A good look at “Storm on Demand” Cloud web hosting services
Are you interested in cloud hosting technology for your website? Cloud technology certainly presents significant advantages compared to conventional web hosting (instant provisioning, resource scaling, and better security) and Liquid Web’s “Storm on Demand” is certainly one the best and most popular players out there when it comes to cloud server technology.
If you’ve been in the market for quite some time, you’ve probably heard a few things about it yourself – but is it really the right web hosting solution for you?
Now Storm on Demand is actually a marketing arm of a web hosting company called Liquid Web and one that specialises and exclusively offers a range of Linux or Windows based cloud hosting solutions that webmasters can choose from which includes:
- The Storm Server hosting plan which starts with web server base specifications of a single CPU, 75 GB of storage and 0.9 GB of RAM. As a cloud hosting service, webmasters can instantly scale it to as much as 64 CPUs, 250 GB of RAM and more than 1 TB of disk space.
- The Storm SSD cloud hosting plan which is very much similar to the server plan except with the added benefit of an SSD hard drive for even better website performance
- The Bare Metal Server plan which is basically a “hybrid” web hosting plan combining the power of a dedicated server with the flexibility and security that cloud hosting technology offers. Users can choose from more than 80 different specifications to best match their web hosting needs.
Is Storm on Demand the right cloud hosting solution for you?
Network Uptime
An important quality of any web hosting service is network uptime and overall reliability – with Storm on Demand; it’s something that webmasters would never have to worry about. Storm on Demand’s service level agreement guarantees perfect network uptime with the exception of scheduled server maintenance work and upgrades.
A 100 percent network uptime is certainly a good thing and rightfully so considering its relatively high cost not to mention the fact the perfect uptimes are the expected norm in cloud hosting. It is however important to note that the said guarantee does not cover downtimes due to Cpanel issues or external security issues like DoS ( Denial of Service) attacks.
If said guarantee is not met then webmasters can claim free hosting time worth 10 times as much as the duration of the down time. So for every minute of downtime webmasters can get an hour back of cloud hosting.
Support levels
Storm on Demand offers 3 types of support across all their cloud hosting plans – Self-managed with basic level support, Core Management with software and security support and the Fully Managed support plan with complete Cpanel support (you won’t even have to touch it).
All these support levels also come with around the clock phone, chat and email support. Of course support is also present via social media channels like Facebook, Google+ and Twitter although it isn’t that active. I imagine it’s because they found that most of their clients are more inclined to seek out help from direct channels.
Who is it for?
Now if you’re reading this then you are probably well aware of the advantages of cloud hosting. Storm on Demand certainly represents one of your best choices in cloud hosting technology and unlike conventional web servers, offers hosting solutions that are fast and highly adaptable to one’s day to day needs.
Against
As good a cloud hosting solution Storm on Demand is, it’s certainly not without its drawbacks and perhaps the most significant of which is cost. Granted that as the cloud hosting arm of a large, proven and well established company (Liquid Web), Storm on Demand is certainly in a position to charge higher than most of its counterpart but such costs can be prohibitive for many webmasters. Storm Server base prices start at $35 per month to as much as $750 per month.
Another disadvantage with Storm on Demand is the lack of a free trial or a money-back guarantee. I suppose it shows how confident they are with the quality of their services but it would have been good to know that there is always a way for unsatisfied customers to get their money back. Thus one might want to avoid getting into a long term contract or simply opt to pay month to month for their cloud hosting services (just in case).
Conclusion
Overall Storm on Demand is an excellent choice in cloud hosting service providers and you won’t see many comments or reviews online that speaks ill about any of their services. It’s basically a department within a bigger web hosting company and offers clients the benefit of a specialized cloud hosting department and the industry-leading hosting mechanism of a large and well established web hosting company. It’s innovative and highly reliable approach to cloud hosting should prove suitable for any webmaster in need of a comprehensive and modern cloud hosting solution.
Are you interested in Storm on Demand? Subscribe through this link and choose one of several great bonuses that we offer at www.thinkbigonline.com/bonuses. Simply send us the receipt of your purchase at bonus@thinkbigonline.com.au.
