Shifted to Doreo Web Hosting, Fused Network Sucks
Finally I shifted AbhinavSonkar.com to her third web host. Actually, it should have been second but a bad experience with web hosting company called Fused Network forced me to look for a third one. Read on for details.
Why I changed my Web Host?
Since the birth of this blog, I had been hosting on FutureQuest. I think it is an excellent web hosting company and would recommend FutureQuest to anyone who is looking for hosting a new website. Though a bit pricey, the best thing about this host is it provides you a dedicated IP address so you are not on a shared server. Yes, starting at $9.95, you get a dedicated IP address for the lifetime of your blog at no extra cost!
Then why did I leave them? Firstly, they have a very high cost to features ratio. They told me it was necessary to maintain high reliability and no doubt, they were very reliable. Only a single downtime in the eight months that I was with them. But the bandwidth limit of 5GB became a hindrance to the blog’s growth and penalties were being levied. In the last month, the projected bandwidth usage was to such a level that I would have had to pay more than monthly hosting charges as over-bandwidth fee! The other plans offered by them were too costly for me.
Secondly, some features were missing in their package. They didn’t provide subdomains with any of their package. No raw logs analyzer. Their control panel reminded me of my dad’s MS-DOS based system. Considering all these factors and to avoid the heavy over-bandwidth fee, I decided to look for a new web host. I signed up with Fused Network.
Why Fused Network Web Hosting sucks
I only stayed with Fused Network for a week. It turned out to be a bad choice but I guess, you got to have such experiences too!
The signing up was normal though the email carrying account setup details took a long time to come. The email was very short and the inadequacy of all the details made me realize how exhaustive FutureQuest was with its account details. Let me give an example. The email said that SFTP was available for use but when I tried to login, it failed. I created a ticket to address the issue. I had all my interactions with a guy called David McKendrick. He told me he had to request SSH access beforehand to use SFTP. If that was the case, then they should have mentioned it previously in the email itself.
The features provided by Fused Network were fine and the server worked fine for the few days that I was with them though it is too short a time to pass any judgement. But I rate Support very highly in my book and that is where they suffered. What stoked the fire was another query that I put forward to them regarding redirecting a subdomain which involved wordpress software. Mr. David used a very interesting phrase, “…asking that question to us is like asking your landlord to do your laundry for you…”. Wow! An interesting thing to say to your new customer! From there, one thing let to another and they fired me by giving 24 hours before the account would cease to exist. How convenient of them as a web hosting company, knowing that a website requires more than that time to settle with a new hosting company.
They returned me my money immediately and I quickly signed up with another hosting company which I had considered while shifting originally. And I am glad I did. Searching for a good web host takes time and in such crisis you have to have some idea beforehand to avoid downtime. I signed up with Doreo Web Hosting and had all my queries solved the way I expected.
Few Tips for changing web hosts from my twin experience!
I would like to include a small guide to changing web hosts so that you do not have to face any downtime during the process. Its not very difficult if you know what exactly needs to be done. I will try to highlight it as lucidly as possible.
Firstly, you need to find a good web host. Now there are way too many resources and web hosting companies. To have some basic idea, I would suggest you to read this article: How to Choose a Web Host. You will get to know all the features that needs to be considered while making a decision. Searching for a good web host can be a pain. I used this reference list to look for established web hosts. It made my job much easier. Hopefully it will help you in coming to a decision quickly as well.
- Make sure you have all the backup of your website files on your local hard disk. You should have a backup irrespective of whether you want to change web hosts or not.
- Sign up with your new web hosts and wait for your account to be setup. Upload all your files via FTP or any other way you prefer.
- Ensure that your website is looking perfect with the new web host. Only when you are completely satisfied should you change your nameservers.
- The effect of changing nameservers take some time to propagate through the internet. You might be able to see your new website with your domain name but a visitor from some other country (different DNS) might still be seeing the old website (the website on the old host). So don’t rush to delete the old website yet. No need to inform your previous web host about your plans at this point.
- After about a week you can be sure that everyone is seeing your website on the new host. Now’s the time to cancel your account with the previous web host. If you can time your web hosts changing schedule, you can avoid paying both the web host. Though you will have to pay twice for the common month.
- This way you can ensure minimal downtime for your website.
- If you use wordpress blogging software and use WP-stats plugin as well, then remember to reinstall the plugin for tracking to continue.
- Lastly, make sure you have chosen 2-3 web hosts so that if an unexpected occurrence occurs, you are ready for it!
I think that should help you a little bit if you ever decide to change your web host. For a detailed explanation, you can read this: Changing Web Hosts – Tips on Moving Your Website.
” Though a bit pricey, the best thing about this host is it provides you a dedicated IP address so you are not on a shared server. Yes, starting at $9.95, you get a dedicated IP address for the lifetime of your blog at no extra cost! ”
Having a dedicated IP doesn’t necessarily mean you are not on a shared server. A single server hosting multiple sites can have many IPs pointing to it.
