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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
    Location
    Woodbridge, NJ
    Posts
    840

    Thumbs up BurstNET budget Linux VPS services: 9-month review

    It's been 9 months since I outgrew shared hosting and required a VPS for my websites. I have plenty of experience as a Linux sysadmin and MySQL DBA, making an unmanaged VPS the best choice for me. After doing my research, I decided to go with BurstNET's budget Linux VPS services.

    I started out with 1 VPS -- their basic package with 512 MB RAM / 1 GHz CPU / 20 GB storage / 1000 GB bandwidth. Soon after, I purchased 2 more of the same, and upgraded 1 to the next available package (1 GB RAM / 1.5 GHz CPU / 50 GB storage / 1000 GB bandwidth).

    So in total, I have 1 VPS with 1 GB RAM as my primary web and mail server, 1 VPS with 512 MB RAM as my database and DNS server, and 1 VPS with 512 MB RAM as a development/testing server. All 3 are located in BurstNET's Scranton datacenter.

    Things overall have been excellent, with great performance and stability. Support tickets have all been addressed quickly and thoroughly. There have been a couple of "bumps in the road" over the past 9 months, but only minor issues, all resolved quickly enough to make them barely worth mentioning.

    I would not hesitate to recommend BurstNET's Linux VPS services to anyone, as long as they have the knowledge and experience to properly configure, secure, and maintain their own servers. Like any unmanaged VPS provider, BurstNET would not be a good choice for someone coming from (fully managed) shared hosting who has little to no sysadmin experience of their own.

    Now, at first glance, you will find a large number of negative reviews of BurstNET, both here on WHT and elsewhere. This might make it seem that they are not a good choice for a VPS. Dig a little deeper however, and you will find that the vast majority of BurstNET complaints are unwarranted, coming from 3 major groups of people:

    1. Those that do not have the expertise for an unmanaged VPS, who expect things to work just like the fully-managed shared hosting they are migrating from.
    2. Those that expect a $6 VPS to perform as well as a dedicated server costing 20 times as much.
    3. Those that do not read the TOS, and fail to properly cancel services, fail to respond to and address abuse notices, and so forth.


    If you look past these groundless complaints, you will find very few justified grievances with BurstNET's services. You will discover that BurstNET is an excellent choice for a budget unmanaged VPS provider. There are only a handful of providers that can compete in this price range.

    In short, if you are an experienced Linux sysadmin, who has either outgrown shared hosting or simply wants more control than shared hosting can offer, you would be wise to include BurstNET in your search for a low-cost Linux VPS.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Feb 2010
    Posts
    1,030
    Rarely to see good review of BurstNET arround here. Glad to see that you are happy with them.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
    Location
    Woodbridge, NJ
    Posts
    840
    Quote Originally Posted by tihhc View Post
    Rarely to see good review of BurstNET arround here. Glad to see that you are happy with them.
    They're out there, just unfortunately overshadowed by complaints, 99% of which are completely unwarranted or caused by the client themselves as I explained above.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jun 2003
    Location
    Oklahoma City, OK
    Posts
    2,116
    Glad you are happy with burst seems some have good luck and some bad if it works for you that is great.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Jan 2003
    Location
    South Africa
    Posts
    2,158
    I found Burst to be awesome even when I had very little knowledge of running a VPS years and years ago. Support was supa' fast! Even a few months ago VPS was setup within a day and support responds fairly fast.
    █ █ █

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Hertfordshire
    Posts
    455
    Very accurate review- BurstNet do provide excellent service, but you rarely get anything but complaints on this forum.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Oct 2010
    Location
    Celje, Slovenia
    Posts
    15
    I'm never going with burst.net again and i suggest neither do you. They're just looking for you to make a mistake and violate their "TOS" to rip you off for the $50. There's where they make the real money.

    I seriously do not recommend a provider like that to anyone. Better use leaseweb or something.

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    Nevada, US
    Posts
    5,550
    Quote Originally Posted by urbee View Post
    I'm never going with burst.net again and i suggest neither do you. They're just looking for you to make a mistake and violate their "TOS" to rip you off for the $50. There's where they make the real money.

    I seriously do not recommend a provider like that to anyone. Better use leaseweb or something.

    Based on your comments, it is quite obvious to me that there is more to your story then you are letting on.

