Hello Guys,
I am faced with a delima. I have been badly hurt with cobaltracks and now need a new server immediatly. My biggest concern is cost at the moment as this is so sudden. I have narrowed down to Interserver.net -vs- Pwebtech.com.

Interserver has unbelievable prices and features
Pwebtech has very good reputation for support.

Please help me decide and all feedback is greatly appreciated.

I assume you are looking for a dedicated server and/or colocation? I have been with interserver in the past (for about two months). I moved from interserver to Site5 (hence, indirectly with pwebtech) since May 1. Nothing wrong with interserver, especially since I do not really need that much support from them (never ask for reboots, etc). My experience with interserver was great. The reason I move was because of two reasons ... VDI was having (lot of) problems at that time and also because I get a cheaper deal with Site5 (at that time).

I currently am also considering about colocating one or two of my servers with interserver. They have changed their price structure and it's great ... Although I am not sure how great VDI is right now (somebody can comment?). NAC.net is also great, though it was better a while ago (their network seems to have bit of problems lately).

guess, if you don't really need that much support and you know how to administer (at least basic) your server, than going with interserver would not hurt you especially with their price! But if you would rely heavily on tech support, then I would suggest you check interserver's boards (http://boards.interserver.net/). Some people has started to complain about their support.

I have no first hand experience with pwebtech, so I won't comment about them.

cheers,
:beer:

I don't need that much support especially with the WebPanel. With my current cobalt raq3 i had to manually do stuff as it has limited features. this is why I messed up once. I won't be doing anything manually with WebPanel/Cpanel

i'm from outside usa so I can only get dedicated server

Does'nt anyone else use interserver.net here? I am hoping to find valuable suggestions here before I finally buy the server in the morning. Also I am open for suggestions on some other companies who have similar support and prices.

And any views on VDI? I have heard scary reviews about them on WHT but interserver.net says that all those problems have finshed now.

Originally posted by arrty
And any views on VDI? I have heard scary reviews about them on WHT but interserver.net says that all those problems have finshed now.

Could very well be the case .... I have this ping plotter program pinging different networks (VDI, NAC, weinbar, Abovenet, HE, affordablecolo) but before I could save it, my windows crash ... I will do it again, and I will update you with the results for you to compare yourself (in this case, VDI vs. NAC) ....

BTW ... what kind of control panel do you expect to you? Interserver will be using WebPanel and Pwebtech will be using Cpanel3. I am not sure whether you need to pay extra monthly for this Cpanel3 with pwebtech; it's free with interserver, I believe. Both WebPanel and Cpanel3 are almost identical currently, but I think Cpanel3 is being developed and updated more rigorously than WebPanel (though the new version of WebPanbel should integrate billing as well, not sure when it would be releashed). At any rate ... if the two control panels might make a difference for you (especially in the future), then it would be easier for you to decide :)

Good luck deciding ...

cheers,
:beer:

I agree with the comment that NAC.NET isn't what it used to be... at least it got a lot of praise 3 months ago when I was looking into sites... but the actual REALITY of it hasn't been that great.

I have two sites doing the same thing... one at pegasus and one at weinbar... the Pegasus one has unexplained packet loss and other network issues much more than the Weinbar site... when under similar loads and on 100% identical servers and configuration (co-located servers I built myself), both built in the same room at same time.

I'm not saying that they are BAD, just average. Weinbar has actually been above average.

I have both my sites monitor each other and I monitor myself from Seattle. My tolerance of monitoring is very low (I monitor every 0.5 seconds using customer software). For most sites, it is more than good enough, but for us... the quality needs to be more consistant.

dektong - you said interserver had some really good prices lately? They published anywhere?

Originally posted by StephenRS
I'm not saying that they are BAD, just average. Weinbar has actually been above average.


Weinbar has been very good, indeed. well, I think not the last 24 hours or so since qwkmon reports my site being down for at least one hour (but then qwkmon only checks every one hour. Used to get 100% uptime with weinbar, it's now down to 99.81%.

my server at nac.net is also being monitored by qwkmon ... it gave me abour 98.8% of uptime (was doing 100% few months ago) ... Both of these servers are monitored since July 1 ...

