Why I Left MediaTemple and Switched to Synthesis
For those who follow me on Twitter, you probably know I’ve been a big MediaTemple supporter. I’ve been hosting my sites with them for many years, and absolutely love their support, but it’s time to move on, and here’s why.
From MediaTemple to Synthesis
Like many websites these days, I use WordPress to handle my content. It’s reliable, very customizable, and fairly easy to use. However, unless you have a very tuned and optimized server, your WordPress site can turn into a nightmare.
So, Optimize Your Server!
Trust me, if I had the know-how to fully optimize a server, I would have done so a long time ago. The fact is, I have very little background when it comes to MySQL and Apache optimizations, and as I’ve learned from the little optimizations that I’ve done, it’s an on-going process. As your site gets more (or less) traffic, further optimizations are needed.
MediaTemple Won’t Help?
Unfortunately, not really. While they provide some very detailed articles in their knowledge base, when it comes to their (dv) servers, optimization is up to the user. Now in their defense, it clearly states this on their website, so it wasn’t a surprise. But as I mentioned above, with my little optimization knowledge, even their detailed articles were pretty useless to me. With my little experience, I either need to hire a server manager, or switch to a host that will work with their users in regards to optimizations. Queue Synthesis.
Why is Synthesis So Much Better?
In short, Synthesis focuses on hosting WordPress based sites. They completely understand the importance of strong optimization, which is why their servers are 100% optimized for WordPress sites. No extra garbage, and it’s run with top notch technology, including NGINX, APC, and PHP-FPM.
On top of their servers being perfectly optimized, they also offer a migration service for those who either don’t want to deal with the hassle of migrating their whole site to a new host, or simply for those who don’t know how. But they don’t just move your files over.
- WordPress Migration
- DNS Migration
- File Cleanup
- Plugin Control
- Security Enhancements
From my experience, Synthesis’ migration service is worth the extra money. Their team works directly with you to make sure everything is set up perfectly, and there was absolutely no downtime. I would not have been able to pull that off myself.
Pricing
The pricing that Synthesis offers can be closely compared to MediaTemple’s (dv) line, but when you factor in the optimizations and the dedicated support, you’re benefitting much more from Synthesis. In fact, because of their strong optimizations, I was able to safely purchase smaller server than the one I was using at MediaTemple, so I end up saving money!
Thank You, MediaTemple.
While I will no longer be hosting my main website through MediaTemple, I have nothing but good things to say about their support team. Sara, Matt, and the rest of the social media team are beyond fantastic at what they do, and the few phone calls I’ve made to their support team have also been great! I really do wish I could have stayed on board, but my business is too valuable to run on a non-optimized server.
