HostRocket Webhosting Service Provider

HostRocket is a shared and dedicated web hosting service provider, with loads of features, and a decent customer support. The pricing displayed on the site is also amongst the most competitive rates available today. $4.95 a month for the host of features that are provided is not bad at all. However, HostRocket doesn't mention that to get that rate, you will have to sign up for 2 years of hosting service, and plan lower than that will cost you as much as $14.95 a month. This simple misleading advertising gimmick reduces their credibility quite a bit. Secondly, not all the features are made available at the $4.95 a month rate, which makes it even more questionable. Aside from this issue, HostRocket does offer good webhosting service with very good features.

HostRocket has multiple payment plans, and each one comes with additional options. As mentioned before, you get the $4.95 a month price only for the 24 months plan without the dedicated IP that is available with some others. As such, it would be misleading to say that these features are available at a very competitive price.

The different plans are as follows:
Rocket Freedom - 24months - $6.95/month with Dedicated IP
Rocket Freedom - 24 months - $4.95/month
Rocket Freedom - 24 months - $7.95/month
Rocket Freedom - 24 months - $7.95/month with a free domain name
Rocket Freedom - 12 months - $9.95/month
Rocket Freedom - 12 months - $11.95/month with dedicated IP
Rocket Freedom - 6 months - $12.95/month with dedicated IP
Rocket Freedom - 6 months - $10.95/month
Rocket Freedom - 1 month - $12.95/month
Rocket Freedom - 1 month - $14.95/month with dedicated IP

After a close scrutiny it is easy to see that most of the plans are absolutely useless given the fact that similar features can be found for $6 or lower. The plans seem to be designed with the sole purpose of making as much as possible off of each customer. This shows that even though the features and services offered are good, HostRocket is not necessarily a company that is very credible. As if you confirm this suspicion, HotRocket requires an additional $20 for new domain registration. This is about 4 times the average price of a new domain name from most places.

As far as the service itself is concerned, other than storage space, it is at par with industry standards offering unlimited bandwidth, 100GB of storage (standard is about 200GB now), ability to host upto 10 domains on a single account, an impressive pre-installed script gallery, unlimited autoresponders, unlimited email forwarding, unlimited email accounts, and 1GB of Pop3 mail storage space. Unlimited subdomains, domain parking for upto 10 domains and support for 10 MySQL databases is also provided. However, again, it is important to mention that hosting extra domains or subdomains on the same account costs extra. With all the features enabled, you could end up paying as much as $50 per month for webhosting at HostRocket.

By failing to mention all these hidden costs, HostRocket really diminishes its credibility. Similar features can are available at other places for much lower costs, and with better support and greater credibility. As such, it is advised that if you are looking for a shared hosting service provider, you look elsewhere.

HostRocket also provides dedicated servers for webmasters with higher needs. However, as with shared web hosting, the dedicated servers costa bit more than they should. Additionally a $30 a month fee applies for the use of cPanel user interface. You can choose from AMD-based and Intel-based servers. The pricing of the systems seems rather haphazard, with some AMD servers costing more than the Intel ones, and some Intel ones costing more than the AMD ones. For example, the basic AMD processor costs $69.95 a month. The configuration provided by this model is as follows:
1000GB transfer, 512 MB RAM, 80GB hard-disk, 1.8GHz Processing power.
The basic Intel model costs $89.95, with the following configuration:
700GB transfer, 60GB disk storage, 512 MB RAM, and 2.0GHz processing power.
This makes some sense, since the processing power offered is greater, even though the transfer and storage limits are better with AMD processor.

However, at the same time, another model of AMD is priced at $149.95 and offers the following:
1000GB transfer, 80GB disk space, 512 MB RAM, 2.0Ghz processing power.
The comparable Intel model actually costs less, at $139.95, but offers more:
700GB transfer, 80GB disk, space 1024MB RAM, 2.4GHz processor.

This makes almost no sense, especially in light of the fact that the earlier model of AMD costs more than Intel.

Now, this isn't an issue in itself, but is actually another indication of the fact that HostRocket didn't think things through and yet another blemish on their already tarnished reputation.

All in all, HostRocket neither offers competitive prices for their dedicated Servers, nor does it disclose the massive hidden costs with their shared hosting services. As such, it is recommended that you look elsewhere for your webhosting needs.