I have been using ServerAxis as my VPS provider for several months now but I haven't seen much about them on these forums, so I wanted to post a review.

Bottom line up front: I believe ServerAxis is absolutely the best-kept secret in VPS hosting. I've tried 4 different VPS providers now and I'm certain I'll be sticking with them from now on. Their support and sales are knowledgeable and helpful and their servers are super fast.

Specs: ServerAxis recently doubled the amount of RAM on all their plans. Even before this, it was a great value, but now it's just insane... I am only on the "entry level" $30 plan, which has 0.5GB dedicated RAM and 1.0GB swap, plus 20GB storage and 200GB transfer. I haven't found any other provider that comes close to these specs for this price.

Because I'm not using a control panel, my OS is a fully 64-bit CentOS 4.2. Most CPs are not yet x86_64 compatible so this may not apply to most. (The default is CentOS 32-bit with a 64-bit kernel, but since I needed a firewall and iptables apparently can't operate in a mixed 64/32 environment, I requested an upgrade to a full 64-bit OS).

They use Xen instead of Virtuozzo, so your hardware resources are guaranteed. Tools such as "free", "top", etc. show the exact amount of used/free resources on your VPS. No guesswork, no oversold nodes... you always know where you stand!

Subjectively, this VPS just "feels" faster than any I've ever used. When I'm updating a website or changing a config, I like to log in over SSH and edit stuff with vi. With other VPSes I've used, there is often an intermittent lag between half a second to several seconds when I open/save a file, etc. I've never gotten that with this VPS.

Stats: I created a 58MB test file on my VPS then downloaded it from my employer's LAN. The full file downloaded in 27 seconds (2.27MB/sec). Not bad!

My UnixBench score (WHT version) was 101.

Latency and hops are very reasonable (I get <12ms pings from Louisville, KY but of course that's very dependent on location, etc.)

Support: As I mentioned, quality of support is great. The techs are very knowledgeable, professional, and helpful. The plan is only "Basic Management" and I don't need support very often but when I do they are always great and always go the extra mile to answer my questions well and explain things in full detail. They don't talk down to their customers or gloss over problems.

The support response time I would say is "good". Most tickets are replied to in about an hour. Not the fastest out there but pretty good nonetheless. However, they do have an emergency pager, and the one time I had need to use it (which happened to be on a Sunday morning), I got a reply in about a minute.

One other thing that really impressed me about these guys is that when I ordered my server, they are the only ones that didn't send my root password in plaintext over email! Sure, you're gonna change your root password anyway, but still... the root password was only available over their HTTPS backend, and getting in there required the password I gave at signup, which was also secured. A nice touch.

Before I first ordered my server, I emailed their sales team with some questions about their company and servers. I got a reply from Dave (I believe he's the owner) very quickly which answered my questions in great detail. I replied a couple more times with other questions, all of which were answered quickly and thoroughly.

In Closing: Obviously I'm very impressed with these guys... I'm just an entry-level customer but my experience has been far better than with any other host. I've used some pretty good hosts before but ServerAxis is certainly my favorite. I definitely recommend giving these guys a try if you're in the VPS market. They regularly post specials in the "VPS offers" forum.

http://serveraxis.com/vds.php

Thanks for the great review :)

I have recently ordered a virtual server from ServerAxis, and so far everything has gone very smoothly. They operate out of Equinix Chicago, so the network should be pretty top-notch. Xen means no overselling, which is another plus for customers!

I went for the $45 a month deal with 1GB RAM, 40GB disk, and as the OP said, this is far better than anything else I have seen. I don't quite know how they can afford to do it, but I'm not complaining!

They also don't sting you on extras like Cpanel ($10 a month) or extra IPs (starting at $1 a month each).
The transfer allowance at 200GB a month is less than some, but should still be plenty enough for most people.

Initial impressions are very favourable. My account was set up promptly and the machine seems considerably more responsive than a 256MB VPS I have elsewhere (and am paying the same price for)

I haven't dealt with support too much yet, but the responses I have received have been polite and helpful.

I will do a more in-depth review in a couple of months.

If you can look past the rather prosaic website, you might just find a diamond in the rough here.
http://www.serveraxis.com

Not all VPS providers using Virtuozzo oversell. That is something people like to say but it is bogus. Some may due to money constraints, etc but not the case for all providers.

