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History
Originally established in 1998 as a support service to Lycos Europe, M8 INTERNET commenced trading on Monday 06 January 2003
The company provides basic, cheap, and reliable website hosting
Using only the highest quality servers based in the United Kingdom
Current Facilities
The data centre offers a secure, resilient environment for our web hosting platform
Based in a secure facility the data centre is built to an N+1 specification, so that if any particular service fails - e.g. electricity or air conditioning - another backup service automatically takes over the failed service's job
Power
Dual power feeds enter the building at different points and Uninterruptible Power Supplies (UPS) ensure that all power to the server area is clean and spike freeIn the event of a power outage the UPS can take the entire data centre load for up to five minutes
However within 20 seconds our redundant generators are able to indefinitely take on the entire data centre load
Security
The data centre is manned 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, so that if anything goes wrong engineers can respond quickly and effectively to the problem
Access to the data centre is via a master access list using Smart Card authentication
Access to the data centre is by authorisation only
CCTV operates throughout the facility
Cooling & Fire Suppression
The temperature of the data centre is kept at a steady 20oC to allow optimum equipment performance
Our fire detection system monitors the room for any sign of fire and allows operators to respond to such a situation using a variety of fire suppression techniques
Technology
100% Dell Servers
We use only Dell servers in our website hosting platform
Utilising state-of-the-art technology we have built a web hosting platform that is second to none
Our platform is designed in such a way that if any server fails another server automatically and without delay takes over that server's workload
For example, if one of our mail servers breaks down another server automatically comes online, with all the correct configuration, and takes over the work of the failed server
During this period no email is lost
As well as this, all data is stored in two large network disk arrays
Data is automatically synchronised between the arrays so that in the event of an array failing the remaining array continues to serve data to the servers with no downtime
For further information on products from Dell, please visit their website
Website Hosting Infrastructure
The following diagram represents the website hosting infrastructure
Server Specification
Our current server specification is :
100% Cisco Gigabit Network
The network operates on industry-leading network equipment from Cisco Systems
All our switches and routers are developed by Cisco
Our network is based on gigabit technology, which means that it runs at a speed of 1000 Mb per second - most web hosting networks are limited to 100 Mb per second
Our network also utilises 100% CAT6 network cable, which contains four pairs of copper wire and, unlike CAT5, utilises all four pairs
CAT6 supports Gigabit (1000 Mbps) Ethernet and supports communications at more than twice the speed of CAT5e, which is the other popular standard for Gigabit Ethernet cabling
Software
Redhat Linux Platform
Redhat is the leading provider of Linux open source software
For many years now Redhat Linux has been the number one choice for website hosting companies, not just because of Redhat's amazing scalability but also because of its track record as the most stable operating system available in the market today
Our systems utilise the latest Redhat server technology to allow our servers to be continually up to date with Redhat system & security patches
Unlike many of our competitors we run Redhat Enterprise Linux, the most stable release of Redhat Linux available and the only version that keeps completely up to date with security patches
MySQL 5
MySQL is a true multi-user, multi-threaded SQL (Structured Query Language) database server
SQL is the most popular database language in the world. MySQL is a client/server implementation that consists of a server daemon (mysqld) and many different client programs and libraries
MySQL v5.0.45
Perl, PHP4 & PHP 5, Ruby, Python, Zend, Ghostscript, and ImageMagick
Full support including the most commonly used modules for Perl, PHP and Python
Perl v5.8.5 with Crypt::SSLeay module v0.51
PHP v4.4.8 with Zend Optimiser v3.3.0 and PHP v5.2.5
Python v2.3.4
ImageMagick v6.3.4
Sun ONE ASP (Chili!Soft ASP)
Sun ONE ASP (Chili!Soft ASP) allows you to use the Microsoft ASP programming launguage on Linux
All standard Apache modules are installed on the web servers, including mod_rewrite
These are the correct versions as at 01 April 2008, for the latest versions please see the Control Panel demonstrationConnectivity
Through use of the above facilities, technology, infrastructure, network, and software we provide one of the most stable and reliable website hosting platforms you will find
Performance
Uptime
We aim for 99.9% uptime, however we do need to take the servers offline for maintenance, replacement, or upgrade occasionally
This is always scheduled for overnight, in the UK, and with as little disruption as possible
Details of planned maintenance are at the System Status page
We currently provide two uptime performance indicators
Please note that these are external indicators and we do not guarantee their reliability or accuracy
For details of our uptime performance from 29 September 2006 :
For details of our uptime performance from 19 December 2007 :
