[moodymonster]

Looking about for web hosting you can't help but notice that cost are so much less in the US to the point where they are incomparable with those in the UK.

So I was just wondering whether there are any disadvantages of being UK based but having your site hosted in the US.

If anyone can throw any light or experience it would be greatly appreciated thx.

[frates]

A far distance makes risks probability higher, because there are more hops to get to the server where you're hosted. (usually around 15 jumps from europe to us, try a traceroute to the webhost you're considering). It also makes ping a higher value, which means a bigger latency if you plan to use some sort of ssh login, nothing scary, but still a bit slower than something right next to you (by that I mean not a ocean ); the same applies for bandwidth, could be a problem if your site propose big downloads.

One other problem could be the timezone, in case of an eventual maintenance downtime, it'll likely be in the middle of the night for your host, but in the morning or middle of the day for you. And in case something goes wrong, you just can't take your car and go ring at the door to talk face to face.

From a legal point of view, check the webhost complies to the safe harbor policy :
http://www.export.gov/safeharbor/

[moodymonster]

thx for the reply.

Didn't consider the legal side of it, so thanks for your insight there.

I'm thinking of using dreamhost, I've asked them about safe habour, and I'll have a nose about with regard to pings etc.

thx again

[inkhead]

Who's your target audience? If your target audience is US customers then host in the US, it will generally be faster..

If they are UK customers host in the UK.

Host where-ever the largest block of your customers are.

[moodymonster]

I haven't noticed any difference in speeds of sites based in the US to the UK, the site content will typically be <60k per page, inc images.

The price differences are substantial:
US:~$10
UK: ~$44
(per month)

And even then bandwidth allowance in the UK is way less, typically 30GB/pm vs >100GB. As well as disk space and so forth. I have no desire to pay more than I have to for a service which in addition to being more expensive is inferior.

People looking at the site would be from all over.

[moodymonster]

Upon further googling I have found some UK web hosts offering parity with US hosts. Which is better - I'd rather be hosted in the UK, 'cause I'm over here.

thx for the replies

[Love Calm Quiet]

And then there's VistaPages, which someone in forums recommended & I've been test-driving: billing is based in CA; not SURE they're equip is there. They've got dirt cheap beginning offers (incl. PHP & MySQL, etc.) & very reasonable rates to expand from there .

Using WatchMouse.com to see latency from diff parts of the world doesn't make it seem that there's necessarily a lot of difference. Check that out

[moodymonster]

thx for the watchmouse link - v cool.

I think I'm going to give servage.net a go.

[Love Calm Quiet]

they've also got a watchmouse widget that's most cool: willl show (free) hourly performance on any web site over 72 hour period!