Domain Question...

[Anim8or666]

I hate my current host. Their downtime has pissed me off to the point where I don't care whether my contract is up or not, so I bought a new hosting plan from Media Temple. The question is, how would I go about transferring my current domain onto the new host/server?

I'm sure citricsquid or any of his dozen alts can answer this...

[Jessii]

If your new host has registrar capabilities, then you should be able to transfer it through the domain's control panel. You'll also need to be in there to switch the nameservers over anyway. So if your host is a registrar, look at the FAQ on how to transfer it. I don't remember how I transferred from my old host (which really sucked) to dreamhost to act as a registrar. It actually worked out well because it seems that everytime I renew my contract, when my domain is up, I get a year of domain for free. I don't remember the last time I actually paid for my domain lol.

[Afro-Ninja]

if your your host has control of it you'll have to contact them about releasing it and transferring it to you

I'd suggest keeping your domains through a third party like godaddy so that this is never an issue in the future

[Andy-Smithy]

Just out of curiosity, which host were you with?

[Anim8or666]

At 7/1/08 08:10 PM, Andy-Smithy wrote: Just out of curiosity, which host were you with?

Fastnext.com. Terribly cheap prices for what seemed to be a lot- 3tb of "supposed" bandwidth. This was before I learned of better hosts like Dreamhost and Media Temple. Media Temple is expensive; at $200 a year compared to $80 for Fastnext. However, Fastnext is down every other day, which really does not look good, especially since I host my portfolio on it. Not to mention Media Temple has free 24/7/365 support.

[Andy-Smithy]

I came across those two hosts quite a lot (Dreamhost & Media Temple) quite a lot, and they seemed pretty good.

I'm about to sign up again and renew my contract with 'supanames' which I've been with before, and are excellent. But yeah, don't want this to be a hosting showcase ;)

If you contact the hosting admins of media temple, they may direct you to a link which can transfer your domain and server information over to your package. Most hosting companies these days have that facility and option.

Good luck with your new host

Andy

[Anim8or666]

By the way, I have an urgent question! My server seems to be up again, but when I go to my site, it shows a "great success, Apache is installed" page. Does that mean all my data is gone? Also, how would I go about backing up and restoring a Wordpress database?

[notsquid]

At 7/1/08 11:05 PM, Anim8or666 wrote: By the way, I have an urgent question! My server seems to be up again, but when I go to my site, it shows a "great success, Apache is installed" page. Does that mean all my data is gone? Also, how would I go about backing up and restoring a Wordpress database?

You should have backed up from your old host, have you? If not, you've lost everything, if you still have access to the cPanel @ your old host do a mySQL Database backup through phpmyadmin and use cPanel to backup all your files.

[Anim8or666]

Yeah, I got it all backed up. *sigh of relief* Now I just have to get my old host to let go of my domain name... And since my contract with the bad host ends in December, I might as well use it as a proxy so it doesn't go to waste...

[notsquid]

At 7/2/08 11:01 AM, Anim8or666 wrote: Yeah, I got it all backed up. *sigh of relief* Now I just have to get my old host to let go of my domain name... And since my contract with the bad host ends in December, I might as well use it as a proxy so it doesn't go to waste...

They won't release it.

[Anim8or666]

At 7/2/08 11:02 AM, notsquid wrote: They won't release it.

Does that mean I have to get a new domain and wait until my contract expires to get my old domain back?

[notsquid]

At 7/2/08 11:12 AM, Anim8or666 wrote:

At 7/2/08 11:02 AM, notsquid wrote: They won't release it.

Does that mean I have to get a new domain and wait until my contract expires to get my old domain back?

I'm not sure, I need more information first.
When you signed up for your hosting, was the domain "free" with the hosting, or did you pay for it separately?

[BoneIdol]

If they won't release the domain, they should have a function on their control panel to edit the domain's A records. You can use these to set your domain to point to your new host without having to have the site offline for a day or 2, like you would if you changed the nameserver of the domain.

[Anim8or666]

Thanks for the tip, BoneIdol. I'll try that for now. Now to answer squid's question- No I did not get it "free," I had to pay for it, and it was part of the bill.

[notsquid]

At 7/2/08 11:27 AM, Anim8or666 wrote: Thanks for the tip, BoneIdol. I'll try that for now. Now to answer squid's question- No I did not get it "free," I had to pay for it, and it was part of the bill.

