Well after an almost heated dispute over a very minor infraction with Krypt Technologies, the company has proven itself to be a company worth looking at.
Anyone that knows Jimmy Woods can tell you, he's a tough cookie to deal with, an idiot, jack*** etc, it's often that im called something new. So when a company surpasses our expectations, it's something to write about.
We've been hosting with Krypt for only a few days, we signed up after seeing an offer posted on the dedicated hosting offers section. We were up and running in a day or so.
We had some problems with the server that were tended to right away and eventually we were provided with a new server with some free upgrades to cover the problems experienced.
Im sure it's not anyones policy just to give out free upgrades because of problems out of their control, but Krypt did. They also worked with us on some other unconventional topics that other companies won't.
You can host with any dedicated server in the world, but only a handful are going to give you the kind of satisfaction and support you need to survive in this business and Krypt Technologies is proving itself, at least with this nut, to be a company worth working with. So if you are in the market for a new dedicated server, I would highly suggest taking a look at these guys, you won't be disappointed.
We began hosting with Krypt.com a few months ago after see'ing their advertisements on this forum. We've been aware of Krypt.com for years and always had our doubts about the service they could provide due to some information on their website. We try to size companies up before we order from them because we are a very demanding operation. We do have alot of special requests that help us focus on the niche of customers that we have. I guess you could consider us a difficult customer. When we seen Krypts advertisements on here in connection with their recent UnderNET IRC Server link we figured we'd give them a second look. I personally wouldn't be involved in the webhosting business if it weren't for IRC so i'll always credit those companies that are willing to host IRC (given the reputation it has). We spoke with Mark over at krypt originally and he answered all of our sales questions. Everything seemed good, their ordering system was missing some spots for us to input some options (partitions etc...) so we did follow the order up with an e-mail. The e-mails were not being acknowledged and I did not want to have to pay them to reformat a server just because of a missed e-mail. I was later told our e-mails were being put into their spam folders and requested the reason for this but was not provided with an answer. During our sales conversation with Mark he hesitated when we said we'd be doing e-mail, so we assumed Krypt was very careful about who they let e-mail with spam and all so we looked pretty highly at that and assured Mark that we do not participate in any spam operations.
We were provided the server very quick as ordered shortly after that but the server appeared to be defective. We had a number of problems with the server that were finally deemed to be hardware related. Krypt provided us with another server and everything was good after that. Upon launching the server we found out that they were blocking IRC ports. I specially asked about IRC and the possibility of ports being blocked in our sales chat with Mark so I figured this was a breach of our deal. After requesting a cancellation and refund of the service as it was provided on false grounds I was told that IRC would be permitted but they would have to manually open the ports for us. We spoke with both Ted and Tim from Krypt, they both appear to be partners in the company and both had nothing good to say about the UnderNET server they host. They both claimed to have little to nothing to do with it, said it was work for them to even get it linked and benefited nothing from it. I find this hard to believe since krypts services are mentioned right in the irc servers MOTD (thousands see that daily, free advertising). So we knew what we were up against here. Since they did agree to open the ports for us we did consider this to be a mix-up and let things go.
The uptime has been good, haven't seen any network problems but we have had enough trouble that we're moving away from Krypt. Krypt offers the cPanel control panel but is not licensed from cPanel to provide licenses. We assumed that a hosting company of this size would of been licensed by cPanel and didn't even bother to check. We later found out that they have to purchase each license so when we ordered a VPS this weekend (with cpanel on the order) they just supplied the server without cpanel. I wrote in and said wheres the cpanel and they said we have to wait until Monday when cpanel opens to get a license. Now im no newbie here, cpanel doesn't sell individual licenses to companies (unless it's a bulk purchase) so I know this isn't true. They do sell one time yearly licenses but I doubt that's what Krypt was going to do however it's not my business. They provided a product incomplete and then said it would be days until the order would be complete.
There have been minor things here and there with Krypt and we can somewhat look beyond some of the things we encountered, we just expected more from a company that has been around as long as they have. However we found ourselves unable to mail nationwide isps due to the ip space we were provided being blacklisted. We contacted Krypt about this and were told to "E-mail from somewhere else" They said they were a large operation and they have no control over what people do and they are bound to be listed in the spam databases. So to this day, you can't e-mail Comcast customers (at least on our ip blocks). Tim from Krypt argued this point saying they have several comcast customers however he was proven wrong when I asked him to e-mail our comcast account, he said he did, but we never got his e-mail.
