Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Colocation and Data Centers : Qwest

[sailor]

what does everyone think of qwest?

[sailor]

for those of you that dont like it - can you tell why please. thanks!

[ReliableServers]

Arent they the same ballpark pricing as level3 and uunet? I would pick one of those up over qwest.

[sailor]

dont worry about price - just want opinions on the network itself.

how does it compare to some of the other big ones?

Originally posted by Dilhole
Arent they the same ballpark pricing as level3 and uunet? I would pick one of those up over qwest.

[Dragoon]

Qwest's NOC has a well deserved reputation for being clueLESS and indifferent.

Qwest is often a very difficult company to deal with. They are expensive and there are often numerous hidden costs. They have been juggling a huge amount of debt and have narrowly escaped bankruptcy court on more than one occasion.

However.....

They do own and operate a large fiber network in North America - both local and long haul fiber. The have excellent peering in place and the network performance is solid. They did own the largest next generation fiber optic network in Europe (KPNQwest) but it's history. Bankrupt, sold off in peices.

[sailor]

Originally posted by Dragoon
Qwest's NOC has a well deserved reputation for being clueLESS and indifferent.

Qwest is often a very difficult company to deal with. They are expensive and there are often numerous hidden costs. They have been juggling a huge amount of debt and have narrowly escaped bankruptcy court on more than one occasion.

However.....

They do own and operate a large fiber network in North America - both local and long haul fiber. The have excellent peering in place and the network performance is solid. They did own the largest next generation fiber optic network in Europe (KPNQwest) but it's history. Bankrupt, sold off in peices.

thanks man - this is exactly the kind of detailed feedback I am looking for.

[IGobyTerry]

They have been juggling a huge amount of debt and have narrowly escaped bankruptcy court on more than one occasion.

I believe I read somewhere that their total debt is more than one their network is worth.

[rusko]

i have seen quite lackluster performance from qwest on several occasions. it may be solid, as dragoon pointed out, but solidly mediocre. they are fine in a mix, imho, especially if you are looking to complement an existing carrier with peering issues, but i would definitely do level3 before i did qwest.

paul

[Dragoon]

I would do Sprint, MCI, or L3 before I did Qwest. However, I wouldn't "do" any of these by themselves. Single homing is foolish in today's market and I have yet to see any one transit provider that even comes close to perfection.

Of course, your mileage may vary and often does from one region to another.

Qwest was really, really bad a few years ago. They've improved considerably. The only major issues I've seen recently involved the various Microsoft viruses. Qwest was either unwilling or unable to filter any of the malicious traffic. The impact on its network and clients was rather severe. This goes to the cluelessness I mentioned earlier.

[sailor]

which would you pick if the pricing were say - 4x tyhe cost per meg from sprint / mci / att and 2 times the cost per meg from l3 vs the per meg from qwest?

also - how do you guys rate qwest compared to the olikes of abovenet, allegiance, verio, aleron etc.

also - what if qwest had no backhaul costs and all the others did? are the otherst hat much better?

Originally posted by Dragoon
I would do Sprint, MCI, or L3 before I did Qwest. However, I wouldn't "do" any of these by themselves. Single homing is foolish in today's market and I have yet to see any one transit provider that even comes close to perfection.

Of course, your mileage may vary and often does from one region to another.

Qwest was really, really bad a few years ago. They've improved considerably. The only major issues I've seen recently involved the various Microsoft viruses. Qwest was either unwilling or unable to filter any of the malicious traffic. The impact on its network and clients was rather severe. This goes to the cluelessness I mentioned earlier.

[Dragoon]

Originally posted by sailor
which would you pick if the pricing were say - 4x tyhe cost per meg from sprint / mci / att and 2 times the cost per meg from l3 vs the per meg from qwest?

Is this real or supposition?

If it's real I'm surprised. Qwest has historically been very stubborn on pricing.

Go with Qwest if they are offering it that cheaply, especially if this is for DV2 as you already have a few providers to add to "the mix".

also - how do you guys rate qwest compared to the likes of abovenet, allegiance, verio, aleron etc.

I would put Qwest above all of these especially Allegiance (Yuck!) and Aleron.

also - what if qwest had no backhaul costs and all the others did? are the otherst hat much better?

Hmmm, this also surprises me since I 've seen Qwest try to charge local loop fees and really high port charges even when cross-connecting to them in the same exact room.

Qwestlink is very good for local transit but, usually, very pricey.

[sailor]

yeah - thats my thoughts too. should be a nice network to add to our mix -

abovenet - qwest - allegiance - aleron

I may even drop aleron.

Originally posted by Dragoon
Is this real or supposition?

If it's real I'm surprised. Qwest has historically been very stubborn on pricing.

Go with Qwest if they are offering it that cheaply, especially if this is for DV2 as you already have a few providers to add to "the mix".



I would put Qwest above all of these especially Allegiance (Yuck!) and Aleron.



Hmmm, this also surprises me since I 've seen Qwest try to charge local loop fees and really high port charges even when cross-connecting to them in the same exact room.

Qwestlink is very good for local transit but, usually, very pricey. [/B]

[poisonrevers]

Over the better part of the last decade, Qwest has seen its ups and downs. They became extremely competitive in the mid-late 90's with lowering the bandwidth pricing from $50KUSD/mo for a T3 to $30K/mo then $20K and lower and lower. They bottlenecked and had crappy service for a while and improved after that in the early Y2K.

They have an amazing footprint in the US and IntraUSA peering is very good. Other than that, there international range stinks. KPNQwest is garbage and they have garbage peering in Asia/pacific etc...

So, if all you care about is US traffic, then maybe go for them, although they aren't the cheapest anymore. That's why they have most government contracts, because they tend to stay within the US confines. I guess reducing the possibility of a breach (Terrorism or otherwise).

My 2 cents.

[haesu]

They have very well peered high performance network. Their network is extremely reliable and almost works like telephone system where you expect your IP connection to be up 24/7/365. Their bandwidth is overpriced. And their sales reps are rude. And their NOC is clueless and have tendancy to delete emails received from customers. And their bills have all these hidden costs sales reps don't and won't tell you.

So go figure.. What you decide is your call :-) I voted "they are ok" as an average value.

-hc (Yet another qwest cust)

[sailor]

this is all good information - sounds like they are pretty good but administratively they suck. well - we will not be getting them. they did abait and switch on us with low pricing and when we signed they had the gaul to come back and tell us that they were wrong and it was actually 4 times higher per meg - what a joke.

I will never use them and will never recommend them .

in fact - I am going to sign with level3. they have been very straight on all their costs and fiber availableilty and I hear their noc actually knows what the heck they are doing.

Originally posted by haesu
They have very well peered high performance network. Their network is extremely reliable and almost works like telephone system where you expect your IP connection to be up 24/7/365. Their bandwidth is overpriced. And their sales reps are rude. And their NOC is clueless and have tendancy to delete emails received from customers. And their bills have all these hidden costs sales reps don't and won't tell you.

So go figure.. What you decide is your call :-) I voted "they are ok" as an average value.

-hc (Yet another qwest cust)