Atspace Hosting Introduction

Atspace is a hosting company that was founded in 2003, is based in Germany, and has more than 800,000 websites and over 120,000 domains under their belt.

The company was founded to provide free hosting but has expanded to also offer paid shared hosting plans, VPS plans, and additional services like SSL certificates and domain registrar services. There are a variety of plans to choose from, based on your needs.

Plans and Specializations

This web hosting provider offers several types of hosting plans (free, shared, semi-dedicated, and VPS).

Shared Hosting Plans

Free Hosting: Free hosting plans provide a variety of features with no associated cost. There are some limitations and professional / premium plans will include more features.

On free hosting plans you can only have one domain, and a specified amount of storage space. Atspace lists free hosting plans offering unlimited traffic but there are unspecified limitations so once a site becomes very high-volume, the host may recommend moving to one of the premium plans.

There are low cost hosting plans in this space, as well, from pennies per month that include additional domains, more MySQL databases, and additional features, such as more than 1 email account as well as DNS management.

Shared Hosting Plans: Premium shared hosting plans range from basic plans, pro plans, enterprise hosting, and Atspace’s EasyVPC Plan. Service plans range in price with additional features and benefits on a sliding scale.

Higher-priced plans have unlimited domains and subdomains as well as FTP accounts. Email accounts are unlimited starting at the basic premium plan (only the free plan has a limit of 1 email account). All premium plans offer spam and virus protection and a variety of tools like web analytics, customer care, and $0.00 activation fee.

Semi Dedicated Plans

In addition to shared hosting, Atspace also offers Semi-Dedicated hosting packages for those who want more ease of management without the costs associated with VPS hosting plans. This could be a good idea for a starter site anticipating fast growth.

Plans offered include starter, pro, and advanced plans with varying access and benefits. All options include data backup, unlimited disk space and data transfer, unlimited domains and subdomains.

VPS Hosting Plans

Atspace VPS hosting plans offer a scalable plan on demand with the highest level offering XEN True Virtualization technology. An easy-to-use control panel, 1-click for 50+ scripts, user full SSH access, and pre-configured server libraries are a few of the features.

Atspace also sells domain names and a variety of different SSL certificates and offers reseller hosting plans.

Datacenters

Atspace’s Datacenter is in Germany and is part of the pan-European tier 1 fiber network. With 24/7 monitoring and diesel generators, the company leverages the latest in technology to deliver 50 gbits worldwide.

Atspace leverages Apache on the Linux operating system. The company does not appear to list extensive information about hardware and other network infrastructure information.

Overview of Support and Customer Service

Support is offered but free accounts only get limited access to support. Premium accounts get 24/7 access to support.Live chat is available for pre sales.For support and technical questions, a ticket system is used. Free accounts do not have access to the ticket system but do have access to limited documentation.

Server Monitoring / Backups

Backups are done as a courtesy on premium plans. The same applies to security.

Billing & Payment Policies

Payments are accepted by PayPal (plus major credit cards) and WorldPay. There are money back refund policies but customers should familiarize themselves with these policies as there are limitations.

Hosting Uptime Guarantee

Up to 99.9% guaranteed uptime is guaranteed on free accounts and 99.99% uptime is guaranteed on other plans. Money back guarantees for some higher end accounts need to be made within five days.

Conclusion

Pros of Using AtSpace Hosting:

• Many plans to choose from including low cost and free websites
• Free websites have zero advertising on them
• No activation fees
• Established company
• Support included on all premium plans
• VPS Plans are scalable
• Zacky installer offered with varied scripts depending on your plan
• Some plans offer a free domain
• A variety of discounts and promos are often available as an incentive for new customers

Possible Cons

Site outages and poor response time on support are sometimes reported. While there are many reviews available detailing experience with free hosting, limited reviews online regarding premium services.

Those considering Atspace hosting are encouraged to look closely at the many plan options available to ensure you get the features you are seeking.