So if your looking for an server company that will provide you with blacklisted ip space, isn't licensed by cpanel, provides an IRC server for major network with dismay (yet keeps the advertisements from it) Krypt is your company. It doesn't matter to them anyhow, as they told us, they have thousands of customers and sell alot to China, we all know how well China conducts itself on the internet.
Anyone has servers with Krypt ? I am planning to order few with them , so wanted to hear feedback from existing customers. I am not very pleased the communication with them ,the replies are very slow via email and hardly responds on IMs.
I've had a Krypt VPS for a few months now, started with the VPS400 package and moved up to VPS800 over time. Initially (I'm guessing they had just gotten into providing VPS's) the service was EXCELLENT! My VPS was located in their LA datacenter on the Level3 backbone. First two months the VPS was rock solid, I was running a full LAMP (no optimizations) install along with Webmin. By the 3rd month I started having issues with sluggishness, both on the site and SSH. Put in a support ticket which got responded to within 10 minutes as usual (fantastic support!) and their techs moved my VPS to a less loaded VMware node. Things were again pretty solid for about two weeks, then the same thing happened again. I let it be for a few days thinking it may just be a spike, but even after a week it was still pretty horrid. I had even turned off the LAMP install and Webmin in favor of a lone Lighttpd install to serve static html pages. Mind you by this time I had been upgraded to above their VPS800 package, yet I was still having performance issues. Put in another ticket and asked to be moved to another node, they said sure and asked a timeframe, I told them asap and let the issue be. After 4 hours of not hearing anything back, I update my ticket to find out that they were having some issues with the VPS, ok bad things happen, give them time. A few hours later I ask again and am told that they formatted the VPS without any authorization from me...Its a VMware host, they could at the least have attached the virtual hard drivei mage to the new install of my VPS, but they prefered to just delete it. I run several ESX servers at work and even with a nonbootable (according to them) image, the hard drive can still be mounted and recovery can be attempted. I was angry but I have a few dedicated servers with Krypt so I gave them another chance. I took the freshly installed VPS and started hunting down backups to restore from. Installed LAMP and Webmin, gave it a week and once again: slow. I'm fairly certain that CentOS repo apps and Webmin arn't enough to cause a VPS to dog down this bad, even with *everything* turned off (top shows 24MB ram usage) SSH and pages being served by lighttpd are taking 3-10 seconds to come up, as before they came up before I even let go of the button.
Ratings Support: 10/10 Service: 6/10 VPS Quality: 5/10 Network: 5/10 (great in the beginning, after a week less than 400KB/s)
Overall they're a great provider, but they need to monitor their nodes more carefully and find abusers. It seems to me like they're either overloading their nodes or have something misconfugured thats causing issues. I was told a few times to restart my VPS which didn't help at all. Orderded a VPS with them about 2 weeks ago on a different account, havn't even touch it since I got it, as of right now, SSH is sluggish, apps like top take an average 5 seconds to come up, max throughput is ~300KB/s from Seattle (hit ~7MB/s when I first got it). Same issue as my other VPS. I'll provide my domain to the mods for authentication.
Let me start out by giving a bit of information about what I host. I am a gamer. And as a gamer, I find it necessary to host (usually, for free) a server in whatever game I play at. At the moment I host a large server for a game called 'Tremulous', one of the largest. The game is a free open source game based off the Quake engine. However, the game is very resource intensive when it comes to hosting a server.
I have been with Krypt for about 2 years now - And it has got to be one of the best choices I have ever made. While krypt does not have the same setup as one such as Softlayer with their Automated OS Reformats/Restarts - they have a friendly staff that would do just about anything for you in a very timely manner - why, my server itself was setup within hours. I came to Krypt because I was on a very limited budget.
Krypt's got one of the best ping times (or so it appears) for the West Coast - and the midwest appears to get around 60 ping, which is very good. Krypt has always been willing to work around my budget to get me what I need - and the owner himself is willing to help you with your troubles, even though he has staff that could very well do it for you.
I have yet to have any major trouble with krypt's network, or their power supply. Their network and quality is very premium, and if there has ever been any kind of problem on a line (especially ATT, which, in my opinion, sucks), they have always been willing to reroute the traffic or even remove it completely from the mix. Since they own their datacenter - they can do this. I've never even had a hardware problem with them!
Now, I've had my fair share of datacenters. I've used The Planet, Softlayer, Volumedrive, Superb, Krypt, Aplus, ServeByDesign, wholesaleinternet...And I've got to say - the most stable and sturdy has got to be Krypt. I would suggest them to anyone that needs a server!
