Can someone give their views of the current state of Rackshack? Is it looking good??

I've only been reading problems with their AMD servers, and customer support. From their forums and here, I've got the feeling that they have low quality hardware and un-reliable setups, mainly the software on it. HOW stable are their servers?

I'm *still* waiting for Rackshack to get themselves together, so their level of service increases before even planning to purchase a server from them. I don't actually need the server yet, but will do in the future and until then I'm not too sure to go with them or not. Their pricing is great, so I do hope their do better soon :).

Alan

I think RS is fine, most of the hardware problems are not really with the hardware, they are with the users.

Network has been rock stable since they got the move problems solved..

Happy customer
Shortracked

Thier gig-e circuit which was on line when I bought hasn't seen usage in days URL=http://www.rackshack.net/aboutus/networks.asp]Network Status[/URL]. Suppose to get a new Time Warner gig-e soon.

They haven't got the bugs work out of thier Ensim setup. There are fixes for the main issues on the Rackshack Board or Ensim board. However, now that I have a copy of the Ensim Technical Manaul and have been tweaking things I am starting to take a warming to it after my initial problems.

Hardware - WBL - SIS Chipset with IDE drives seem to work pretty well. They are not hardened servers but will work for most things.

Don't jump till you need to they are still on a learning curve. I got a box just after XMAS and will begin moving sites tonight.

they are pretty stable everyone has problems sometime --- they are well known :)

I've had such a bad exp with them with screw-ups like an ip issue which took 14 days (gave me 4 invalid ips after 7 days wait)...

Also there was another issue that seemed to be limited in my ip range and it really just seems like i had bad luck. It was extremely rare that all these things happend to the same server but it did.

I would probably use them again for their excellent value and like i said my first exp was most likely rare and I don't think the same problems would occur again if i bought another server from them.

Recently have gotten much better. We've been with this since last April, and except for most of the month of December (datacenter move), the service has been pretty good. Customer support is another story though...

LOL, some mixed responses there... something along the lines of "they are good, BUT...". Doesn't really help in deciding to use them or not, it'll be nice to hear some updates from Headsurfer himself :).

Alan

Originally posted by ho247
LOL, some mixed responses there... something along the lines of "they are good, BUT...". Doesn't really help in deciding to use them or not, it'll be nice to hear some updates from Headsurfer himself :).You're going to hear good and bad about any host you investigate, likely more bad than good because, most of the time, people who are doing well with a host don't take the time to start threads like...

"Wow... things are really good here"

More likely, you'll hear someone who has had a problem, for whatever reason, and bear in mind, sometimes the loudest complainers in the end, turn out to have been their own worst enemies and brought their problems onto themselves by either ignorance or some other self-perpetuating cause..

I don't think there is a *perfect* host in existance. RS is good, there are likely better, most certainly worse hosts out there.

HeadSurfer might respond to your message, but there is a plethora of his musings and reporting on the forum at Rachshack.net, he's a hands on guy and is pretty active.

They were recently defrauded by someone and this seems to have taken quite a bit of his time over the last week, meeting with the FBI and such.

The network is stable, the service seems to be catching up to the volume now that they are in a 24/7/365 staffed datacenter.

Pricing being what it is there, it would be hard to find a service/bandwidth/price combo that could beat them right now.

Shortness

Yeah, I agree that people who are happy with the service don't post their thoughts on here or other forums and it's mostly people that have had bad experience with hosts that do. I guess the only way to find out if Rackshack is a good company or not is to join them myself in the future and hope it works out well :)... I just wish they'll have a plain AMD server with no Plesk or Ensim (lol, I seem to keep moaning on about that).

Alan

Originally posted by ho247
Yeah, I agree that people who are happy with the service don't post their thoughts on here or other forums and it's mostly people that have had bad experience with hosts that do. I guess the only way to find out if Rackshack is a good company or not is to join them myself in the future and hope it works out well :)... I just wish they'll have a plain AMD server with no Plesk or Ensim (lol, I seem to keep moaning on about that).
True True... Although you will see a lot of people on the forum at RS who espouse being quite happy. I'm thrilled... I paid 250 bucks originally which was eventually discounted to about 185 per month for a raq3 at hostpro, it had one 8 gig hd and 64mb of memory and 30g of transfer a month.

I now pay 149 + tax (about 155 per month) for a raq4i with a 20 and a 30g hd.. 512mb memory and 300g of transfer.. Happy camper on that end!

On the data center move.. I hate datacenter moves! Period, there is no way to have one without about a month of crap, I don't care who does it or where they move.. it's going to be a hassle.. That being behind us, my server is smokin in the new dc, average cpu temp runs well below 29deg C.. sometimes as low as 24 friggin degrees...

It's "cool" there <g>

On the plain wrapper box, they are going to be offering just exactly what you wish for soon from what I am reading on the forum there. Apparantly enough request for it, so they will offer it.

You could well have a new home..

Just a promoter.. not even an affliate, so I don't even try to get people to sign up for RS to get the 50 bucks fee.

