Results 1 to 12 of 12
  1. #1

    HostRemote and TelecomColo.. Ugh...

    Unfortunately, both of these providers have no reviews here - so I wasn't able to get the inside scoop without going through it myself.

    After going through the HostRemote and TelecomColo roller coaster ride, I had to write a review of the process and what went on.

    HostRemote is a colo facility in Central/South New Jersey. They've been around for awhile, but had a bad outage this summer which was the start of their demise. While they were going down, they sold the remaining company to another company - Telecomcolo.com. This is where things got ugly.

    As soon as TelecomColo.com took over, they started a wave of scare tactics to try and get customers at HostRemote (like me) who we're on the prowl for a new provider to switch over to TelecomColo.com's datacenter - which was about 15 miles away. What do I mean by scare tactics, well, they started sending cryptic emails that even though they took over the HostRemote operation, the power could go off at any time.... But dont worry they said, we have this other facility you can move into... How convenient... All new contracts of course... with all new pricing. What pissed me off was this "oh, the power could go off at any time BS". You either shut off power or you dont, there is no grey area there.

    After a week a scare tactics, they finally made an official announcement with a shutoff date (a few weeks from now).

    There's no point in talking about HostRemote because they are gone. But I think what TelecomColo.com did is wrong. Lie, mislead, force, stong-arm customers into a bad position. Not to mention, their datacenter (which I toured), was practically empty. They're just trying to buy customers, as a company they have ZERO experience in the colo business. And the owner, who gave the tour, comes off as the most ruthless jerk I have ever met.

    Stay away from these guys. Ethical business practices still have value these days.

  2. #2
    Sorry to hear that. I've looked at the fixedorbit.com - looks like they've got 765 IP addresses with QWEST and PAETEC (I believe it is USlec) providers and AS belongs to digitalspeed.com - not that much impressive, but workable solution. But with ethics that you've mentioned - I would be cautious too.
    Thank you
    Professional Streaming services - http://www.tulix.com - info at tulix.com
    Double optimized - AS36820) network, best for live streaming/VoIP/gaming
    The best quality network - AS7219

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Apr 2009
    Location
    Dallas/FortWorth TX
    Posts
    1,703
    Are you sure it was a COLO, sounds more like warehouse in iraqi warzone.
    <<< Please see Forum Guidelines for signature setup. >>>

  4. #4
    Greetings:

    That's sad news.

    We were at HostRemote for about four years until we moved (mainly because we needed better bandwidth pricing).

    While we were at HostRemote, the service was good along with solid network uptime.

    I'm sorry to hear about the situation with them.

    Thank you.
    ---
    Peter M. Abraham
    LinkedIn Profile

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Oct 2009
    Location
    Ashburn
    Posts
    210
    That really is a terrible way to go down! I wonder if Telecomcolo was forced to make a move from the facility by purchasing the assets of HostRemote? Maybe the facility operator only gave Telecomcolo a few months to salvage everything as I would imagine HostRemote was a little behind on their bills!

    Either way, there is no excuse for the strong arm tactics and obviously they could have dealt with it better than that!

    Telecomcolo seems to be a tiny company out of Philly as they dont have much going on in terms of their own AS #...

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by tulix View Post
    Sorry to hear that. I've looked at the fixedorbit.com - looks like they've got 765 IP addresses with QWEST and PAETEC (I believe it is USlec) providers and AS belongs to digitalspeed.com - not that much impressive, but workable solution. But with ethics that you've mentioned - I would be cautious too.
    Thank you

    Ha, it gets even better. I love Google. The guy who gave the tour, he is the owner, his name is Adam Pasternack. I did some googling, and apparently he is a notorious FAX Spammer. All the fax spam is powered behind that same small AS and digitalspeed.com.

    So the picture is more clear now. After years of fax spamming, he decided to branch into colo. I can only imagine the kind of colo tenants he will have.

    http://www.junkfax.org/fax/broadcast...gitalSpeed.htm

    He even has FCC violations against him in New Jersey.

  7. #7
    Having dealt with the HR shutdown and move to Telecomcolo I can state the following;

    HR notified my client with an initial warning of just 7 days, we had to move out a full cabinet and two /28 nets. Needless to say they should have given us a much advanced warning. Their solution was 'we already have a co-lo lined up for you', yes, how convenient. Then when we started talking about our assigned IP addresses and the fact that we have well over 500 domains to worry about, things got hectic.

    I will state the following about Telecom;
    1. Their co-lo is far better than HR ever was, environmentally and technically speaking
    2. They (including Adam) did everything to carry over our partial C blocks, we were tied into it with 6 other clients and this can take a lot of effort to migrate properly. In the end we didn't have any DNS work on our end.
    3. I will say that the staff that I have worked with are very knowledgeable and fast to reply, including Eric & William.
    4. So far their service has been very solid, let's hope things stay that way.

    Now, if we had more time, we would have shopped around to stay outside of the city since we are a South Jersey company. I know plenty of people that are very happy with Snip in Pennsauken, including myself.

  8. #8
    Greetings Martin:

    As a former Host Remote client (we left a few years back on good terms), it is good to hear a number of positive things.

    Though I do agree that seven days notice is extremely short; 30 days would have been a good minimum with 90 days optimal.

    If misery loves company, one of the many reasons we left NTT/Verio (to go to Host Remote) was that we had very close business friends co-locate in an NTT/Verio Philadelphia facility and NTT/Verio gave extremely short notice on their close down of that facility.