I met James Lumby, the owner of CPC Technologies through QuoteColo. Mr. Lumby’s quotation was so spectacular that I shipped my Dell PowerEdge 1950 to his facility the next day.
Once FedEx got it there, it was online in minutes! We had some issues when the server loaded but the techies were right there ready, willing and able to help. James has done more for me in less than a weeks time then my other data center has since February 2007.
In fact, I am so impressed by his services, I am moving another system to him next week. You can’t go wrong with James and CPC! In my opinion, they are the best!
Well actually getting closer to two months now. And so far it has been smooth, the network has been up 100% of the time so far. I would assume in part due to their Dual 6500 series routers with redundant gigabit providers fed into them.
James (the owner of CPC) was even so kind as to meet me our there the first day as I had decided to drive up to Dallas and install our gear myself. I made it a mini-vacation with my wife so it was fun. I am actually taking a trip up there again this weekend.
CPC is housed in the Colo4Dallas facility in none other than Dallas TX. But you may have known that already.
Overall Recap: - Solid Network Uptime - Great Deal on a full Cabinet - James is great help, naturally his Cisco and networking knowledge greatly exceeds that of my own. I no longer think I'm awesome with my 2950 switch. - I've already had to call once at 6AM and he did not even flinch. Got me all set with some hands on tech support. This was my fault anyway, I forgot to send up my Lantronix Spider. But in 30-45 minutes I was up and running again. So that rocks my socks off and keeps my clients happy.
If I think of anything else I'll post it as I usually do in my living reviews. If anybody has any questions or if I missed anything let me know. The fact that he operates out of the Colo4Dallas facility is a huge huge plus. Because C4D already rocks by itself, but with CPC it makes it even easier to deal with anything that comes up.
I have been a customer of Codev Technology Ltd for several months now, and am more than happy with their services. I run a booking system website for a ski clu (sunshine.org.nz) and the staff at Codev have been very helpful in getting my systems up and running.
The speed and uptime are perfect, as you would not expect less, and the service is prompt and friendly.
Is anyone else having issues with Layered Technologies. For the past 18+ hours they've been 'down' from the Global Crossing network. Does anyone know anyone at Savvis and/or Global Crossing that can check and see what's wrong with their routing?
I warn you, there is not a single good thing to be said about iWeb8 after our vast experience with them so if you want cliffnotes, picture a man shuffling through around 100 emails, invoices and chat logs while screaming in frustration. I’m attempting to piece together a structured account of our experience at iWeb8 Technologies through all that so bear with me here.
We run a non-commercial website that receives around 20 million page views per month. The problem is we quickly outgrew our technical know-how and had a pickle on our hands once our dedicated server at HostGator started buckling under the pressure. Friday is our most active day, as that’s when we have new content for our members – it’s also the day when our server became virtually inaccessible due to the traffic. We needed a solution, because HostGator basically told us to upgrade our machine or stop bothering them, [click here] for that story.
We narrowed our choices down to 2, SoftLayer or iWeb8 Technologies. We called them both up and learned about their datacenters and what direction we should go with our situation. SoftLayer’s salesman misunderstood a bit (as we later learned, more on that later) and offered us an overwhelmingly costly setup (upwards of $1500+ per month). iWeb8 ‘s sales representative “Brian” reeled us in with a couple promises – 1)The solution they outlined to us (2 web servers, 1 database server) would work. 2)If we opted for Level 5 management ($149/month) they would “treat our servers as if they were their own” (word for word)
We were very excited and worked out the details with them. We were convinced to go with a 12 month plan which would save us money in the long run. Our server manager suddenly switched from “Brian” to “Patrick Bertrand” at that point. And then the problems started.
The very first Friday we were fully set up on their servers, we crashed. We crashed under less traffic than our single cheap dedicated server at HostGator handled. It took iWeb8 1 hour to reboot our server. The next Friday, we crashed. We were down for 3 hours before we were rebooted. On 11/08/07 We asked for a hardware diagnostic and an inquiry into why we were crashing with pretty much twice the power we previously had – they told us we should add 2GB more ram to our servers for $50/month each.
We had them install the 2GB on one server to do them in phases, and thus minimize downtime. After the installation of ram that server performed far worse than it ever did before, and shot up to 100% CPU usage with 1 user online. This was my first experience with the post 6 PM Janitors who man their support staff. Apparently after that timeframe all the knowledgeable techs go home. After hours of waiting and talking on live chat / phone (to the same person every time, the only person who answered…) I was basically told that nobody there could do anything and I would have to wait until 8 AM EST for a senior technician to look at it. OTHERWISE, I could pay $180/hour or some ridiculously high number to get it immediately looked at. That Level 5 support really pays for itself huh?