Anyway ... I have been monitoring vdi for quite a while ... I should probaly start doing it :)

cheers,
:beer:

Originally posted by StephenRS
dektong - you said interserver had some really good prices lately? They published anywhere?

this is yet unconfirmed ... But interserver used to have a fix colocation deal; they now accept custome configuration ... Talk to Mike (and say dektong sends you so that I might get a benefit from them, who knows :D) and he will make a custom quote for you :) I found interserver custom quote very useful, since they will include WebPanel for free... might not mean too much for you since you are doing Windows, not Linux :) BTW, last time I went with interserver, they do not charge me for OS installation nor they charge me for rack setup ... completely free (they install the OS and configure everything for free, at least at that time).

cheers,
:beer:

Originally posted by dektong


Weinbar has been very good, indeed. well, I think not the last 24 hours or so since qwkmon reports my site being down for at least one hour (but then qwkmon only checks every one hour. Used to get 100% uptime with weinbar, it's now down to 99.81%.

cheers,
:beer:

Then there must have been a problem with qwkmon because we have been monitoring your servers as well and they have had 0 downtime.

Your results with qwkmon are only accurate if qwkmon's network is up 100% and all points in between (not 99% or even 99.8%). I doubt if you can with qwkmons reports where the fault lies.

Originally posted by WeinBar Jack
Then there must have been a problem with qwkmon because we have been monitoring your servers as well and they have had 0 downtime.


I should not call it down ... my apology ... but during that time, the network was slower than what it used to, I believe .. The way qwkmon measures network performance is by measuring it's latency time ... when the latency time goes very high, it might decide to call it "network outage", though the network might necessarily went out, indeed ...

Your results with qwkmon are only accurate if qwkmon's network is up 100% and all points in between (not 99% or even 99.8%). I doubt if you can with qwkmons reports where the fault lies.

Undoubtefully agree! But you never complain about this fact when I--using the result from qwkmon--tell people that your network has been up for 100%, have you? ;) ... Anyway, the way I know there was no problem with qwkmon is because I am monitoring two sites at the same time while my friend monitors another 2 sites at the same time also .. if qwkmon went down, then I expect this will be reflected on all of the 4 logs, not just one?

Anyway, I think we should go back to the original post's intention ... i.e. to get a fair comparison between pwebtech and interserver ...

arrty, have you also considered Burst? I know we all have a mix feeling about burst, but .... gee ... I am suprised to see how good their network actually is ... Again, currently I am monitoring --using ping plotter--Nac.net, Vdi.net, Weinbar.com, Affordablecolo.com, Above.net, He.net and I just included Burst.net ... Anybody else want their network being monitored and compared by me? :D Also if any of you is interested to see the result, you can contact me ... I will eventually make it public so that people can decide which network is better (during this period, of course :) )

cheers,
:beer:

Dektong,

Can you include Epik.net on that for me?

Keep us informed of the results.

Thanks

Originally posted by StephenRS
dektong - you said interserver had some really good prices lately? They published anywhere?

http://www.interserver.net/index.php3?action=getpage&page=dedicated&category=services

dektong,
What software are you using to monitor your servers?

Originally posted by arrty


http://www.interserver.net/index.php3?action=getpage&page=dedicated&category=services

I am pretty sure StephenRS was referring about colocation :)

cheers,
:bee:

Originally posted by arrty
dektong,
What software are you using to monitor your servers?

qwkmon (www.qwkmon.com) or arsdigita (http://uptime.arsdigita.com/uptime/) and there are many others that I do not remember off hand right now. I like qwkmon better since it will have all the record/graphs of network performance (at least the performance from where qwkmon is to the designated network) and also logs since the monitoring starts.

Enjoy and cheers,
:beer:

Hello Guys,
I have decided to go with interserver's 1GHz Special Dedicated server. I won't be getting the server for two more days am open to comment. If you have any info about them please let me know.

Regards