    We have zero interest in collecting the $50 abuse fee. It is there simply to motivate clientele to resolve their AUP/TOS issues promptly.

    Seeing that you were charged a $50 fee, I think we all know it's your on fault, and you did not resolve AUP/TOS issues that you caused.
    .
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  9. #9
    Join Date
    Oct 2010
    Location
    Celje, Slovenia
    Posts
    15
    U wanna know my story?

    I've been a good client for over a year. No abuse notices, no complaints. After a few months, one of my payments gets overdue. You delete my VPS instead of just deactivating it and loose all my data. You ask me to understand what happened, i say OK, you give me some cents of discount on payment and i let it go. It happens, i think, i'm a webhosting provider myself and i would appreciate if i did this to my client and he understood.

    Then, about a year later, i get an abuse e-mail. I see the email but as i'm in a lot of work, i forget about it. Days later i get another e-mail. I see that one about 10 hours after i get it. The e-mail says:

    Dear BurstNET Customer,

    It has been over 24 hours and we have not received a response back from you with what was done to resolve the abuse complaint we sent to you. Please get back to us with in 8 hrs or your server will be suspended.


    Sincerely,

    BurstNET Abuse Department
    BurstNET BASIC POLICY & SERVICE GUIDELINES (AUP)
    https://www.burst.net/policy/terms.shtml [US]
    http://burstnet.eu/policy/terms.shtml [EU]

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------
    *** If an adequate response is not received within 24 hours,
    service may be suspended and a $50.00 fee will be assessed.

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------


    Sh*t i messed up, i need to go fix it, but hey, its too late. The VPS is suspended. No problem, i'll ask them to unsuspend and get right on it. But no! Your support tells me what i need to pay $50. But How?? The last e-mail said "If an adequate response is not received within 24 hours,
    service may be suspended and a $50.00 fee will be assessed" Does it anywhere say "within 24hours of the first email?" Nope, it doesnt.

    Then i wait for anther 3 days because support is answering every 12-15hours, then i get an invoice for 50 GBP!!? Isnt it $50??

    As i said. I'll pay the $50 (not 50 GBP) and copy my files off and when it expires i'll move to another provider.

    Dont give me the cr*p about reading your TOS and that its my fault. I know its my fault but this just shows that your emails are telling me different than you are and that you're just lookin for the fee. Even by your explanation i missed the 8 hour mark by like 2 hours and now i MUST pay.

    I thought that since you once deleted my account and lost all my files by YOUR mistake you'd atleast be decent enought to activate my account now when i missed your "deadline" by 2 hours. Seems you're not.

  10. #10
    The Abuse and Customer Service departments are investigating the situation, but you may want to review the Acceptable Use Policy accepted at the time of your order.

    ============================
    Alerts are provided as a courtesy. Prompt responses to alerts are required. When an alert is sent, the designated abuse contact is responsible for acknowledging his/her understanding of the offense and providing an adequate response, to the satisfaction of BurstNET®, within 24 hours of the notice. Failure to sufficiently respond to an abuse alert will lead to suspension of any active services involved in abusive activity and will result in a Ј50.00 fee. If reactivation is warranted, all abuse fees and any outstanding service fees must be paid prior to service being reactivated. Repeated abuse and/or failure to respond to abuse alerts will result in service termination.
    ============================

    It should be noted that the initial alert sent to you was emailed at 05:57:12 EST on the 29th of January and your initial response was recorded at 19:10 EST on the 5th of February. In addition to the 24-hour warning, the initial alert included the following statement:

    ============================
    "Note: If this is a critical matter or additional reports are received, we may need to immediately deactivate the system until the matter can be addressed.
    ============================

    I think it's a stretch to say that the subsequent suspension warning was missing the words "within 24 hours of the first email."

    Also, as long as we're making full disclosure, I should document that the situation you encountered last year was remedied by our sincere apologies and a full month credit - NOT "some cents of discount on payment."

    Due to the nature of the abuse detected on your server, we are discussing whether or not reactivation is an option. You will be updated in your ticket once a decision has been made.
    Last edited by jeandanielle; 02-08-2012 at 03:25 PM.

