I currently have 2 dedicated servers at Rackspace and have been very pleased with the customer support I have received. My contract with them is about to expire and my OS is becoming obsolete (Redhat 7.3) on the servers.

Rackspace is offering me the ability to migrate to new servers with Red Hat ES 2.1 and Plesk 6.0 at about the same price I am paying now

I have been checking out Server Matrix because of the comments read here at WHT. They can offer me 2 servers with CPanel at a total price which is about $30 less per month than RackSpace. Other advantages are:
- Way more bandwidth at Server Matrix
- Twice the drive space
- RH Enterprise 3.0
- Much faster processor
- More IP's
- Twice the ram, etc.

Again, I think very highly of RackSpace and they have served me well but after looking at the Server Matrix prices/features and talking to them on the phone (they are very nice), it makes me think about switching. They seem to have their act together.

What would you do?

Do you think ServerMatrix is on par with a company like RackSpace?

With Rackspace you really do get a more managed solution. The basic Server Matrix offering is basic managed at best.

It really depends on whether you need the managed service or not.

:) Hi domain,
I have to agree with eddy2099, you are getting more features and less management at Server Matrix, so you need to weight up what is more important to you.

If it's Features then your decision is clear, go with Server Matrix
, if it's management then stay with RackSpace.

It's not just that. I'm sure rackspace doesn't oversell or at least not much at all so their bandwidth lines are always fast and unsaturated. On top of it, because of the profit they can make like this they probably have more money invested in their network and support so it would be much better in terms of quality. However, servermatrix does oversell but not too bad. It's really your choice on whether you'd like to go with that or not.

The servers I am comparing from RackSpace are here:
rackspace.com/products/recommended/linux.php

Single AMD 1.3 GHz Processor
- 512MB DDR RAM
- 40GB EIDE Drive
- 30GB Burstable Bandwidth
- 24x7 Fanatical Support™
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 2.1 Preinstalled
- RackWatch Basic
- Plesk 6 100 domains
- Redhat ES 2.1

The servers from ServerMatrix I am comparing are here:
servermatrix.com

Single 2.8 GHz Pentium 4
- 80 GB Drive
- 1024 MB Ram
- 1000 GB Bandwidth
- Silver Support
- Private VLAN
- Red Hat Enterprise 3.0
- Cpanel


As far as server management goes, don't control panels eliminate most of that need or am I missing something?

Thanks everyone

Specs for Specs the Servermatrix configuration is world ahead of what you be getting from Rackspace.

Control Panels does help to a certain extend but of course it depends on your competency level in the underlining operating system to do some fine tuning and tweaking of your servers

With RS you get 100% SLA and 1 hr replacement guarantee, SM gives you 99.9% SLA and there is no 1 hr replacement guarantee. SM provides what you would classify as entry level servers but RS is all about uptime and for mission critical requirements.

Don't get me wrong, SM isn't bad. If it is, I wouldn't be using them for all my dedicated server needs right now. They do provide a good service for what's its worth. If you are comfortable in managing your server, it is definitely a great deal. They are a good company and are behind their every word.

At RackSpace, if I need a patch applied or some minor configuration, I simply fill out a trouble ticket and they do it for me, no charge.

Looks like ServerMatrix will charge me for things like that unless I upgrade to the Gold Level Service which gives me a 1 hour admin service per month. They charge an extra $50 a month for that.

Any other companies to consider?

Servint is another contender
https://www.servintservers.com/

You might consider DV2/GNAX's servers.

As I understand it they are fully managed (check their definition of managed to be 100% sure).

(Link: http://www.tranxactglobal.com/ )