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Overall Rating: 98.4%
Web Master's Review:
General Impression - Category Rating 99.0%
IX Web Hosting has been in business since 1999 and has recently made a remarkable appearance
with the opening of their new data center in Hopkinsville, KY. With a highly professional
website and very attractive hosting plans, they have managed to be added to the list of companies
that TheHostingChart is reviewing.
As the months passed by, IX Web Hosting continuously improved its performance in both reliability
and customer service, resulting in extremely quick loading websites and high customer satisfaction
and consequently mastered to be rated #1 by our review team.
Price & Cost Effectiveness - Category Rating
97.0%
IX Web Hosting's plans give you an excellent value. Regardless of your needs, their plans
allow you to save money right away - but the savings are even greater if you need to host mutiple
domain names. Their billing cycles run from quarterly, semi-annual to annual and 2-year billing
cycles, the choice is yours on most plans. The longer the billing cycle, the higher the discount
that is provided.
When hosting more than one domain name (multiple domain names or sub domains), you can host them
all on a single plan. You will save a great deal of money since there are no fees at all for
adding, removing, or changing hosted domains and subdomains. You can manage it in real-time via
the control panel.
There was not a single billing issue with any of our anonymous test accounts, we have always been
treated with great respect and fairness. There were no over- or unexpected extra on any of our
hosting accounts. What is more important - when we requested a refund for 2 accounts, we were
granted a full refund without questions asked. 100% money-back - including setup fees. An
impressive approach towards customer satisfaction.
They will help you with CGI scripts, upload problems, even if you don't know how to use FrontPage
- we were assisted kindly via telephone and their Live Chat service. This is an important
aspect for a web master maintaining multiple websites, as for a busy website, there is a constant
need to change your site's content and scripts used.
Where else can you get 20,000mb web space for $3.95/mo, or unlimited unlimited disk space
and multi domain hosting for $12.95/mo, paired with a zero-risk 100% money back
guarantee.
Reliability - Category Rating 97.8%
During our extensive hosting experience with IX Web Hosting, we have had hardly any
server outages. It would be a lie to say none of our 23 anonymous test accounts have never been
down - however, the uptime track record for our test accounts is impressive.
The question is not IF downtime happens, the question is when it happens and how quickly your
hosting company can resolve the problem. Quick problem resolution is a must, so your site will be
back online in no time.
Our overall reliability experience with IX Web Hosting is positive. They claim to provide 99.9%
uptime for all hosted accounts and they have a guarantee on their website proving their track
record. We had 100% uptime for the majority of hosted accounts, however - 2 out of 23 accounts
only had an uptime of 99.2% due to a server glitch. The glitch was resolved quickly (within 90
minutes), however the uptime amount of these two accounts did not reach 99.9% this month. After
inquiring with their billing department, we have been reimbursed for the downtime that occurred
with two free months of hosting service. We found this to be an adequate compensation for 60
minutes of downtime.
Data Center (toured) - Category Rating
99.1%
As the title indicates, we have personally visited and "examined" IX Web Hosting's
data center. The importance of doing that is obvious. You might have heard of the "story" that
80% or more of the web hosts are just resellers, and another 10% are just co-locating in some other
data center, without direct physical access to the machines. Unfortunately, that story is plain
reality.
We have personally verified that IX Web Hosting's data center facility actually exists by paying
them a visit in Hopkinsville, KY. As the 16th data center we visited, it was a rather pleasant
surprise that they actually HAVE the equipment they list on their website, as well as the security
mechanisms, firewalls and CISCO state of the art routers.
IX Web Hosting currently employs two redundant fibre-optic loops to connect their data
center. The fibre-optic connectivity is provided by Bell South and their bandwidth is
redundantly served by Qwest Communications. They are currently busy upgrading their connectivity
for future expansion.
Customer Service - Category Rating 99.0%
In my entire career as professional web master, I have never seen more responsive and
technically sound support staff. I am thoroughly impressed by the technical skills of the IX Web Hosting customer care team.
Regardless of which artificially created problem I have prompted them with, everything was
resolved within 24 hours: PASV FTP issues, CGI scripts with programming errors, PHP coding
issues, ASP ODBC database connectivity, MSSQL Enterprise Manager troubles, domain-lock and
expiration tricks - we were not able to fool them.
The support provided can be rated as above excellent, especially the 24 / 7 LIVE CHAT feature.
We have submitted a total of 450 support requests so far in the past several months, and on 400
requests the response has immediately solved our problem. The other tickets had to be reworked
to send more details to the technician. We called in via Live Chat at 3am and 5am EST several times
and our requests were answered promptly and courteously. Unlike other hosts, IX Web Hosting is
providing It is a true 24 / 7 chat service.
Control Panel - Category Rating 98.5%
The basis of their control panel is H-Sphere, however IX Web Hosting's programmer staff
have modified it heavily. Both LINUX and WINDOWS hosting based accounts are provided and
the control panel functions flawlessly with accounts on both platforms.
The control panel they provide allows you to add, remove and manage your domain names,
subdomains, FTP accounts, email accounts, mailing lists, auto responders, email aliases, MIME
Types, Apache Indexes, PHP / ASP configuration, mySQL, PostgreSQL and MSSQL databases, SQL database
users, cancelling and resuming your subscription and reporting trouble tickets from one
interface.
In addition to the comprehensive functionality listed above, they also offer an online file
manager, an web design program called Site Studio as well as Web Mail. All these features along
with the senseful customizations IX Web Hosting's programming department has applied to the control
panel software have made us rate this category with an astounding 100%.
The usage of the control panel itself is very fast and reliable. The administration of your whole
account is very user-friendly and IX Web Hosting provides an extensive customer guide with detailed
explanations on how to use your hosting account.
Conclusion: One of the best hosting companies we have ever reviewed.
Review Duration: 4 months
Rich Hummington for TheHostingChart.Com, 04/04/2006
Overall Rating: 98.4%
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"Since I am
new to Internet business, recommendations are the first that I rely upon when looking for partners
on the web. So, it was only due to the fact that 