Hello everyone, I have been a client of FastServers.net for the past 2-3 weeks, This is my first dedicated server as I was a reseller before, and everyone at FastServers/Powersurge have been EXTREMELY helpful. I really don't have any experience with setting up a dedicated server or using Linux. They have been extremely helpful and patient with me. There has been only one outage (which wasn't a problem with them, it was the he.net data center) which from what I've read here is EXTREMELY rare from them, and they're email wasn't working, but I came on here and two people from they're company were posting in here keeping everyone up to date, which was extremely nice of them to let us know. Oh yeah and the package I got was this the FSC 1200 package with cPanel/WHM, (Server - $98.00 + cPanel - $38.00) bringing the total to $136.00. Yes I know the $198.00 setup fee isn't too great, but they were nice enough to split it over the first two months for me. Everything has been extremely quick 99% of the time so far (besides the day with the he.net data center problem).

So my verdict so far is if anyone is looking to go with a reasonably priced Dedicated Server, with great support/service, I would HIGHLY recommend FastServers.net

I've been eyeing FastServers for quite some time now, and since it was time to get another server, I decided to go with them earlier today. I've already experienced great support from Aaron (on a Sunday, no less)... hopefully the server will be up and running soon.

In a few weeks after I've settled in I plan on posting a full review about them... but so far, they've been very helpful and pleasant to deal with.

I was looking at Fastservers before I requested a quote from WHT members on a dedicated box...

And I have to say, the people at fastservers have been nothing but helpful in PMs...

I've heard alot of great things about them, but I also heard alot of good things about Nocster, and look how they turned out :D

Guess I just don't wanna get bured twice :D

Thanks for the sharing. Always good to hear personal feedback.

I understand their Servers are Managed. If so, do they allow root access and your own customization? (i.e., partition setup, paths, installing root scripts, etc.)

Hello Rob, they do allow root access, and I'm not 100% sure if they allow you to setup to partitions yourself and all, I would email them and ask :)

Thanks! This is a helpful thread. I've been looking at fastservers.net for awhile now.

Hearing the same thing about the same service/product from two different sources, is always a good thing in my book.

Having already been in contact with them, on other things, I was just looking for some feedback from another using their services. With you having a good experience to date, I figure it would be easy for you to share personal things you have experienced.

I've heard of other companies providing Managed servers that either: do allow root access if you always make sure they know the password(s) and others that just do not.

I look at it from the point-of-view that if I want to run/install scripts or setups that require root user access, I should have that opportunity. Not having that opportunity would seriously impede me from doing any business for a Dedicated server.

A Managed Dedicated server with no root access -- to the person paying for the server services -- is not a bad thing, for some. For others, it means live with it or contine to look elsewhere.

We are not talking out of school here ( maybe I'm wrong but I got that impression from you :)) but simply having a good discussion of the pro's & con's, of someone's services. No flames, no insults, and sooo refreshing!

Hello, well with FastServers.net you have a PSA (Personal System Administrator) Which from what I've seen is somewhere between a Managed and Un-Managed server, if you do change the root password, the PSA would like to know in case he has to do any work on the server for you. As I said I do have root access to the server, but me personally I'm a relative newbie to Linux and Web Server Administration, so I'm glad to have a PSA to help me out :)

I've just joined Fastservers myself...

I was hosting a box over at Servint.net - who I have nothing but good things to say about - but I haven't read much about on these forums... for those interested... I was with Servint for 2+ years. They provided excellent support/service. When I emailed them questions or requests, I would always get replies back in _minutes_ (less than 5 usually) at all times of the night/day. For hardware and bandwidth upgrades, they were quick to reply... and did upgrades in the middle of the night to prevent major downtime.

So... why did I leave them? Well, the server I had was costing too much for my site's income. I realize though that $$ isn't everything... in that I did not feel that jumping to a random $99/month host would be worth it with bad support.