Anyway, I found your blog by reverse IPing 66.185.16.37. I have some of my sites hosted here and I wanted to check out what other sites are hosted on the Whitestar server. I recently shifted to Doreo Hosting and the experience has been great so far.
indeed, Fused Network and Dave sucks. Unprofessional company. Bait and switch. AVOID AT ALL COSTS! here’s another Fuse network review http://www.hollywood-newsroom.com/tech/fused-network-review-sucks-avoid-for-wordpressmu-buddypress/
Good morning Abhinav!
I’ve held off for awhile in responding to this post — it’s rare that I do so on third party sites but I did want to clear up any confusion. I’d first like to mention that I am completely satisfied hearing that you’re content with another provider — there’s a great host out there for everyone and the more decent providers, the better.
As for your experience with Fused, I can say that we still don’t offer any sort of software customization & installation. Although we often install software on behalf of users — we can’t go through and modify / tweak your mod_rewrite entries as you had requested — that’s something that (and as I stated before) is on par with asking your landlord to do your laundry or dishes, it truly is. Although we allocate the space and resources to you, you’re paying for the space, infrastructure and our time ensuring that the systems are online and flawless.
We’re not paid for software development and don’t offer it as a service. I’ll wholeheartedly agree with you on our welcome emails being lacking — they tend to state the obvious (e.g. ftp access, control panel information) and the rest can be found in our knowledgebases. Even those are in dire need of more thoroughness but all improves in time.
At any rate, again, I’m very glad to hear you found a host you’re satisfied with and I hope they continue to do you justice. 🙂
I’ve also had a very un-professional experience with David from Fused Network. They run it like a 1 man company. And get this, I found out they run both Fused Networks and Hostjury. Look at the posts on Hostsjury’s blog, that’s the same David.
Bunch of scammy, shady reviews too putting them at #1.
I love that comment, real professional David
“asking that question to us is like asking your landlord to do your laundry for you”
What “great” manners from our Canadian neighbors to the North.
Its not often I comment on things, but I thought I would share my experience with fused network.
I have never had any problems at all, all my answers are always answered well, and very quickly, even with the time difference here in New Zealand, its a shame you had a bad experience with them, and I have had the total opposite, and quite happily recommend them to everyone.
Sounds like another fake review like all those fake reviews David puts up for fusednetwork.com on his hostjury.com site. Just look at all those reviews, they look great, heck even I got taken in by it. Then I found out David McKendrick also owns the same review site and it made sense how such a rude little man could get so many good reviews.
What a joke of a one-man company.
I highly DON’T recommend fused network, what respectable company owns a review site that puts their own company as the best?
We don’t place ourselves at the top of the review list, we’ve simply arrived there as a result of positive reviews.
At certain points in the sites’ history (Hostjury, that is) we’ve been as far low as 5th as a result of other providers inching above. I had no problem either way even if we’re rated lower but most clients seem to think we do a great job — there’s the odd one that disagrees but that is the nature of any service.
As for Hostjury, it was launched prior to our purchase of Fused Network as I believe I iterated above. If we could separate the two further, I would. I’d love to rid of hostjury and spend more time catering directly to my clients at Fused Network.
At first, I was worried about this post before signing up with Fused, but I’ve been with Fused for a month or two now. I had a horrible experience with Eleven2 when they lost my wife’s website due to corruption (they claim that they backup sites). When I spoke to David on the phone, he was very patient and answered ALL my questions.
I was with them for two years and unfortunately, I have recommended many of my friends to go with Eleven2. I’m urging them to move off Eleven2 when I can.
Granted, hosting is a hit or miss, but my experience has been totally opposite of yours. David his support site have been very helpful in transferring my sites from Eleven2 and Fused answered my support tickets within a few minutes. On the other hand, Eleven2 would wait a day or two before responding.
I am not affiliated with any hosting company, but my sites are happily running on the Fused Network. Their FTP doesn’t drop like Eleven2 and the Fused Network connection is fast.
“Though a bit pricey, the best thing about this host is it provides you a dedicated IP address so you are not on a shared server.”
Well, be advised that having a dedicated IP address does not mean that you are not hosted on a shared server. Actually, for the price mentioned above there is no other option but a shared hosting server … or maybe a very crappy VPS :).
Still, good post, good luck with your hosting.
Thanks for clearing that up. I was under the impression that a dedicated IP address meant a dedicated server as well. Completely forgot about virtual servers. Though having a dedicated IP is better than none at all!
I just want to say that David’s response up there is solid. It is hard to read / hear criticism – especially when you probably don’t agree with it – and maintain such a professional tone. I know nothing about this situation, but read this thread over and thought it was worth commenting on.