I hired an emergency outsource administrator to look at it, he quoted me at $200 until the problem is resolved which was a steal. He found that I didn’t need ram at all. It was in fact my faulty motherboard that was causing the problems on that server. Ooooooh! Thanks for doing your “hardware diagnostic” properly and telling us to upgrade our ram for $50/month iWeb8, you’re really looking out for your customers. Finally at 12:15PM EST noon the next day it was looked at and replaced.
Exactly 1 week later on 11/15/07 all of our servers went offline for an hour or two. We were told it was a network issue and it was resolved. Nice.
Now here’s where the monster problems started. On the evening of Tuesday 12/01/07 all of our servers went offline. We opened an emergency ticket and the Janitor responded saying 3 apache modules were missing (huh?) and that it was fixed. Thing is, it wasn’t fixed at all. All 3 servers were still offline and unreachable. Finally our outsourced server admin gets into one of them and sees the load at 150+ with a ton of httpd threads open. He runs netstat and concludes we’re being DDoS attacked. Swing and a miss again, iWeb.
After exchanging pleasantries with the Janitor all night the senior staff finally got in at 8AM. His conclusion was to shut down apache and wait it out, since iWeb8 has no DDoS mitigation systems. Great. 2 days pass and nothing improves. We talk with our server manager to find out if we can terminate our contract and take our business elsewhere due to the pile of [expletive deleted] they’ve dumped on us ever since signing us, and the uselessness of “Level 5” support. He responds saying, and I quote
“Concerning level 5 support, have you requested the monitoring service alerts to be sent to our sysadmin cell phones ? if you did please provide the original RT number so that i can investigate to see why it has not been done on our side”
Wonderful. So you’re basically paying for nothing until you use your psychic powers to determine that you need to request something you thought was assumed with your $149/month. Nowhere when we signed up were we told we had to submit a ticket to request that our Level 5 support is useful. He also mentioned that the original salesman was “wrong” in offering us the phrase “we treat your servers like they’re our own”.
He responds again saying the website is working from his side. We test from 3 ISPs and proxies and we can’t connect, so no, it’s not working. Our server admin determined that their solution involved blocking pretty much all incoming traffic except their own range. We once again requested that the contract be terminated, as we were blatantly lied to on multiple occasions and they’re threatening our website with their poor level of service. He says he needs to discuss it with the higher ups.
At this point I’d already moved my sites to a 2 web server 1 database setup at SoftLayer, they put my site under their Cisco Guard and their team actively worked against my DDoS attack, ending it within a few hours. I’ve been happily at SoftLayer ever since 12/5/07 without any issues on this setup. See my review of them by [clicking here].
Anyway, on 12/17/07 iWeb sends a global email to all their customers informing them that “Improvements will be made to night and weekend customer service”, thus admitting that they were actually manning their Janitors – too little too late though.
On 01/15/07 we still hadn’t heard from them (except for a couple dozen invoices that failed because we weren’t going to send them anything until this was finalized), so we talked to our lawyer and threatened legal measures on iWeb8 if we didn’t hear from them so that we could terminate the contract. On 01/16/07 we got an email from Patrick Bertrand confirming that the contract could be ended, they would send us the details later.
Turns out the details was they wanted 20% of the remaining contract value to terminate, which he ensured me was a “good deal” because “he knows his company and this is the lowest they’ll go”. Is he trying to sell me a car or what? At this point it’s whatever, if we can pay $1,495.26 (20% of the remaining contract) to make the iWeb8 nightmare end, let’s do it. So we did, on 01/25/08 we paid the entire amount and our contract was effectively terminated.
Now in March the nightmare returns. We receive an email from them demanding that we pay $740.00 for “services” rendered from the period of when he said he’d talk to the higher ups till we were waiting for them to do virtually nothing until we called them up in January.
At this point we’re weighing the option of paying off these swindlers and being done with it once and for all (even though they’ll probably come back to us in June with “interest” invoices on this current one) against fighting it. That’s where we’re at now… I hope this was enlightening for you if you’re considering falling for iWeb’s lies, random surcharges and all in all horrible service.
I am trying to get a hold of the abuse department of Layered Technologies. They host a splog which is continually ripping my content - takes the content down after a complaint - just to publish it again after a few hours.
I only have sales@layeredtech.com - and even so they promise to forward the request - the latest rip is from yesterday evening and still on the other site.
