Hi, thanks.
I was shopping around and I had installed a couple of other backup plugins, but I had not activated them.
I had thought the 304k showing on the BackUpWordPress dashboard was indeed for database only, which would mean that it could not accumulate 17GB in just 14 backups.
At the same time that my host threatened to suspend me in 3 days for alleged disk storage abuse, they sent me a cart link to a $35-a-month VPS, and proposed to move my account over to it. I currently pay $6.99 a month for Maximus, which of course is “low”.
This host “caught” me 3 months ago when I signed up for a free account at Xtreemhost. The paid host which owns that was “trolling” inside the Xtreemhost cpanel, with a little chat widget that popped up in my taskbar. That’s how they recruited me into a 1-month free trial of their paid host at $6.99.
I quickly proved to my new paid host a day ago that I could not possibly be taking up 22GB (in all!) of disk space. I gave them print-screens.
Also, I went into cpanel and immediately reduced my new, mostly empty email accounts from the default 250MB to 25MB, saving a total of 4050MB (over 4GB); but the indicator in cpanel still showed 22GB disk usage, even after logging out and logging in again! No change!
So, I told my host there was something wrong with his disk usage meter. He never answered that. I said, SHOW me where I have a total of 22GB stored, even after deleting over 4 GB! Show me the url’s to the folders.
My host popped up in the little chat widget inside my paid cpanel, while I was also logged into my main WP blog in another window, looking at my BackUpWordPress dashboard with 304k written all down the 14 backups.
My host immediately blamed THAT particular blog and specifically BackUpWordPress for 17GB of my 22GB alleged occupancy. I have the chat transcript. He indicated what looked like an encrypted url which he said was a folder in cpanel with 17GB of backups in it by BackUpWordPress of the one site I had open in the other window.
I said, give me 48 hours to look into it, i.e., don’t suspend me and shut off all my new sites! I said, I will look into it, and I will clean out all but the most current backup.
My host immediately responded that in that case, he had already “just” deleted all but the current backup — and sure enough, in my other window, there was now just one 304k backup on my BackUpWordPress dashboard! Which the host had alleged was 17GB of backups, including backups of backups!
Of course, now that it’s “deleted”, I can’t check it. That was quick work, coming after me in a live chat widget.
My host now said that I had 4GB in all of disk usage, which was “acceptable” for Maximus.
But this doesn’t add up. The host had initially alleged a total 22GB of disk usage. I had deleted over 4GB of empty email space. That should have brought it down to 18GB in all.
If 17GB of backup files were then deleted by the host on my one blog, I should have had 0-1GB disk usage in all, but my one site open at that time contains 2.39GB of uploaded legitimate files.
Somebody got lost in their math.
I doubt that there were 17GB of backups of that one site with BackUpWordPress.
It is the largest of my sites and I have been starting to get visitors, a couple every few minutes, and the site isn’t all up yet. None of my sites are all up yet.
I think something is a bit fishy. I think I was being hit on to triple my monthly fee.
How could a cpanel disk usage meter give such a wrong reading? And not change at all when 4GB is deleted? Can these things be tinkered with like used-car mileage?
If there was tinkering, the only site to which an “allegation” of “abuse” could be hitched was the one with the most files, and the most visits; so, perhaps the backup plugin became the only possible scapegoat to cover the attempt to triple my fees?
The same host has just upped the monthly fees as of June, from $6.99 to $9.99. Which is fine, if you have a normal host and no funny business.
But, they are way too “hands-on” to be making a profit at $6.99 or even $9.99 a month, which has bothered me. These people are really “sticky”. They follow you everywhere offering to chat in that widget. Who has that much free time for $7 to $10 a month! I said, you’re like the old Maytag repairman waiting by the phone for something to break!
Which brings up a point. At the time of the threatened suspension, my existing, good uploaded images began “breaking” in my same main site…. in all plugins — stars in star ratings broke; paypal button in two plugins broke, and all my social icons broke; and this followed my own pics in my Media Library mostly suddenly breaking. Was somebody trying to feign disk overload? Because I checked the plugin folders in cpanel, and the pics were all still in there.
As for my own pics in Media Library, the broken ones could not be restored by uploading again, the uploaded image was blank and white, even when the name was changed… the images only uploaded again as visible when I regenerated them with presumably new checksums(?)
So, were these pics “broken” at the level of the database? I don’t know how to read a database. Only when identical looking images and same file names but freshly generated were put in, did they show up again when uploaded to my Media Library. Brand new pics also showed up, those with no prior presence in the database.
I kinda think I need to find a new host with realistic prices, who isn’t fishing me in on a cheap deal with a view to escalating me in a couple of months.
I think this host may have miscalculated in scapegoating your very good backup plugin. I’m a newbie, but I am not completely stupid.
I think your plugin is just fine; and I thank you for your time.
