Free hosting:
If you're on the internet, in all probability you already have
access to free web space. Many ISP's (internet service
provider) provide their users with free web space on their servers.
Some may call it your FTP space, FTP stands for File Transfer
Protocol. FTP is merely a program that transfers files or
folders to your web space. Contact your ISP, they will give you your
FTP username and password. In many cases you will have to use an FTP
program to upload your files, don't panic there are many free FTP
programs and once you get the hang of using an FTP client you will
never go back to uploading files one by one.Many free hosts will
not let you host your ebay auction picture on their servers, so READ
there terms of service before uploading and linking your pictures.
I don't endorse any of the free hosts, I'm a firm believer that you
get what you pay for.
Paid Hosting:
This is where I differ from most people. I don't use
picture hosting services, I use full featured web hosts. Why
you might ask, picture hosts do nothing more than serve pictures to
auction sites such as ebay. As a picture server the load on
their servers can be extreme, to the point of not serving your
picture at times.
Web site hosts are generally serving small websites to internet
viewers, much less demand on the server.
How do I select a paid host:
This can be a daunting task, there are thousands of hosts out
there, all very eager to tell you anything in order to sign you up.
There is no such thing as an honest review of hosts. The
reviews you read are merely an endorsement for one of their paying
advertisers. So how do I know who to chose?
This is my process for choosing a good host.
1) If they offer unlimited anything, run as fast as you can,
nothing is unlimited.
2) Do they have a discussion forum, this will give you a good sense
of customer satisfaction. Are there technical people
representing the host answering posts, there should be.
Hangout at their board for a few days to see what is going on.
Go back in the board postings and check how they handle problems.
For me, no forum, no host.
3) Do they have support, live help is offered by many hosts but
generally a ticket system is used. If you have a problem you
initiate a trouble ticket explaining your problem, they should get
back to you within 12 hours max. Email some questions to the
host see how long it takes them to get back to you.
3) Cost, many people base their choice on cost, in my opinion
that is the worst way to chose a host. If your $2 a month
bargain can't serve your auction pictures 50% of the time what kind
of bargain is that. Costs for a good host should range from
about $5-$10 a month. The host that this web site is on costs $5.25
a month (600 meg. of space, 12 gig of transfer).
4) Proof of performance. A good host will prove their
server performance, not make silly boosts like "99% up time
guaranteed". Make them prove it. Most hosts monitor
their servers, they know exactly what their up time is.
Weather or not they make it public is another story. To see the
actual up time for the server that this web site is on
Click here.
As you can see the up time is usually at 99.6% or better.
Well, that's how I choose my hosts. Currently I have 3
hosts, the above method is how I made my choices, it is time
consuming but well worth the effort.
But you didn't recommend a host, I know :-)
That's your choice to make.
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