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  1. #1

    Cartika Websites Down. Reseller Alternatives?

    All of my websites on Cartika Hosting have been down for more than two hours and customers are upset. The data center in Dallas, Texas is down and there's no backup system. Does anyone have recommendations for a reseller host that has dependable backup systems to prevent websites from going down?

    Thanks, Gary

  2. #2
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    Most reseller accounts do not provide automatic fail-over between data centers... you could setup a custom system for yourself, but that would be much more costly than the reseller account you have now.

    Why is the noc down anyways?

  3. #3
    See this post: Colo4 Service Entrance 2 issue

    http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=1072692

  4. #4
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    Hmm, just read that, not good at all, but this seems to be a rare problem. I guess you have to weight if the increased cost would be worth it; you would basically have to have failover setup with an active standby in a different noc.

  5. #5
    One of my clients suggested Rackspace cloud hosting. I'll call them this morning.

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by gbcactus View Post
    One of my clients suggested Rackspace cloud hosting. I'll call them this morning.
    I would research that thoroughly before jumping ship; I recall some issues with that option.

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by gbcactus View Post
    One of my clients suggested Rackspace cloud hosting. I'll call them this morning.
    Do a search on this forum. Rackspace has had power issues of their own in the past too, and even an instance where they lost data on a fairly significant segment of cloud servers.

    If you're going to start jumping ship over just one issue which is out of Cartika's control anyhow (just check the outage forum to see that many other providers are affected by the colo4 issue), you're going to be jumping ship from provider to provider for a long time, as these kinds of things can happen anywhere.

  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by gbcactus View Post
    One of my clients suggested Rackspace cloud hosting. I'll call them this morning.
    Hello,
    If this is the first time you have seen downtime, I would not jump ship. Downtime happens regardless of the setup/location. Moving sites can cause more of a headache at times. With this said, if downtime is a constant, then run (dont walk) to the nearest exit. Cartika is one of the most trustworthy hosts on WHT, so I would stick with them unless its everyday,.

  9. #9
    This comment was posted on the Cartika forum by a Cartika staff member.

    "Firstly, the fact that our primary network is up and several of our infrastructure is up indicates that we are indeed using A+B power. We just arent using it on all of our infrastructure - frankly, it is very expensive and people already complain that our $10 shared hosting is too expensive."

    I'd like a host that has backup power. My sites have now been down for three hours and customers are mad.

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by gbcactus View Post
    This comment was posted on the Cartika forum by a Cartika staff member.

    "Firstly, the fact that our primary network is up and several of our infrastructure is up indicates that we are indeed using A+B power. We just arent using it on all of our infrastructure - frankly, it is very expensive and people already complain that our $10 shared hosting is too expensive."

    I'd like a host that has backup power. My sites have now been down for three hours and customers are mad.
    I think you're misunderstanding what A/B power is vs. backup power.

    Cartika and any host in Colo4 has backup power - that constitutes a UPS and generators. Currently there is an issue with a transfer switch from my understanding, causing an outage. But that doesn't mean there is no backup power.

    Some customers in Colo4's facility go an extra mile and purchase A/B power which means there's power from two separate PDUs. But each individual unit is still backed by UPS and generators. A/B power is extremely expensive and you're going to be hard pressed to find too many hosts that are using this. And even if they are, it's possible they are impacted by issues like this (like some Colo4 customers with A/B power that are still down).

    I understand you're frustrated, but I think you need to put this into perspective. Issues like this can happen almost anywhere. It's unfortunate that it happened at Colo4 and is affecting Cartika, but you should know that Colo4 is a reputable operation that has had very few issues over the last several years. We have a few systems on Colo4's network that have experienced 99.99%+ uptime over the years. This is the first time we're seeing an extended issue.

  11. #11
    The Cartika website is up because it has A+B power. My sites are still down. Customers are mad. Some don't have email which is essential to their business. I need a more dependable host.

  12. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by gbcactus View Post
    The Cartika website is up because it has A+B power. My sites are still down. Customers are mad. Some don't have email which is essential to their business. I need a more dependable host.
    And some other Cartika servers with A/B power are still down, the same with some other providers. A/B power doesn't mean you can't possibly be affected by this issue.