  11. #11
    Join Date
    Oct 2010
    Location
    Celje, Slovenia
    Posts
    15
    So what you're saying now is that you need to decide whether to reactivate my VPS after the payment or just terminate it?

  12. #12
    I dont know how to say but 50 buck penalties is ridiculously unacceptable

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    Nevada, US
    Posts
    5,550
    Quote Originally Posted by alexwbh View Post
    I dont know how to say but 50 buck penalties is ridiculously unacceptable
    No, what is ridiculous is that we have to charge that to motivate our client abase to actually resolve their abuse issues promptly. We don't due it to make money, and more often than not will refund it if the abuse issue does indeed get resolved. Time is money, and our staff should not have to chase down our clients to get them to resolve issues. If we do, then it is only fair that the negligent client has to pay our staff, not us! Resolve issues, or let us know you are working on it at the very least, and such fees are not charged.

    Please do not comment on things you do not have full details about, or make false assumptions on things you do not have first hand knowledge of.
    .
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  14. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by urbee View Post
    U wanna know my story?

    I've been a good client for over a year. No abuse notices, no complaints. After a few months, one of my payments gets overdue. You delete my VPS instead of just deactivating it and loose all my data. You ask me to understand what happened, i say OK, you give me some cents of discount on payment and i let it go. It happens, i think, i'm a webhosting provider myself and i would appreciate if i did this to my client and he understood.

    Then, about a year later, i get an abuse e-mail. I see the email but as i'm in a lot of work, i forget about it. Days later i get another e-mail. I see that one about 10 hours after i get it. The e-mail says:

    Dear BurstNET Customer,

    It has been over 24 hours and we have not received a response back from you with what was done to resolve the abuse complaint we sent to you. Please get back to us with in 8 hrs or your server will be suspended.


    Sincerely,

    BurstNET Abuse Department
    BurstNET BASIC POLICY & SERVICE GUIDELINES (AUP)
    https://www.burst.net/policy/terms.shtml [US]
    http://burstnet.eu/policy/terms.shtml [EU]

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------
    *** If an adequate response is not received within 24 hours,
    service may be suspended and a $50.00 fee will be assessed.

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------


    Sh*t i messed up, i need to go fix it, but hey, its too late. The VPS is suspended. No problem, i'll ask them to unsuspend and get right on it. But no! Your support tells me what i need to pay $50. But How?? The last e-mail said "If an adequate response is not received within 24 hours,
    service may be suspended and a $50.00 fee will be assessed" Does it anywhere say "within 24hours of the first email?" Nope, it doesnt.

    Then i wait for anther 3 days because support is answering every 12-15hours, then i get an invoice for 50 GBP!!? Isnt it $50??

    As i said. I'll pay the $50 (not 50 GBP) and copy my files off and when it expires i'll move to another provider.

    Dont give me the cr*p about reading your TOS and that its my fault. I know its my fault but this just shows that your emails are telling me different than you are and that you're just lookin for the fee. Even by your explanation i missed the 8 hour mark by like 2 hours and now i MUST pay.

    I thought that since you once deleted my account and lost all my files by YOUR mistake you'd atleast be decent enought to activate my account now when i missed your "deadline" by 2 hours. Seems you're not.
    Thank you for your story, it let us know the truth.
    Wiredtree Good|

  15. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by alexwbh View Post
    I dont know how to say but 50 buck penalties is ridiculously unacceptable
    This is actually a low fee, in comparison to others we've seen in this market.

    Keep in mind that, to avoid the fee, all we ask is for customers to do their best to prevent abuse, monitor for suspicious activity and sufficiently address any incidents that occur.

  16. #16
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Location
    United States
    Posts
    107
    To avoid all of this all you have to do is communicate. I've never used burstnet but I know they have been on the market a long time and had a few friends use them without problems. A quick email to burstnet asking for more time would not hurt.

  17. #17
    Join Date
    Mar 2009
    Location
    Miami, Florida
    Posts
    20,777
    Quote Originally Posted by HostWisdom View Post
    To avoid all of this all you have to do is communicate. I've never used burstnet but I know they have been on the market a long time and had a few friends use them without problems. A quick email to burstnet asking for more time would not hurt.
    +1 - Burst uses the fee as a way to motivate people to act on abuse complaints. If you are responsive they dont charge it.
    Keith I Myers
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