I finally read some messages that people seemed to be happy with Fastservers so far, and they keep a close eye on your box... _AND_ were cheap enough that it made financial sense to make the move. If things turn out differently, I would consider going back to Servint... but so far, things are ok. I'm transitioning my domains over there... so we'll see... still early yet. I just got the box on 3 days ago.

arn

Originally posted by Website Rob
Thanks for the sharing. Always good to hear personal feedback.

I understand their Servers are Managed. If so, do they allow root access and your own customization? (i.e., partition setup, paths, installing root scripts, etc.)

I believe with "Full Managed Services" they don't allow root access, but with regular "Managed Services" they do -- all of this stuff is defined in their SLA -- http://www.fastservers.net/policies/sla.shtml

I am sure they offer root access if you want to manage the servers yourself :)

Perhaps it would be best if we left off speculating and allowed those that know for sure, to provide us with the Feedback they choose to? :D

I recently signed up with FastServers too based on the great feedback from this thread. My experience was great, just as everyone elses. They split the setup fee into two months and even offered to give me 6 months free of charge if I payed for 6 months then! Too bad I maxed out my paypal transactions :rolleyes: . Overall, they ar great people and their busienss will be extremely successful in the next couple of years.

Im not holding such high regaurd for fastservers right now =)

Originally posted by Samuel
Im not holding such high regaurd for fastservers right now =)

Hi, can you give us more information as to why?

Thanks

I would imagine this is involving a server incident that occured in the past 24 hours. I will be standing by to gladly offer feedback on this issue, as there were a few procedures performed by our staff that will definitely be improved for a similar future situation.

Anyway, I am standing by.

Isildur, Anonymous nicknames don't sit well with me so thanks for the comment, but I am unaware of your real name.

Yes, there was a few mistakes from server administration, to customer service issues.

These customer service issues deal with the possiblity that you are forgetting, without people, you have no need to take colocation in, manage, or lease servers at all.

Grow you must, but don't forget the people.

Um this little interchange has been most enlightening to the readership NOT! Samuel, care to enlighten us further on the problem for the benefit of the reader?

Why don't you find someone else to go after eh?

Just because I don't say enough for you, you are bent about it?

And?

And it had nothing to do with the Interchange thing, or whatever you are talking about.

Originally posted by iSuperWeb
Oh yeah and the package I got was this the FSC 1200 package with cPanel/WHM, (Server - $98.00 + cPanel - $38.00) bringing the total to $136.00. Yes I know the $198.00 setup fee isn't too great, but they were nice enough to split it over the first two months for me. I've tried to ask for the setup to be split over 2 months cos we are tight on budget this month but they refused. :(

Originally posted by Samuel
And it had nothing to do with the Interchange thing, or whatever you are talking about. Well, then what 'did' it have to do with?
You can't just jump in a thread and bash someone without telling them, and others, what you're talking about.

Well, you can. But, it sure doesn't hold much weight then.

Originally posted by Samuel
And it had nothing to do with the Interchange thing, or whatever you are talking about.

Interchange
http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=interchange&r=67

To give and receive mutually; exchange.

to give and take mutually; to exchange; to reciprocate

The act of mutually changing; the act of mutually giving and receiving; exchange; as, the interchange of civilities between two persons. ``Interchange of kindnesses.'' --South.

Dont' know why people on jumping all over Samuel? He stated there was a "customer service issue" which seems clear enough to me. Details are nice, but not mandatory. If "Tech support" had of been used instead, there would probably not be a peep. Everybody seems to understand "Tech support" issues. :D

Seems to have really gotton Samuel flustered though? There are a few companies that share a Forum name among employees and could be a different person with each post. I think that the sig. is more important Samuel, as it identifies the company itself so there is some accountablitity. Then there is the reference to "the Interchange thing" which has some recent postings at WHT, on a Security issue. If one does not have root, it requires "Customer support" to apply the patch. Or would that be "Tech support?" ;)

Yes it surely did, and if I posted what actually happened, you wouldnt understand the true nature of the cockup, nor would beleive it.

It had to do with a lack of communication between techs, research by a tech about a kernel upgrade, the lag in time it took to resolve the kernel upgrade etc.

