You can get a MySQL .Net Connector for ASP.Net, which has been a good experience so far. I've found that many hosts provide .Net hosting with a MySQL database for just as cheap as PHP/MySQL hosting.

Where did you hear that. SQLExpress was designed for web applications as a competitor to MySQL and I can find nothing to suggest it has connection limits. Can people back up these statements please?

"
When delivered in SQL Server Express form, Microsoft has limited SQL Server in several ways:

§ A database cannot exceed 4 gigabytes in size.

§ SQL Server Express may be installed on a multiple CPU machine, but it will execute (run) only on a single processor or a single processor core if multi-core processors are used.

§ SQL Server Express may be installed on a server with any amount of memory, but will use only up to 1 GB of available RAM memory.

Other than these limitations SQL Server Express provides virtually the full power and breadth of SQL Server capabilities. Although MSDE was limited to no more than five users, SQL Server Express no longer has such an artificial throttle on performance. Within the limits of processor, RAM and maximum database size, SQL Server Express always runs at full speed. "

Those limitations are the only ones I am aware of from the MS documentation on the subject.

elkdanger · 9 May 2007 at 15:54

pinkaardvark said:
.. words..

No, you're right - you can use the SQL Express edition (I was thinking about the developer edition commercial site-wise). However, are there any shared hosting outfits out there that provide SQL Server Express given that it will be shared amongst several clients? Then the performance restrictions will come into play, depending on the complexity of everybody else's sites.

Also, I never said it had a connection limit, but I did say that multiple connections will use up resources and SQL Server Express can't use it's resources to the full, which on shared hosting you may need it to.

If you've got the money, buy your own dedicated server and whack it on. Or host it from your own connection if you have the speed.

pinkaardvark · 9 May 2007 at 16:03

With Express you don't actually have an Instance of SQL Server installed, it's a bit like access in that you just drop the .mdf and .ldf files for a database into your web folder. So the contention with other users of the hosting partners server is no different from any other file type.

Lots of ASP.NET 2.0 features rely on SQL 2005, in fact many features automatically use SQL express, so unless you have MSSQL access you lose a lot. There are lots of hosts out there that provide Express free or at reasonable rates, i'm just asking for reccomendations not M$ hating.

As said in my original post this is not for commercial stuff, just as a testbed for my own purposes so don't want a dedicated server or VPS but I am happy to pay a bit more ie £150 a year sort of figure.

pinkaardvark · 9 May 2007 at 16:20

thedazman67 said:
I'm with UltimaHosts great customer service and good prices, fully featured.

http://www.ultimahosts.net/

thedazman

Looks good but a bit concerned about the "unlimited" dimension. what's the performance like? and can I ask what your hosting with them.

elkdanger · 9 May 2007 at 16:21

pinkaardvark said:
With Express you don't actually have an Instance of SQL Server installed, it's a bit like access in that you just drop the .mdf and .ldf files for a database into your web folder. So the contention with other users of the hosting partners server is no different from any other file type.

Lots of ASP.NET 2.0 features rely on SQL 2005, in fact many features automatically use SQL express, so unless you have MSSQL access you lose a lot. There are lots of hosts out there that provide Express free or at reasonable rates, i'm just asking for reccomendations not M$ hating.

As said in my original post this is not for commercial stuff, just as a testbed for my own purposes so don't want a dedicated server or VPS but I am happy to pay a bit more ie £150 a year sort of figure.

Nobody is "M$" hating here

That's fair enough. I've been under the impression that you actually have to install the server, and I've just never been bothered to try connecting without it. In any case, you won't lose a lot by not using MSSQL - by doing a little work you can use which ever database provider you wish.

If it's just for testbed stuff, why do you need hosting? Could you not do your testbed stuff locally?

pinkaardvark · 9 May 2007 at 16:28

elkdanger said:
If it's just for testbed stuff, why do you need hosting? Could you not do your testbed stuff locally?

Basically i'm a .net winforms SQL developer but I want to expand my skillset to include ASP.NET. So yes I can run everything locally but I'd like to publish stuff for review, I'd also like to knock up some commercial sites for friends etc to get me into the whole web design arena. I've built web sites before many moons ago and I don't have any problems with the technology, ie I know enough ASP/CSS/XML etc to get me through but I want some experience working with real published sites and if hosting is only a couple of hundred quid it's no real loss.

elkdanger · 9 May 2007 at 16:37

pinkaardvark said:
Basically i'm a .net winforms SQL developer but I want to expand my skillset to include ASP.NET. So yes I can run everything locally but I'd like to publish stuff for review, I'd also like to knock up some commercial sites for friends etc to get me into the whole web design arena. I've built web sites before many moons ago and I don't have any problems with the technology, ie I know enough ASP/CSS/XML etc to get me through but I want some experience working with real published sites and if hosting is only a couple of hundred quid it's no real loss.

Well, good luck

I'm looking to go in the opposite direction at some point. I'll keep an eye on this thread in case mention of a good host comes up, since I'm after one aswell.

One host that got recommended to me was 1uhosting.co.uk, which seem decent. You'll need to go for the business account to get SQL Server hosting, but it still seems within your budget.

huppy · 9 May 2007 at 18:32

elkdanger said:
One host that got recommended to me was 1uhosting.co.uk, which seem decent. You'll need to go for the business account to get SQL Server hosting, but it still seems within your budget.

I can also recommend 1uhosting (can't remember if i was the one who recommended them to you elk!)

I've been with them for about 10months and have found them top quality. So far - things may chance if they suddenly grow.

elkdanger · 10 May 2007 at 07:45

huppy said:
I can also recommend 1uhosting (can't remember if i was the one who recommended them to you elk!)

I've been with them for about 10months and have found them top quality. So far - things may chance if they suddenly grow.

No it wasn't, it was a real-life person who recommended them to me

I'm sure you're a real-life person too, but.. you know what I mean!

Hawkpie · 10 May 2007 at 09:37

huppy said:
I can also recommend 1uhosting (can't remember if i was the one who recommended them to you elk!)

I've been with them for about 10months and have found them top quality. So far - things may chance if they suddenly grow.

Another vote for 1UHosting. Been with them for well over a year and have had no bother at all. Good control panel and support has been excellent.

thedazman67 · 10 May 2007 at 17:35

pinkaardvark said:
Looks good but a bit concerned about the "unlimited" dimension. what's the performance like? and can I ask what your hosting with them.

Not had a problem with performance i am on the Standard.NET package, initially i had some trouble processing payment the online instant help was really useful. Also at the time they had a 2 hosting packages for the price of one offer on which they didnt advertise.

thedazman