-Jay

I wasn't saying all providers did, but that with Xen, you know for a fact that they can't. Try asking a provider using VZ exactly how many accounts they have on a machine and see if you can get a straight answer...

In any case, this is a thread about ServerAxis, not overselling - let's not veer off-topic.

That's fine. Good to hear they are a good host. There needs to be more of them and less not good ones.

-Jay

Yeah, I have to chime in on the "virtuozzo overselling crap". Yes many providers oversell, but just b/c you use Virtuozzo does not mean you automatically oversell.

This is a big deal to me as I cut profits to enable more HW Nodes and less VPS's per node. This enables a very fast and enjoyable expirience as many clients have explained.

Anyway, just don't assume all VZ providers oversell because there are many of us that don't do this and take pride in our quality VPS's.

I went for the $45 a month deal with 1GB RAM, 40GB disk, and as the OP said, this is far better than anything else I have seen. I don't quite know how they can afford to do it, but I'm not complaining!
I wondered the same even before they doubled all the memory, but after emailing back and forth with Dave I was satisfied that they are a stable, profitable company that's been around for years.


If you can look past the rather prosaic website...
Funny you should mention that; I rather like the website... no bandwidth-sucking Flash animations, no goofy stock photos of attractive smiling women wearing a headset or lounging on their couch sipping coffee and typing on their laptop, just all the info I need and none of what I don't. Kudos!

Yeah, I have to chime in on the "virtuozzo overselling crap". Yes many providers oversell, but just b/c you use Virtuozzo does not mean you automatically oversell.

This is a big deal to me as I cut profits to enable more HW Nodes and less VPS's per node. This enables a very fast and enjoyable expirience as many clients have explained.

Anyway, just don't assume all VZ providers oversell because there are many of us that don't do this and take pride in our quality VPS's.
No one said or implied that all VZ hosters oversell. We said that Xen hosters can't oversell due to the way it partitions hardware resources.

If you run a good quality hosting service with plenty of resources for your nodes then I'm sure your customers know that and your reputation will reflect that, regardless of what tools you use.

The reason I mention this is that in general Xen seems to get far less attention and far fewer providers than VZ because it's newer and it's open-source, and I think that's a shame because it's a great platform. I was very glad to find a new Xen provider and even more excited that they are very good in my opinion and wanted to extol its virtues.

Of course that final decision is always up to the customer but having greater choice is always a good thing.

I hear ya ;) I might play around with XEN more in depth if I ever get the time.

is it worth paying extra $10 to get a Cpanel for the entry level VPS from Serveraxis? Because this would bring it up to $40/month, which is almost the same the level-1 VPS of powervps. I was wondering which one is a better choice??? :)\

or put it in another way, if I am going to be the only one who uses my VPS, do I really need a Cpanel? What does Cpanel basically do? sorry, but I know this sounds like an idiot. :(

thanks ;)

Only you can really know whether you need a control panel. Personally, I don't use one, but I don't need to expose this functionality to clients either.

A control panel gives you a web interface for such things as creating domains, users, email/ftp accounts; setting DNS entries; updating software; and managing websites (permissions, certificates, etc.). So if you know how to do all that yourself, then no, you don't really need a Control Panel.

However, as these plans have only basic management, you're pretty much on your own, so if you don't have experience with such things then a control panel will help you out. But even at $40/month, for the resources you get I would still say it's a great deal.

A VPS is exactly like a dedicated server in almost every regard. There's nothing about a VPS that would require you to need cPanel that you wouldn't need it for on a dedicated server. Not sure if that answers your question or not. If you're not familiar with what control panels do, I would highly recommend researching them (the popular ones are cPanel, Plesk, and DirectAdmin) before buying.

thank you for the answer. That helps a lot. But I have one more question: without control panel, how do you set up domains, DNS entries and email/ftp accounts? use command line in SSH window?

thanks again

thank you for the answer. That helps a lot. But I have one more question: without control panel, how do you set up domains, DNS entries and email/ftp accounts? use command line in SSH window?
You got it!

A web control panel is really geared towards someone who is going to resell services. I personally find that control panels are too restrictive for setting up customized solutions. They only work with certain servers and often come with customized versions of certain services, so you have less flexibility in setting up the things the way you need.

