Hello,

We're looking for managed dedicated Linux server for our e-commerce web site (10K+ unique visitors a day, 1TB+ traffic a month). Most of our customers are in USA, then UK, Australia, Europe, Asia.

We're looking for highly fast and reliable hoster with good support; extra $100 is not an issue; 30 min. downtime - is.

Regards,

Tim Kinder

I can recommend www.heavenly-web.com (ask for William). I do appreciate their support and reliability and they virtually go the extra mile.
I am not aware of any downtime during the last year with them.

Take a look at rackspace. Of all of the dedicated server companies we work with, they truly impress.

Another option is to go with an unmanaged server at a major provider and then layer onto it 3rd party support. Depending on your needs, this could be better.

We've found many "managed" hosts provide little in the way beyond patch management and network monitoring. While service firms provide a wider array of services.

Take a look at your needs. If you basically just need patch management, monitoring and light deployment/troubleshooting then a place like rackspace may work well for you.

If you need performance diagnostics, security assessment, and more advanced deployment services a msp may be best.

Take a look at your needs. If you basically just need patch management, monitoring and light deployment/troubleshooting then a place like rackspace may work well for you.

If you need performance diagnostics, security assessment, and more advanced deployment services a msp may be best.

I think we still prefer managed sever (does msp stand for it?)

BTW, what are networks and locations in USA to provide a best access to an average US-based visitor?

tim_kinder

If you want personal support, then aim for a smaller company that rackspace, Make sure you do month to month, so worse case scenario, you can move after one month.

tim_kinder

If you want personal support, then aim for a smaller company that rackspace, Make sure you do month to month, so worse case scenario, you can move after one month.

And cheapper - 1.5 TB will cost me $3,000, not $300-600+

You may want to call rackspace for a quote, There pricing for extra bandwidth is not too bad.

I suggest you checking up the dedicated offers forum, there are good offers there.

Give the guys at liquidweb a call - they are a true managed service at a fraction of the cost of rackspace - This is my opinion based on sereral weeks of research. I dont actually host with liquidweb but I am in the process of doing so

p.s you might want to look at my previous post in the managed server section


Regards,

Ryan

MSP = managed service provider

In general, we find that MSPs provide more comprehensive support than do dedicated server providers. Dedicated server providers, however, have direct access to the hardware, so they can often render services that MSPs may not be able to.

My suggestion is to list your needs in terms of:
Network Reliability
Hardware Requirements
Future Scalability
Management Services
Disaster Recovery



Be very complete in your list. This will help you determine what you require. Then make a short summary of these requirements and send it to dedicated server companies or server management firms and see if you find a good fit for your needs.


We always recommend that you list your needs first and then do the budget second. Too many people do this backwards. By starting with your needs, you can determine how much it costs to deploy the desired solution. If this is not within budget, then you will need to re-evaluate your requirements, making cuts where necessary. By taking this approach you have a much better understanding of what you actually get when acquiring servers and services.

A word of caution. The term "managed server" has no precise definition. What some call management others may call unmanaged. For any managed server, the provider should also provide you with an SLA or contract that specifically identifies their responsibilities.

I've seen "managed servers" that included nothing more than patch management. Using RHN companies would push updates onto client's servers. If you required a new program, alternative versions, performance analysis, security investigation they either did not provide it or would charge additional fees.

You'd want to look at an East Coast location for proximity to your customers. You mentioned Australia and that will be the odd ball out.

I can also recommend Gnax located in Atlanta. They are not managed, but you could perhaps hire a company to do that for you. You can also check out VoxRox.com based out of New York. Once again not managed, but you could hire someone to do that for you.

If you're looking for a DC that will fully manage your server then Liquidweb would probably be the place based out of Michigan. I'd have to say that Rackspace is a bit too expensive for that budget.

Good luck and hope this helps

Hello,

We're looking for managed dedicated Linux server for our e-commerce web site (10K+ unique visitors a day, 1TB+ traffic a month). Most of our customers are in USA, then UK, Australia, Europe, Asia.

We're looking for highly fast and reliable hoster with good support; extra $100 is not an issue; 30 min. downtime - is.

Regards,

Tim Kinder

Dear Tim,

Do you need any specific control panel for your server (such as cPanel, Plesk, DA, etc.)? If not, you might want to consider a basic load-balancing solution on a network with consistent 99.999% uptime reliability to achieve superior uptime and reliability.

Most hosts talk about uptime - usually this is network uptime.

Availability is how much of the time your website is actually available.

If availability is your priority then you need:-

dual power
dual ethernet
dual server
dual load-balancer
dual ISP
quality hardware

and if you *really* must not have outage 2 or 3 datacenters.

Watch out on this though as most providers don't have a clue thwne it comes to Global Load Balancing. Most just use an expensive DNS server that won't handle sessions at all.

