It’s been a year since I have gone shopping for a new website host. I found a lot of new ones and some good tools that helped in the search. I also got a chance to preview some of the different tools used by different hosts and wanted to share my experiences.

These are the three most popular tools used by hosting companies to manage their users and servers. Although they are not all the same, they do offer much of the same services. They are also what you, the user, can use to administer your site and it’s services. In addition, these apps are used to setup user accounts on the server itself and each has there own styles and security measures. Here’s a quick rundown…

Cpanel
Cpanel is by far my favorite and IMHO, has the most features and is the best looking of the three. I believe it is also the most expensive for hosts to purchase. This was the system my last hosting company used and I found it very useful. It also gives the user a lot more freedom in the shell than the others. This is the main reason I have to have a host that offers it. Basicly, if you like to ssh into your server and have the usual Unix apps at your disposal, this is the control panel for you (and for me!). It offers the user full access to the server (minus some obvious security issues) and is the next best thing to having your own server. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, don’t worry, any of these control panels would most likely be fine for you. That said, I still think Cpanel offers the most services and is easiest to use.

Plesk
Plesk is very simple if not kinda ugly. It’s not as easy to navigate as the others but has more features than Ensim. I didn’t get to login to a shell using Plesk but from the services I would guess it would be almost as good as Cpanel.

Ensim
Ensim was my least favorite control panel I’ve used. It’s really ugly (Windowsy) and very constrictive to the shell user. Although it may have been the particular host I was on and their configuration settings that were to blame, I had no access to anything but my site and almost no unix app access (eg. no: Pico, emacs, whereis, who, MySQL, etc…). All MySQL databases and users required one of the host’s system administrators to set them up which can take FOREVER. Again, if all you need is ftp access and email setup tool, this tool would be fine for you.

I found the information on these sites very helpful in choosing a host…

• HostingCatalog.com
  This is a great site with a nice selection of hosts including their Best of the Best section.
• HostSearch.com
  They list a ton of sites and great review system. It also allow you to do Hexillion.com
  This site has some great networking tools that allow you to investigate a host and see who and where they really are. Using these tools, you can find out if the host is just a reseller for a larger company, if they reside in your country and even how long they’ve owned their domain name! You should not sign up with a host before checking them out a bit.

In the end, I chose to go with WiseHosting.net because they were one of the best ranked hosts, run Linux, offer Cpanel and had great prices. I also took a long look at: LoBallHosting.com and Eryxma.com. There are a ton of choices out there and with a little time, you should be able to find one that suits your needs. Good luck.