Of course if you're reselling, then flexibility is what you don't want. You want n number of accounts which are all exactly the same. In this case a control panel is great because you know you won't break something because you forgot a period in your BIND zone file or something.

So it all comes down to what you need your VPS for, and how comfortable you are editing httpd.conf, named.conf, etc. by hand.

Thanks for adding this review. When shopping for new services it is posts like this that greatly help in choosing a good or great provider.:)

everything there is sold out

Serveraxis, when will you get more servers and VPSes in stock?

We are expecting to have more available this week.

I'd suggest emailing their sales department; they may not see this thread. Another poster emailed them last week and they said they expected more that week but that apparently hasn't happened.

Bad idea on their part to not give an ETA on new servers! Here I've been talking up their service and now they can't come through :)

you guys hurry up, cuz we're waiting to buy.... so anxious ;) :)

Yeah, I am waiting too. The only thing I don't get about ServerAxis (and almost every other company out there), is why sales doesn't work on weekends.. Weekends are when most people are home and shopping for anything..

But yeah, please if you have an ETA, share it. (This week could mean Saturday - Or sunday depending on your location's start of the week)

Thank

I remember they said they expected to have more VPS available later last week or earlier this week.

By earlier, I think they should mean by this Wednesday noon??

I have no experience with them, so I use my normal definition of earlier (referring to the release of anything, software, hardware, etc).. Earlier being anytime before the next day or week, in this case week.

Well, I will have to say that it would be well worth the wait. I seem to have gotten in on the end of the last batch of offered VPS, been with them for one week now, and this server runs very well, and very fast downloads. The network is great, and the one PHP problem I had when I first obtained my server was fixed very quickly.

ServerAxis seems to be all that I was looking for. Very glad I got my server.:)

I have been waiting for 3 week now to order there server but is seem there company are out of business something that said all sold out :( . I know that they are good company, excellent speed and support but to order their server is pain in the azzzz :(

We are expecting to have more available this week.

As ServerDave said above more will be available this week. All I can say is that for me I am glad I got onboard. I think it would be worth the wait. With the special they ran (free for may) you can imagine how fast the server would fill up. I am sure more will be ready as he stated.

I have been waiting for 3 week now to order there server but is seem there company are out of business something that said all sold out :( . I know that they are good company, excellent speed and support but to order their server is pain in the azzzz :(
No they aren't out of business, please don't spread false rumors when you don't know. I agree they should make their availability ETA more prominent on the website, but they were primarily a dedicated company and most of their dedicated plans are still available.

It takes a while to get new servers in, get them configured and burned in and tested and get everything working. So it's not that uncommon for some hosts to temporarily run out of space.

I have been with too many hosting companies that were great at first but grew too quickly and couldn't handle it and their service went south. At least these guys aren't rushing to sell a bunch of hosts that they aren't quite ready for. I'm sure they hate turning away potential customers just as much as you hate having to wait.

how many days left for May??? :( :( :(

how many days left for May??? :( :( :(

A little more than a week.

it's just starting to annoy. waiting, waiting, endless waiting. Anxious to get a VPS, may be I should take a look at other providers. :(

Already starting to look at other providers incase they don't get them in for today or tomorrow.. They don't work weekends (or at least sales sure doesn't respond to tickets on weekends), so I would say 2 1/2 days left (1:23 EST here)

Ok, for anyone still waiting (and since I can't find the edit button if there is one), this is the reply I got:

"Sorry I do not have a definite ETA yet but we are expecting them to be
available any day now."

So hopefully they will have some tomorrow as I doubt they will be getting them in today and the fact that friday is in 2 days which would mark the end of the business week.

Great review. Heklpful for me as I'm vlooking fora VPS.

I've had a VPS account with ServerAxis for about a month now and would have to say that they are unquestionably the best price/service combination I've found - and I've tried quite a few. There have been a few minor service glitches, as happens everywhere, but support has been resopnsive so I have no complaints.

I've decided to try ServerAxis after doing tons of research (and forum lurking). This review was very helpful.

it seems good.will have a try

ServerAxis is so hot. anyone can recommend another company with large RAM?

Finally,I ordered an vps on ServerAxis and waited for my VPS now. hope the vps can get a good performance.