That's great news.
That means you have a legal right to it and they cannot refuse the domain ownership transfer.
Send your current host an email asking the following; Location of the domain currently. Once they reply, they'll most likely say "Oh it's registered at <so and so>" Then go to the registrar they mention, sign up for an account (They're free at any good registrar) and then reply back and give them your username and userid and email address at the registrar.

Once this is all done they should "Push" the domain to you, which is totally free and is instant. once this is done you're in complete control of your domain.

In the future though; Never buy hosting and a domain from the same company, keep them separate.

[Anim8or666]

Thanks man, I'll do that. One more question though: what's a good place to buy domains from?

[citricsquid]

At 7/2/08 11:45 AM, Anim8or666 wrote: Thanks man, I'll do that. One more question though: what's a good place to buy domains from?

Depends on what you want.
http://godaddy.com is excellent, they have reasonable prices and DNS changes are very fast, but support takes a good day or so to reply.

But yeah, if you use godaddy, use coupons from; http://www.retailmenot.com/view/godaddy.
com
They save you a lot of money.

[Masculine]

I use Spry for all my domains making it easy for me to change the nameserver whenever I switch hosts.

It's only $7.95 a year.

[Captcovert]

At 7/2/08 11:47 AM, citricsquid wrote:

At 7/2/08 11:45 AM, Anim8or666 wrote: Thanks man, I'll do that. One more question though: what's a good place to buy domains from?

Depends on what you want.
http://godaddy.com is excellent, they have reasonable prices and DNS changes are very fast, but support takes a good day or so to reply.

But yeah, if you use godaddy, use coupons from; http://www.retailmenot.com/view/godaddy.
com
They save you a lot of money.

Godaddy, as has been mentioned, do not include Nameservers. A free service that does host nameservers for you is http://www.zoneedit.com/ , for those of us hosting services out of our basements. It's free, so long as your site doesn't see a ton of traffic.

[citricsquid]

At 7/3/08 04:22 AM, Captcovert wrote: Godaddy, as has been mentioned, do not include Nameservers. A free service that does host nameservers for you is http://www.zoneedit.com/ , for those of us hosting services out of our basements. It's free, so long as your site doesn't see a ton of traffic.

What? Godaddy does allow nameservers, godaddy is as complete as any registrar, stop giving out false info :)

[Jon-86]

At 7/3/08 04:22 AM, Captcovert wrote: It's free, so long as your site doesn't see a ton of traffic.

And what would be the point of making a site if you didnt want to show it to people?

[BoneIdol]

At 7/3/08 06:41 AM, Jon-86 wrote:

At 7/3/08 04:22 AM, Captcovert wrote: It's free, so long as your site doesn't see a ton of traffic.

And what would be the point of making a site if you didnt want to show it to people?

Slightly pedantic, but it does hint at a problem with this. If your site just dies as soon as it sees traffic it's not going to get very popular. Hosting like this could really hold your site back.

[Taylor]

Media Temple sucks.

[Anim8or666]

At 7/3/08 06:17 PM, Taylor wrote: Media Temple sucks.

On what grounds do you say this? Previous experience?

[Taylor]

At 7/4/08 12:11 AM, Anim8or666 wrote:

At 7/3/08 06:17 PM, Taylor wrote: Media Temple sucks.

On what grounds do you say this? Previous experience?

Yes.

[Anim8or666]

At 7/4/08 02:55 AM, Taylor wrote:

At 7/4/08 12:11 AM, Anim8or666 wrote:

At 7/3/08 06:17 PM, Taylor wrote: Media Temple sucks.

On what grounds do you say this? Previous experience?

Yes.

So what did Media Temple do to you? Downtime? Not enough bandwidth?

[citricsquid]

http://uneasysilence.com/archive/2007/01 /9338/

[Anim8or666]

Why does nobody tell me this before I buy 1-year plans?! Uneasy silence probably gets a lot more hits, so I'm not too worried about that with my site. Thanks for all the help.

[citricsquid]

At 7/4/08 04:04 PM, Anim8or666 wrote: Why does nobody tell me this before I buy 1-year plans?! Uneasy silence probably gets a lot more hits, so I'm not too worried about that with my site. Thanks for all the help.

Because we shouldn't have to.
Before going with a host, you should always:
Google it, as stupid as it sounds, GOOGLE IT.
Go into their live chat, give them scenarios, see how they respond, if it leaves you uneasy, Run a mile.
ASK US. In this forum, we must have gone through 1000's of hosts, we know who to recommend.

[wreckages]

blah, i was in the same situation as OP, however I lost my domain :l

i'm buying a new domain soon ( this week ) hopefully, should i go with godaddy? D:!