The details don't matter, the response by fastservers over this particular incident has been adequete.

If travis won't indentify himself that's fine, I didn't care to elaborate until he identified himself.

Isildur is a specific username I highly doubt that other powersurge employees are using that same nick...

If they are, then it needs to be specified in their sig stating something like "This username is used by "Tom Dick and Harry"

When a server is dead due to a botched kernel upgrade due to a lack of research before that upgrade, root from 45 miles away does me no good.

Originally posted by SoftWareRevue
Well, then what 'did' it have to do with?
You can't just jump in a thread and bash someone without telling them, and others, what you're talking about.

Well, you can. But, it sure doesn't hold much weight then.

Why do you consider anything other than glowing love, bashing?

Recognize that there are different levels of action and Ill comment.

So it sounds like what happened is that you requested a free kernel upgrade, they botched it and then took too long to fix it and were not polite when you asked what was taking so long? Just guessing...

I was very polite... until what was stated became rediculous.

I requested a free kernel upgrade? Huh?

Where are you getting your information, nowhere did I mention anything the vendor supplied was free, unless you are suggesting FS offer free kernel upgrades?

I was polite for over 18 hours of stumbling on their part, I became insensed when what was stated was rediculous.

To that end it is still being taken care of and is not fully resolved but work is scheduled and I am satisfied they will follow through.

Ill know more about the "Fix" sunday night to finish correcting their error, but they are communicating very well and are being very standup about the error.

I've been contacted at least 4 times since my one comment by no less than 4 different employees of FS and all have been very pleasant and helpful.

I made it very clear that being 45 minutes from the datacenter I would be willing to fix the problem but I was assured it would be handled by them, delayed yes, but they are taking care of it.

This type of event will not happen again according to them if they can at all help it and on my side redundacy and seperate system backup will be the resolution ultimately.

this thread is spiraling off topic... to clarify one point.

Samuel, please reread this post by "freakysid". I think you mistook/misread it

Um this little interchange has been most enlightening to the readership NOT! Samuel, care to enlighten us further on the problem for the benefit of the reader?


He was not getting "bent about it".

Here's the translation of "freaksid"'s original post for the sarcastically challenged:

"Samuel, I couldn't gather any useful information about Fastserver's service from the posts between you and Fastserver. Could you please provide further details so the rest of the readers on this forum could make a better decision about Fastservers"

arn

No Comment

Wish you had said that at the beginning :eek:

It's unfair to post negative comments without posting why. If you aren't willing to post the story, don't post at all on the subject.

What was negative in saying I didn't hold them in such high regaurd right now?

At the time I was dealing with some very irritated customers that had not experienced the amount of downtime since they had been with me and when I came across the post here I posted what I was experiencing.

Next time I'll write a complete log of what I experienced which will surely seem one sided and truly negative.

How freaking touchy feely can you be hahaah

I would like to add some comments about FastServers.Net:

I orderred a server from them about a week and a half ago. It took about 4 days to setup (long weekend), which I find to be pretty good.

The speed of the server and the network seems very good so far.

Support has been VERY quick to reply to my questions. Less than 5 minutes in most cases!!

The only problem I had was how they setup the server. I'm not sure what the tech was smoking, but I think it was pretty good stuff :) It had X windows, KDE, GNOME, games, image editors, etc. all installed!! I have no idea what they thought I was going to use X for, but they put it on there anyways. The good thing is that it was easy to remove. They also installed Redhat 7.2 instead of the 7.3 that it says on their site. However, they did install ALL the updates for redhat 7.2, so that makes up for it in my opinion.

Overall: VERY happy so far and wouldn't hestitate to recommend them. I find support to be the #1 priority for a web host since I can't physically touch my server, and this is where FastServers really shines! Keep up the good work guys!

Yes, we should definitely tone down some of the default install procedures. Normally if you don't want automation installed like Cpanel or something similar, we don't strip off any packages at all from the initial install. Anyways, my apologies for the annoyance of the always overly-extravagant RedHat install brigade...
:o
we'll clean it up for future installs.