John

Most hosts talk about uptime - usually this is network uptime.

Availability is how much of the time your website is actually available.

If availability is your priority then you need:-

dual power
dual ethernet
dual server
dual load-balancer
dual ISP
quality hardware

and if you *really* must not have outage 2 or 3 datacenters.

Watch out on this though as most providers don't have a clue thwne it comes to Global Load Balancing. Most just use an expensive DNS server that won't handle sessions at all.

John


GLB also won't work very well for database intensive sites that change often, otherwise your site will be out of sync in each of the location at every point in time as the mysql boxes are trying to catch up with each other. What works best with GLB is static content , iamges, flash etc.. i.e the use of a CDN network and have a secondary mysql setup elsewhere that isn't live but in slave mode that can become live in the event of a main site failiure, granted it might be as much as several minutes out of date, but your site will be up. The one thing that would be important though is to make sure you have bin logging setup so you can merge the slave site into the primary at when the primary comes backup so you have no data loss.

Running a "TRUE" mysql cluster on the primary site is VERY VERY complex. not necessary the mysql side but on the code optimization side where you might very well have to re-write alot of your code to function properlly within the cluster.

Another method would be to do master with many slaves and a hot master failover with sql query direction technology OR just once again re-write your code to split read/writes.

There is alot of thought and planning that needs to go into an endeavour like that. Just my two cents.

www.razorblue.com

They are one of the best managed application hosts I know, I recommend them all the way. Contact Dan dkitchen-@-razorblue.com

Based on your needs I feel that RazorBlue is a great bet. Layer0 is right, they run a class A shop. It would be a smart decision for you to get a quote from. He operates 2 Locations, one NY and one UK. Between the two, greats speeds to Australia should not be an issue. Plus since they manage every part of the operation, they can easily adjust routing for optimal speeds. Both are redundant Cisco networks with amazing Premium BW. We are there now and have 0 downtime for the almost 3 months we have been with them. He is definitely an expert with managed systems, and they have always been there for us when we needed assistance. The first big pointer for us to go with them was there SLA. Their SLA was better than Rackspace's. RazorBlue Offers 5% off for every 15 mins of downtime should there ever be any(highly doubt it), whereas Rackspace is 5% off for every 30 mins. For me this was a huge deal, and I haven't regretted using RazorBlue the slightest bit. Emailing Dan is the best way, as Layer0 said, its dkitchen[at]razorblue.com.

Jordan

Take a look to liquidweb.com, they are running an special at this moment.

LiquidWeb'd be the best way to go..

The OP has customers all over the world. I don't think one location is going to do it. Liquid Web is a good central US location, but doesn't connect well outside of the US as I have seen. Like others have said, a global custer in multiple locations would be best.

The OP has customers all over the world. I don't think one location is going to do it. Liquid Web is a good central US location, but doesn't connect well outside of the US as I have seen. Like others have said, a global custer in multiple locations would be best.


Jdubz3,
Do you have specific experience with our network? We do _not_ have connectivity problems outside the United States and if you look closely at the other threads that is the conclusion they come to.

If you have specific experience please let me know and we'll look into it immediately.

Additionally, Liquid Web has 2 physical locations as well as redundant Tier1 multi-homed bandwidth from Chicago and Detroit giving us very low ping times globally.

Yes, I do. I was a former customer for a couple months on your network. Your support was fantastic, I will give you that, but the download speeds from europe were less the desirable. My comments were not ment to slash your company, but merely from my personal experience.

Yes, I do. I was a former customer for a couple months on your network. Your support was fantastic, I will give you that, but the download speeds from europe were less the desirable. My comments were not ment to slash your company, but merely from my personal experience.

Did you submit a ticket or investigate this with the staff?

The OP has customers all over the world. I don't think one location is going to do it. Liquid Web is a good central US location, but doesn't connect well outside of the US as I have seen. Like others have said, a global custer in multiple locations would be best.

Yes, we're thinking about it, but not quite sure about technology. When you say "custer in multiple locations" - do you mean different mirrors (mysite.com, mysite.com.au, mysite.co.uk) or the only mysite.com spreaded over a number of physical servers?

Essentiallly your site would be hosted in different locations throughout the US and the DNS cluster would ultimately determine the fastest route. There are lots of clusters out in the world today, just make sure you go with someone that is knowledgable.

At the time I did Travis, but since in the course of one month I hadn't seen improvement I moved on. Now like I said before, I have nothing against you guys at LiquidWeb, your new facility is amazing, I am just sharing my past experience that was less than perfect and would probably keep me from coming back. If you would like to discuss this, let us do so off this thread.

I would suggest www.softlayer.com from personal experience :)

I would suggest www.softlayer.com from personal experience :)

Did you even read the first line of the thread? The OP is looking for managed hosting, Softlayer are not a managed hosting provider.

Dan