Paying more than I have to is something I really hate. If I can save some money and get the same service of course I will do that. But the problem is that the money you save is often not worth the extra downtime and problems that you might encounter. So now when I search for a web hosting plan I like to research what people say about them before just shopping for a price. What's more, I learned the hard way that you have to read the feature set very precisely otherwise you can be in for a nasty surprise when you find you can't do what you wanted to do.

IX Web Hosting has a bit of a mixed reputation online and I wasn't sure if I'd go for it but after looking at their feature set I decided I might as well give it a go. The main selling point for me was the unlimited domains, data transfer and web space offered even with the most basic plan. However, this offer must always be balanced against the risk of overselling, and with IX Web Hosting I found that this was an issue. My site was sometimes slow to respond and I did worry that I might have missed out on some visits due to that.

In terms of reliability there was a similar concern, in that my site suffered a few bits of downtime, sometimes lasting more than 5 or 6 hours and frankly this really grated on me and I doubt whether in the future I'd come back. The story was the same even after a number of upgrades I was told about by IX Web Hosting and it made me think that upgrade just meant - broken in another way.

With such problems it might come as no surprise that their support staff are courteous and efficient at all times - I expect they get a lot of traffic! That said, I did get the feeling that they always responded quickly and tried to help me and often did.

All of this came at a fantastically low price and so I did sort of expect some of the problems I encountered but I didn't expect perhaps this low level of service. I'd advise people to steer clear of IX Web Hosting in the future until they clean up their act. Yes they might be cheap, but you have to remember that you get what you pay for.

There are hundreds of Web Hosts out there. Find out everything you need to know about how to choose the RIGHT web host for your needs, and see the reviews of this weeks top picks at Five Star Web Host Reviews and at Top Ten Reviews for Webhosting

At times exceeding your monthly bandwidth would mean higher monthly hosting bills and that could have long-term implications on your hosting budget. Some hosting companies may charge an additional fee for exceeding the monthly bandwidth allowance also referred to as "bandwidth overage". For the novice Webmaster it is important to understand what exactly is bandwidth usage, how much bandwidth is required by his/her website and most importantly how can he reduce his website hosting bandwidth.

Bandwidth refers to the total amount of information that has been served to your web site visitors each month. So every time, the visitor requests information or downloads files from your website, your bandwidth would go up by a specific amount. The size of the file is directly proportional to the bandwidth usage. Also, more the traffic your website receives, more would be the bandwidth consumption. Bandwidth or the data transfer rate is the speed with which data can be transmitted from one device to another. Data rates are often measured in megabits (million bits) or megabytes (million bytes) per second.

It is important to determine the amount of bandwidth that your website would require in order to balance your hosting budget. You can determine your bandwidth requirement by estimating the file size for each web page and then multiplying that figure by the number of pages on your website. Let us explain this with an example. If a web page comprises of two 15Kb images and 3Kb of html, then the web page would have a total data of 33kb. Now multiply this by the number of page views you expect to have per month (e.g. 100,000 per month). This would mean that 3.3Gb of data needs to be transferred per month for that page.

Now by calculating the final figure for each page you would get a rough estimate of the amount of bandwidth required for your website.

If the user requires a reduction in the monthly bandwidth consumption, then a few points and tips can help him achieve this.

The user can reduce the size of the files on their website like the images and graphics. So for a large image size of (e.g. 200KB), by reducing the file size to 20KB the web owner can dramatically minimize their bandwidth usage as well as speed up their website performance.

Websites that feature MP3 downloads, movies, music, large images or other multimedia enabled features, then the website bandwidth requirement would increase substantially.

On the other hand, a simple text based website or a website featuring html pages or small images would require a lower bandwidth.

It is vital to determine beforehand the amount of bandwidth that your website would in order to avoid loss in revenue or traffic. Once you have a specific figure, you will be ready to receive more traffic and subsequent sales. You can also avoid paying a higher bandwidth fee for additional bandwidth usage.

HostingCoupons.org lists web hosting coupons, deals, discounts, savings and exclusive promotions from the top web hosts. You will find the best of web hosting companies listed there including the most recommended web hosts and domain registrars - godaddy, bluehost and hostgator. It covers blog discussions and topics like web hosting discussions and hosting reviews

Web hosting service is a type of Internet hosting service that allows individuals and organizations to provide their own website accessible through the World Wide Web. The requirements of the application are used to decide which type of hosting is to be employed. The factors which are considered include database server software, scripting software, and operating systems. The use of Linux-based web hosting offers a wide range of different softwares. A typical configuration for a Linux server is the LAMP platform: Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP/Perl/Python.

The webhosting clients can also have other services, such as an email for their business domain, databases or multi-media services. There is also the option available to choose Windows as a hosting platform. The clients can choose from PHP, Perl, and Python and may also use ASP .net or Classic ASP. The web hosting services include personal control panel for easy administration and dedicated IP address. It extends support to PHP, MySQL, SSH Access and CGI-Bin. There is POP, SMTP, IMAP and Webmail Email service availability. Anonymous FTP connections are provided for the web hosting. There are Front Page Extensions as well as Protected Directories to create as many password protected areas as required without the need for any programming.

Windows Hosting provides complete reliability, scalability and back-end support required for today's demanding web sites. Windows hosting supports all the popular windows-specific web development technologies, empowering an individual to create a website or web application in the language of ones preference. In windows hosting using the control panel one can make up to hundred DSNs (Database Source Names) for connecting to Microsoft Access, Excel, SQL Server or MySQL. There can be deployed unlimited number of Microsoft Access Databases within a windows hosting. The support is offered for all the .net technologies. The data can be uploaded and files can be transferred to and from the server using FTP Based Clients, Drumbeat and Macromedia DreamWeaver.

Great web hosting solutions these days enhance the website performance and business value. Windows Hosting and Web Hosting.

Tanuja Shah is aTechnical Content writer with more than two years of experience in writing. At present she is working for Icreon Communications supporting the Search Engine Optimisation department.