Also RH 7.3 is now a possibility as well, for new boxes.
7.3 was giving us fits regarding various hardware possibilities, for a while there, but we've gotten things straightened out for all of the latest linux installs. It's not much of a difference at all, to be honest.

Just an FYI from my vantage point.

Have a great night! ;)

Originally posted by isildur
Also RH 7.3 is now a possibility as well, for new boxes.
7.3 was giving us fits regarding various hardware possibilities, for a while there, but we've gotten things straightened out for all of the latest linux installs. It's not much of a difference at all, to be honest.


Glad to hear, that will save me a huge kernel upgrade...

I can do them, but hate taking the risk with a box remotely...

Is there a particular procedure to contacting Fastservers? I had a few questions on their packages. Tried pming/icqing ap_surge over the weekend- no response. Emailed sales on Monday, still nothing. And this is just a pre-sales question. If first impressions mean anything...

PM bangs here...

He has a fast responce time...

Who did you pm Prohacker?

In any event, I shouldn't have to be fishing around just to get a response for a sales question. Last time this happened to me was with the host lightone.net, which taught me a valuable lesson.

I would of expected a response from them within 24 hours. May be they have lost your email? I would try emailing them again.

Originally posted by eweber
I would of expected a response from them within 24 hours. May be they have lost your email? I would try emailing them again.
Sales emails should be facilitated in 6 to 12 hours at the very least. If you don't get a response in that time frame, find another supplier...

GeorgeC, you can contact me directly if you have any pre-sales questions - josh@fastservers.net. Also look for us on PHPLive at fastservers.net - there is a "Live Sales Support" button on the menu bar to initiate a session(far right).

I apologize for any delays in getting back to you on your email.

they [fastservers] have answered my sales inquiries in minutes, the last one was a few hours ago and replied in 5minutes or so!

Originally posted by josh@fs
GeorgeC, you can contact me directly if you have any pre-sales questions - josh@fastservers.net. Also look for us on PHPLive at fastservers.net - there is a "Live Sales Support" button on the menu bar to initiate a session(far right).

I apologize for any delays in getting back to you on your email.

Thanks for the reply. I'm just worried about the way things were initially handled. As mentioned, sent both pm/icq, plus an email to sales@fastservers.net a few days ago with no response.

Anyhow, I'll be sure to contact you or Dave (a pm I've just received) should I still be interested.

Thanks,

I think Fastservers should explain just what caused the non response. I know I'd feel more confident about signing up. Having to jump through hoops just to get a sales reply can be a sign of deeper problems, whether it's communication in the company, or indifference.

For example, is ap_surge still around? Did FS actually receive george's email sent to sales@fastservers.net?

Personally I'd like to know how many people actually operate and tend to FS. Is it a couple people crew, or bigger?

Greetings:

I am the main contact on sales@fastservers.net and literally stop my daily routines to answer questions about our services. To be honest I did not see George C's e-mail come in or I would have responded to it quickly.

I have been absent from this board as with the influx of new customers my focus has been on getting thing prepared for them.

In terms of how many people work at FastServers.Net, we have a staff of 25, including 5 Sales Engineers ready to assist throughout the day. We are expanding our Sales hours next week to 8am - Midnight to assist new inquiries.

I have had our entire FastServers.Net Sales Team very busy manning WHT on a daily basis ready to answer questions and make sure the needs of this community are being met.

I apologize that George C. did not get a response but assure everyone that the average Sales response time from 7am - 7pm is lightning quick!

If you have questions or would like to speak with on of our SE's I am providing you a list....

abdul@fastservers.net
dave@fastservers.net
james@fastservers.net
matt@fastservers.net
shane@fastservers.net
ap@fastservers.net (That's Me)

We are all over eager to answer any questions and will be standing by ready and willing. George if you would like to e-mail or even call tomorrow during normal business hours I will be glad to talk over anything you have.

Fastservers is kicking ass =)

Keep it up!