    Cartika has been communicating about the outage with their customers as best as they possibly can, and this problem is largely out of their control. They've been doing business with Colo4 for years who has been providing them with a stable facility throughout this time. They obviously couldn't have expected to experience an issue like that of today, but you should at least understand that it can happen with almost any provider.

    Just because a host is having a single significant outage (the first in years) doesn't mean they are not dependable. Because it's not a matter of IF there's going to be an outage, it's a matter of WHEN. Nothing is 100%. Cartika is being completely 'dependable' about this in my book - they're doing everything in their power to make sure all of their customers are kept informed, and I have no doubt that they will work with Colo4 to prevent something like this from happening again.

  13. #13
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    Quote Originally Posted by layer0 View Post
    as these kinds of things can happen anywhere.
    Agreed, though I can definitely understand why it's frustrating.

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    Cartika is using Hsphere I believe. If you are looking for an Hsphere reseller so that you don't have a huge learning curve with something new, there are definitely options out there.

    While complete failover may not be an option for them, its unfortunate that they don't have a disaster recovery plan to alleviate issues like this. All hosts should have a master escape plan for issues like that.

  15. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by Krishopper View Post
    Cartika is using Hsphere I believe. If you are looking for an Hsphere reseller so that you don't have a huge learning curve with something new, there are definitely options out there.

    While complete failover may not be an option for them, its unfortunate that they don't have a disaster recovery plan to alleviate issues like this. All hosts should have a master escape plan for issues like that.
    Thank you for your feedback.

    Would you mind outlining what plan would be reasonable to fail over within x hours when a datacenter loses power? I would be very interested in learning what solution could be delivered to end users...

    We are launching plans which will allow customers with cloud servers to fail over between data centers in case of such failures, but, the price tag is in the $1000s per month. i am curious and quite interested to hear what solutions are possible for sub $100 shared reseller accounts that will allow for customers to fail over between datacenters in a matter of minutes in case of a failure at a data center level?

  16. #16
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    A+B power is not that expensive, maybe a few hundred dollars if you're buying your own servers, and another 10 dollars per moth for the extra port. Even if you deploy your own servers with single power supplies you can buy rack mount PDU's that allow a single plug to be powered by A+B power.

  17. #17
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    "Firstly, the fact that our primary network is up and several of our infrastructure is up indicates that we are indeed using A+B power. We just arent using it on all of our infrastructure - frankly, it is very expensive and people already complain that our $10 shared hosting is too expensive."
    I agree. Redundancy costs money, especially power. When people aren't willing to pay for it, they can't expect their systems to be up when major problems happen in the power infrastructure, especially with a critical single point of failure like an automatic transfer switch.

    Eric

  18. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by cartika-andrew View Post
    i am curious and quite interested to hear what solutions are possible for sub $100 shared reseller accounts that will allow for customers to fail over between datacenters in a matter of minutes in case of a failure at a data center level?
    Me too. Redundancy costs money (power, network connectivity, DNS fail-over and/or BGP redirection, etc.), and most aren't willing to pay for, and thus support, the concepts around redundant systems. Many people (not all!) are generally willing to pay for a plan that is cheaper, simply because of the cost, not considering the risk they are taking, so it's not a great support system for redundancy.

    Having options for redundancy at the infrastructure layer is a great thing, though. If anything, it shows what it actually costs to provide this type of service. Customers will at least be able to choose how much risk avoidance they are willing to pay for.

    Eric

  19. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by erickmiller View Post
    Me too. Redundancy costs money (power, network connectivity, DNS fail-over and/or BGP redirection, etc.), and most aren't willing to pay for, and thus support, the concepts around redundant systems. Many people (not all!) are generally willing to pay for a plan that is cheaper, simply because of the cost, not considering the risk they are taking, so it's not a great support system for redundancy.

    Having options for redundancy at the infrastructure layer is a great thing, though. If anything, it shows what it actually costs to provide this type of service. Customers will at least be able to choose how much risk avoidance they are willing to pay for.

