Im looking at buying one of the Rackshack amd packages, but ive heard a lot of good and bad things about plesk and ensim.

What can i expect from both of them (good side and bad side).

Thanks in advace for your comments!

Although I have no experience with either, I'm grabbing a Plesk box when it becomes available. The only two reasons

Plesk has Qmail.

Plesk has my old favorite, Webalizer.

I'd like to hear from someone with experience with both GUIs about which one they prefer.

Although I am no expert this is what I have heard/seen:

- I like Ensim GUI better

- Plesk comes reseller capabilities, Ensim does not ( you need some extra stuff for that )

What sort of add-ons, where can I get these

Plesk... go for plesk. Ensim is harder to learn and use for newbies. Also things arent as clear in Ensim as in Plesk.

Bought a ensim server thinking it had reseller :( Since I was told by three different people it did, along with the ensim site. Anyways. In order to get reseller you have to buy another package which i hear is $2000+! The control panel reminds me a lot of the raq cp, except it is nice looking :)

Although it is not what i expected, it will do fine. I am hopefully getting another server next week, and would like to move up to hsphere!

Oh yeah, anyway I think you may want to go with plesk when they get more.

Good Luck!

Justin

What advantages does Ensim have over plesk.?

We're using plesk, the biggest downside is the subdomains issue, I wish it would offer Subdomains that did not count towards the main license

Mattan,
I hear you on that one. I think that subdomains should not count as an actual domain against the licence. Plesk should work this out. I hope they fix this in later versions. Also I would like to see in 2.5 a new version of IMP. 3.0 looks nice and I dont know why they dont upgrade that package.

This is knid of a catch 22. A subdomain is a domain. If all you want is a subdomain pointing at another directory, simply create the A record, and add the VH container to the vhost.conf. Yes, I think that they should add this function as an optional feature much like DNS management, and the ability to create domains. But it would not be a wise decision on their part to make subdomains in general free. Some hosting virtual hosting companies only use subdomains for hosting. This means that they could have hundreds of clients and only utilize one domain license. Plesk is a business, they are here to make money, just like all of us.

-Dan

..there have been some drawback using th vconf. file with plesk. Like PHP not working, etc

It works the same way as your httpd.conf. It's just an include file. If you know what directives to use, you can make anything work.

-Dan

I believe somebody posted the download link to RAS [the reseller script for ensim] on the rackshack.net forums.

Could be wrong ;-)

As far as newbienesh goes, I think that Ensim is a lot easier on newbies. Plesk is .. ugly :P

Thanks Mattan for letting me know that about plesk, as for ensim...

the control panel has a few glitches one it seems if you try to login with the wrong username it throws up a list of errors, instad of say "Invalid Username/Password" :)

You cant switch a site from namebased to ip based without deleting the account and readding it!

When you delete accounts, sometimes it gets errors like, couldn't delete FP extensions or couldn't delete the DNS entries...

It also seems slower than anyother CP.

Otherwise I think that it is a GREAT CP :D

Later

Originally posted by AhmedF
I believe somebody posted the download link to RAS [the reseller script for ensim] on the rackshack.net forums.

Could be wrong ;-)

No,
unfortunately these scripts are just...scripts. Nothing fancy nor useful, from a reseller point of view.

-Chris.

Both are good, but lacking:

Plesk:
+ Clients can create subdomains
- It's hard to create a hosting account

Ensim:
+ Easy-to-use
- No subdomains at all

I also think Ensim would be easier to modify befcause of the left navigation being a separate frame.

If anybody would just say some extra pros and cons we can all decide for ourselfs.

I've only used Ensim but found it a real pain in the ars to use.

The navigation is easy enough but creating sub-domains that work is hard, and the premissions on user's is rubbish, I sometimes find my self even as an admin not able to delete some files that someone else created.

Ensim: Any software that does not have "uninstall" is a piece of **** software. Every single thing about this software is hard! :(

I have to say that after reading some of the threads on the subject I am even more confused, or rather unsure of which to choose between the two control panels. It would be easier if there was a clear favorite.

This thread, however, seems to favour Plesk which is funny as I had decided on Ensim just before I read it.

Gyrbo mentioned no subdomains on Ensim, that`s a turn off.
May I ask how Plesk handles subdomains? I read that each subdomain requires a license, but are there any fancy options available, like pointing to sub-directories?

Hi,

We use Ensim for all our servers and its works fine.
As for creating sub-domains and additional databases capability, you can do it , its very easy. You can find more info. of creating subdomains here:
http://forum.rackshack.net/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2405&highlight=sub+domains+ensim

That feature works great.

The ensim interface is nice and easy to use as well as the user control panel. Our customers are happy.

Regards

Rupi

Thanks for the link, Rupi.

I will check it out right away.

Plesk handles sub-domains the same way as full domains.

And I don't know anyway around the Plesk License of every sub-domain counting towards it.

Just search the rackshack forum, there is a way to set up subdomains pointing to sub directorys inside each site. Then it's just a matter of adding a directory with the name of the subdomain and an A record. You can have unlimited subs too if you want but just creatind an A record like this : *.domain.com
but I prefer being able to limit them !

I love plesk and it seems alot more "finished" than ensim. They also do alot more updates then ensim !
Hoot