I know we have had many questions like this and polls similar on the forum but I am just about to venture into my first dedicated server and would not want to make a mistake, which do you favour please and why?

Help me here, I will be taking three more before year end.

Thanks

I would vote both Ev1Servers and ServerMatrix. They are 2 top providers and two of the biggest names in the industry. Also noted for having some of the best networks. Can't go wrong with either. Managed.com is just too unstable to choose for hosting...

Why is GNAX out of the list? :D

I don't know how can you compare Managed to Servermatrix & EV1, perhaps the only Pro of Managed is the pricing.

If you are comparing in terms of reliability & stability, I believe rackspace, gnax, dinix, liquidweb, verio & HE has to be included in the list.

Thanks.

and dinix?

They are on the list, listed as "Other." ;)

There are many providers not listed, this is just a select list of providers, probably the ones Grap simply wanted opinions on.

Originally posted by X F e L i X
They are on the list, listed as "Other." ;)

There are many providers not listed, this is just a select list of providers, probably the ones Grap simply wanted opinions on.

Correct Felix, however, always open to someone making a better choice, desperately need a good strong dedicated supplier with good support, network and reasonable price. Uptime more imnportant than price.

Originally posted by grap
Correct Felix, however, always open to someone making a better choice, desperately need a good strong dedicated supplier with good support, network and reasonable price. Uptime more imnportant than price. Unless you are a fully qualified system adminstrator I would not choose any of those providers listed as a "first dedicated server". Managed.com hasn't proven they know how to administer a network as well as not even having support on the week ends, EV1 seems to be completely hands off as far as anything but an OS restore is concerned and SM has been going through some growing pains with support lately. Are you ready to be able to handle any or all of these types of issues yourself?

In my opinion you're much better off getting a fully managed server and then learning the ins and outs before plunging into the realm of needing to do so much of the administration yourself.

If you know your way around a server I'd go with SM. However, if you don't have any experience and are looking to play around and learn, I'd get a VDS instead.

If you know your way around a server I'd go with SM. However, if you don't have any experience and are looking to play around and learn, I'd get a VDS instead.
Is managing a server that hard? what are the basic/critical managing stuff that you'd need to do?