    Eric

    thank you Eric and an absolutely outstanding post. We recently launched a solution where users could distribute accounts across various data centers - but, we do not yet have a solution to allow accounts to seamlessly fail across datacenters. We do have a cloud based solution that will allow for that, but the price tag is steep. Consider that this facility has failed for the first time in 8 years and one has to wonder if it is worth the investment - end of the day though, people will complain with any outage and we understand that - but ask these same people to pay double or triple their existing rate so that once in every 8 years they can avoid an outage - and 99% of them would not be willing to pay the rate required.. its an interesting business we have chosen here

  20. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by FRCorey View Post
    A+B power is not that expensive, maybe a few hundred dollars if you're buying your own servers, and another 10 dollars per moth for the extra port. Even if you deploy your own servers with single power supplies you can buy rack mount PDU's that allow a single plug to be powered by A+B power.
    the cost for legitimate A+B power is not "a few hundred dollars"... or "10 dollars per month for the extra port"...

    we have an entire facility that is completely A+B from the ground up - and the costs are a good 40-50% more over a 500-1000 sq ft cage footprint. not only on a one time setup, but also on a monthly recurring cost...

  21. #21
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    Quote Originally Posted by cartika-andrew View Post
    the cost for legitimate A+B power is not "a few hundred dollars"... or "10 dollars per month for the extra port"...

    we have an entire facility that is completely A+B from the ground up - and the costs are a good 40-50% more over a 500-1000 sq ft cage footprint. not only on a one time setup, but also on a monthly recurring cost...
    Absolutely right. Fully 2N (or even 2(N+1)) is very costly to implement properly (2x minus the building lease) and maintain enough extra capacity for a full fail-over while handling spikes.

    The mis-information on WHT is baffling. Seems like a lot of people like to hear themselves talk, regardless of the accuracy of their statements. Good politicians?

    Eric

  22. #22
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    Quote Originally Posted by cartika-andrew View Post
    end of the day though, people will complain with any outage and we understand that - but ask these same people to pay double or triple their existing rate so that once in every 8 years they can avoid an outage - and 99% of them would not be willing to pay the rate required.. its an interesting business we have chosen here
    Yep, people definitely like complaining. IT is somewhat of a thankless job.

    You're right, though, 99% (or more) would not pay for risk-avoidance for something that has a very low probability of occurring. It's human nature. I'm sure insurance companies have a lot of data on this. And that's all marketing people live for... to take advantage of this behavior. Somewhat self-defeating on the part of the customer.

    Eric

  23. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by erickmiller View Post
    Absolutely right. Fully 2N (or even 2(N+1)) is very costly to implement properly (2x minus the building lease) and maintain enough extra capacity for a full fail-over while handling spikes.

    The mis-information on WHT is baffling. Seems like a lot of people like to hear themselves talk, regardless of the accuracy of their statements. Good politicians?

    Eric
    Andrew I would agree it is a thousand+ dollars to do A+B power but the question I must ask you is why haven't you provided a name server outside of colo4 when I myself and a few others have brought it to your attention for clients who use your name servers but a third party email provider. This was extremely cost effective and yet you refused to do it. Are you going to do it now to save those clients the frustration in the future?

    This was the main reason I didn't chose you for my hosting.
    Last edited by RossH; 08-11-2011 at 02:40 AM.

  24. #24
    Quote Originally Posted by RossH View Post
    Andrew I would agree it is a thousand+ dollars to do A+B power but the question I must ask you is why haven't you don't a name server outside of colo4 when I myself and a few others have brought it to your attention for clients who use your name servers but a third party email provider. This was extremely cost effective and yet you refused to do it. Are you going to do it now to save those clients the frustration in the future?
    Ross - may I ask why you would mention this? throughout this process, our primary DNS has not been down. So, although you feel we could handle DNS better, we have had 100% DNS uptime for over 8 years. What exactly is your point here? which frustration would this have saved exactly Ross? Our DNS is on different power feeds (explicitly different power plants and are fed off of different networks) - our DNS has not gone down throughout this process - as I told you , the way we do DNS is actually just as reliable as spreading it out across different data centers... and likely more so considering the $100's of $1000's of dollars we have spent on securing our DNS servers via various hardware firewalls, DDOS appliances, etc... which are typically not available at your average DNS pop...

    having said this - we are moving 50% of our DNS to our newly launched Toronto facility in the very near future - we are doing this to better service our newly launched facility - so, even though this would have made ZERO difference here - I think this will meet your expectations correct?
    Last edited by cartika-andrew; 08-11-2011 at 02:48 AM.

  25. #25
    This was the main reason I didn't chose you for my hosting.
    thats too bad - I am not sure how many providers have had a 100% DNS uptime since that point... but, we are one of them..

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