    At least in your case, it sounds like you had a bunch of hustle from the new company to help you out; in our friend's case, Verio/NTT left them on their own.

    Thank you.
    ---
    Peter M. Abraham
    LinkedIn Profile

  9. #9
    Did you get any type of email or formal letter from Telecom stating that they were taking over ownership of HostRemote?

  10. #10
    I don't believe so.

  11. #11
    I know this is an old topic, but I came across it via Google and had encountered the same thing. The experience is still a little raw for me 6 months later, so I had to weigh in ...

    Was at Host Remote for over 5 years... the quality of the service was great then went down down downhill the final year, and I started to look around for other providers. Also, I live in Philly, and the facility was in South Jersey, so I had to tack on an extra 30 minutes to and from whenever I had to go in (and $4 toll).

    I found a great facility and was getting ready to move when I received a call from the fellow mentioned in previous posts that he was taking over Host Remote, that he knew I lived in Philadelphia, that he had a data center in Philadelphia, and would I be interested in seeing it. I informed him that I was already planning on moving to a different provider, and when he found out I wasn't under agreement yet, he sort of made hints about looking at my current contract to see if I was still under contract with Host Remote. Just talking to him, I got a very sleazy vibe, nonetheless, I decided to tour the facility just to see what they had since it wasn't far from my home.

    The actual facility itself was impressive and I could tell it was setup well... however, as previously mentioned, there was no one in any of the cabinets at the time, so obviously they were just starting to go after this business. What I did find off-putting was that the building itself seemed to be a furniture showroom, and all of the other businesses were geared towards home furnishings, and you passed by showrooms on your way to the elevator to get to the facility. It gave the feeling that the data center was sort of "shoe horned" in there which made me question the power and network infrastructure, and was sort of given the run around when I asked to see backup generators etc.

    The bottom line was The man himself. The more he spoke, the less I trusted him. He reminded me of everyone I've ever regretted doing business with, so in the end, that was my deciding factor. After I informed him that I was still planning on moving to the facility I'd originally intended to, he called me a couple of times afterwards and told me of poor service and poor setups at that facility and talked to me like I was crazy for not going with him. I also had the same issue with being locked out of the facility intermittently and generally feeling like I was being bullied.

    So early November, I informed my clients that I would be doing the transition from Host Remote at the end of December. One of my clients does online exams for academic institutions, so this was perfect as after the holidays traffic is low and it would be in between semesters. Around mid-November, we get an email that they're closing the HostRemote facility in EARLY December and that everything had to be out by then. We were given about 2 1/2 weeks notice, I wouldn't be ready by then, AND early December would be during my client's finals, their busiest time. I guess maybe the idea was to give no notice so those clients on the fence wouldn't have time to find an alternative and just go with him.

    I worked my butt off to get out by early December and was able to transition to all new hardware at a different facility without a hitch. But I was so put-off by this guy. I have no doubt that the service would be adequate, I was just left with such a feeling of inconsideration and tension with every dealing that I don't think I would have been able to sleep knowing this guy had access to my equipment.

  12. #12

    My Telecom Colo Experience

    I saw this post over the weekend while googling a few things. I figured I would add my 2 cents.

    First, let me say that I was with HostRemote for about 2 years. I had issues from the beginning. Some out of their control (Cabinet Power Strip Failures) and others totally on their side. I monitor my systems externally and internally and routinely saw hiccups at HR with both network and power. I lived through the small issues. But then came the outages in the final 6 months. I had two outages. One was a HR router issue where HR did not apparently have a valid backup or documentation of my setup. I had to call support (over and over again) and tell them what my IP's were.

    The second outage was the major one everyone experienced. So I was looking to leave anyway.

    Then came the shutdown. I received about 3 weeks notice (approximately) and was contacted by TelecomColo. I also priced out 2 other Colo's and toured one.

    I decided to go with TelecomColo. Adam was more than happy to show me their back end infrastructure, UPS and Power Generators. He also (at length) explained their setup. I did tour TelecomColo before I moved forward. I felt Adam (and his staff were professional)

    I was the second or third customer to move in. The staff were extremely easy to access and had me setup completely ahead of time. They offered to assist with the move but we did it ourselves.

    After our equipment was setup, and in the 8 months since we have had a great experience. I sleep better. Monitoring systems show no hiccups or issues.

    Personally I have had discussions with the technical staff regularly. Eric and (Andrew?) are efficient, knowledgeable and accessible. I am happy with Telecom and did not feel that I was pressured to move there. Just my two cents. You cant buy anything with it.

    Steve

    SysMgt.com

Similar Threads

  1. hostremote.net
    By HostTitan in forum Colocation, Data Centers, IP Space and Networks
    Replies: 3
    Last Post: 07-23-2006, 12:26 PM
  2. DedicatedNow - Ugh!
    By openXS in forum Dedicated Server
    Replies: 5
    Last Post: 05-04-2005, 01:21 AM
  3. HostRemote in NJ?
    By viGeek in forum Colocation, Data Centers, IP Space and Networks
    Replies: 6
    Last Post: 04-02-2004, 02:00 PM
  4. ugh
    By clocker1996 in forum Web Hosting Lounge
    Replies: 32
    Last Post: 08-30-2002, 08:04 AM
  5. Ugh
    By allan in forum Web Hosting Lounge
    Replies: 0
    Last Post: 02-27-2002, 10:18 AM

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •