OK on this side of the pond.
I have to say that I have never had a speed problem and also do not now get timeout failures on pictures which has been my experience sometimes elsewhere.
1and1 have hosted my commercial site for 5 years+ without any problems. The truth is that we have yet to stretch the capacity of the server and will not begin to until we have a lot more members active at any on time. The decision to use shared facilities is in my book a decision based on a desire to operate at relatively low cost with relatively high uptime. Keeping the cost low mitigates against having to agonise over fundraising and so on. Only time will tell whether the speed cost, if any, is too high. If it is we can look for alternatives.
(ps - I have also never yet waited thirty seconds only to be served a blank page, which can get real frustrating)