I love having a 300g buffer for my traffic! That and 50 g of storage on the box makes that part of the picture that I don't have to worry about.. unless my partner, who eats gigs of storage like he ate film before we got him a Nikon D1 to play with.. god.. now with no film bill.. he's gone insane! He uploaded almost 200mb of pix over the last two days on a dialup.. And he's just touched the first layer of his stock!

The only man I know who actually wore out a film scanner!

Shortswiped..

I'm not exactly the Headsurfer but I'm one of the people who helps to maintain and fix the servers everyday. From my perspective we've improved on quite a few things, reboots we get done within 5-10 minutes ( Hitting the switch for the reboot ) and restores we get done in a matter of hours, usually just a couple. Support has been dealing with a learning curve due to two new GUIs being thrown at them but I believe they're handling it very well and learning at a rapid rate, working with the vendors of both GUIs to get issues resolved as quickly as possible, not to mention expanding the existing staff by a large amount to handle the influx of customers coming in, read another post from the HeadSurfer, 278 new servers in half a month sold ! That's a lot to keep up with from the support stand point. Give us a shot, try us out and when all else fails you always have someone who cares available by email, phone and in the forums. I'm always available to PM if you have any problems and I usually keep an eye on forum.rackshack.net for any major issues so I can help resolve them.

Thanks!


Patrick Smith

Hey Patrick, can you guys post more pictures under this page:


http://www.rackshack.net/colo/updates.asp


I would really love to see more of the new place! Thanks!


Jim

Disclaimer - My Linux level is above average but I am not full time nor close to an expert. Currently use a Raq (which I was thinking about replacing with this box) and Clean 7.1 with Webmin on servers.

Bought an Ensim in December. Still not confident enough to place valuable sites on it. The two sites I bought if for I squeezed on to other servers for now and placing a few test sites on the Rackshack one. Rackshack on big learning curve. Usually requires several attempts to get a problem resolved.

Week One
- IP's wrong when provided
- Tech Correcting Crashed Server
- Restored
- Spoke with Customer Service
Week two
- Network Problems the next week
- Got a hold of a WP 3.0 Tech manual and was thinking it might actually be a good thing. Lots of possibilities.
Week Three
- Learning about PHP-Safe Mode and Suexec coexistence
(PHP Script totally locks up server to the point of needing reboot which I have not experienced on a box before)
- Your sites disappear from the adminstration panel once in a while?
- Trying to find my Miva Merchant (All the Doc's when I bought the server say that it is in WP 3.0 but thier support thinks it a third pary product).
- Learning about the Bandwidth Manager Problem - man funny things happen when your error log reaches a couple gb.

In short we seem to ne WP 3.0 testing ground.

Out of the time I have had my server thier gig-e been on line a couple days.

The happy people seem to be the ones that striped Plesk or Ensim off thier server.

Seems that the box for the high setup charge should work 100% day one! Having sufficient problems that bailing or placing a redhat clean install on the server is a prime consideration.

i have an ensim server and no problems at all... does take a couple days to get configured just right, and if you're not familiar with linux it could be difficult... though most problems with the ensim servers are ensim not rackshack...

Jim, I agree, I would also like to see more pics of their new data center :). But the reason for no updates could probably be because they have been so busy this month.

Alan

Anyone adding servers at their pace will have some problems and get some criticism. However, I think one should evaluate Rackshack on the basis of their total package. First, they are clearly the price leaders. Therefore, even if their service is only average, the overall value is very good. Second, they probably deal with more novice dedicated customers than any other provider and this has to increase the problems. So, my own personal grade would be a "B". Price-A, Network B+, Support C. I would say for the customer who wants to play and learn but isn't hosting customers, they are a great place to start. Likewise, for one who is capable of administering a server themselves and has Ensim or Plesk experience, a good provider. Probably wrong for the person with little experience, getting their first server and expecting to immediately host customers on it.

how could you give their network a B? when a service provider's network routing tables are soo messed up that when going to verio's network from it, it chooses their twtelecom feed over their own verio feed, and then going to cogent's network it chooses their verio feed over their cogent feed (when its in use, as it seems to get used strictly for backups)... heh... atleast when going to twtelecom on them, it goes over their twtelecom feed... heh... but going to savvis from them, goes over twtelecom instead of their savvis feed... ! i mean... thats some seriously poor configuration... and their network is running at like 50%+ utilization... some of their feeds actually peaking at 100%...

oh... just noticed... seems they are running their cogent feed at full-time now... hmm....

Spent an Hour last night with customer support at RackShack. The Ensim package that they provide does not include Miva Merchant. They kept wanting to send me to the techs but I refused cause the techs kept closing my tickets when I inquired (3). I comment before that they are so good that they close your tickets before you open them.


On side note; I said I was not an "Expert" and above average as I have been using linux 3 years now 10-30 hours week. I certainly did not mean to give the impression that I lacked experience.

B was just my opinion. However, it was based on regular monitoring of uptime and regular pinging to see the speed, the latency, and the lost packets. And, obviously, I did not check all servers...just a couple.

On this board we talk a lot about carriers....and about types of bandwidth....and about traceroutes and all that is helpful. However, all the consumer really cares about is can his site be reached and at what speed. At least by my tracking, rackshack still is above average on both those accounts.

I do wish Rackshack 'good luck', but we won't be spending any more money with them.