WANSecurity - Fully Managed Hosting - My Experience
Apr 12, 2009
Some of you may remember when I was asking for help on a good dedicated hosting company. I looked around for a month and finally found a great company to host my websites, WANSecurity. I received at least 10 dedicated server offers, but chose to go with WANSecurity because of the server and service they offered me. With so many options out there, I thought it would be helpful for me to share my experience with some of you. I have been on shared hosting for about 10 years and have never messed with dedicated servers. I had no idea there was so much work with dedicated servers until I got my hands on one. I was used to getting everything set up for me at Lunarpages. Although I love Lunarpages, their dedicated servers are nowhere near those offered by WANSecurity. Robert, the WANSecurity founder, has been particularly helpful. I received a recommendation from a WHT forum member telling me to get in direct contact with Robert for the "best managed hosting" offer out there, and guess what... I think I got it. Robert and WANSecurity moved all my files, installed Apache, Red 5, set up my mail servers, configured all of my large databases, and did so much more.
Although I am new to dedicated hosting, their managed plans are world class and their servers are very reliable. No issues in the last 6 weeks for me. If you are new to dedicated hosting and don't feel comfortable running everything on your own, trust these guys. They do a great job and they are flexible. Their managed hosting plans are new but they have been around for 11 years. They know their stuff and most of all, they care about you. That's the great thing when you are a big fish in a small pond. They truly care for you and therefore offer you the best service. If you are experienced with servers, they are still a great choice. They will give you a great deal on a server even if you don't need all the managed hosting services.
Check them out at: [url]
You can also get in touch with their founder if you are interested. PM me for his email. Feel free to ask me any questions. I'm open to give you my personal feedback.
View 1 Replies
ADVERTISEMENT
Oct 16, 2009
recommend best uk fully managed dedicated server hosting
View 14 Replies
View Related
May 9, 2009
how the hosting provider would back me up in setting up my vps, support in additional issues etc. with regards each of the above topics.
View 2 Replies
View Related
Oct 21, 2009
About us first, we do cPanel shared hosting and also (however you want to put it) fully-managed proactively monitored dedicated hosting - due to this we need access to our equipment all the time so we host it locally.
Ed from RapidSwitch contacted us via live chat on our website at the start of September to introduce the company, he offered us a rack from £650/mo, mentioned we could take it upto 32A power (obviously not for that price!).
We're based in Maidenhead (in the town centre), 5 minutes walk from RapidSwitch and 5 minutes drive from BlueSquare, as we use power-hungry Dell PowerEdges and the DC is closer to us we thought we'd have a look.
We arranged a tour. On the tour we were told about their dual diverse dark fibre, diverse power, how their staff support cPanel, how the rack would be fully managed by them but we'd be able to pop in anytime to do work, how they'd let us move in our kit during the night, sounded great.
The following day the whole Poundhost vs RapidSwitch thing went down, soon after RapidSwitch themselves went down too, which was slightly worrying.
We moved in, or tried to First time we asked for DC access it took 1 ticket, a wait of 60+ mins, then an angry phone call from me to get it sorted out, it was sorted out for the following day -- okay, strange? We moved in the next day.
Some days later we decided to move some of our live kit at BlueSquare over to RS for the evening.
4pm - I open ticket saying I need access to rack some live servers as per our verbal agreement when I signed up, and I get a reply saying No, as they don't accept hardware or visitors outside the hours of 8am - 8pm Monday to Friday.
4:30pm - I phone Randeep (sales guy) and talk to him, he talks to a Manager, arranges an exception, says a note will be put in my account regarding tonight and the other server moves we had discussed before I signed the contract.
4:50pm - I follow up this ticket to make sure they're ready.
8pm - Again, I follow up this ticket to make sure they're ready.
8:45pm - I arrive at BSQ after having sent them one ticket.
9:05pm - I leave BSQ after going through security, meeting a BSQ tech, unracking a box from BSQ1 and BSQ3, signing documentation, etc.
9:15pm - I arrive at RapidSwitch, no one answers the buzzer, so I phone. A member of technical staff (seems friendly, etc) takes my hardware, I ask "Can you rack this immediately?", I am told "No we're really busy", I mention that I had arranged this earlier, he replies "Well I wish they had told us!!!", I am then told "Management always arrange maintenance tasks at the same time and never think of the fu****g monkeys (he said this!!) that actually have to do the work, there is no communication at all"... He then goes on to talk about only 2-3 people being on shift in the evenings, how they have too much work, etc. I ask "Can it be done in the next hour?". Am told "Uhhhhh I'll try but Ive got a mountain of jobs to do". Tech then walks off with the servers, forgetting to take the rails, network cables and power cables. I mention this to him, he says "Oh, I'm not used to this Managed Rack malarkey". He then says "I'll update your ticket to say we took delivery of your hardware".
9:28pm - I drive off.
9:34pm - I arrive at my office, no ticket update. I wait around a bit and reply to the ticket asking if it can please be done ASAP. No reply, I then phone and ask what the deal is, am told on the phone "ohh we'll do it in 10-15minutes, when (unaudible) comes back, but usually colo orders are racked within 48hrs, we're really busy!" (so basically am told that what I'm asking isn't acceptable and they're too busy to cope -- not what you want to hear from someone who's supposed to be managing your hardware)
9:50pm - I phone up and ask what the hold up is. Am told your staff are too busy still, am also told that servers are racked within 48hrs of delivery. (So, basically I'm pushing my luck).
10:27pm - I get a reply saying your staff will do it as soon as they've finished their current jobs.
10:40pm - By this time I am getting customers shouting at me as this is taking too long, too right! I sternly reply to the ticket asking again to please rack them, once again explaining my situation.
10:49pm - I get a reply saying the servers will be racked as your tech has finished his other jobs.
11:08pm - I get a reply saying the servers have been racked but not plugged in, asking how I want them cabled - fair question, if not a bit obvious.
11:20pm - Servers are pinging
11:25pm - I have reconfigured the servers to work on the new IP range, so my job is complete, I then emailed them back asking if they're cPanel trained - turns out they aren't, although some members of their team might know bits and pieces - not what I was told on the tour, not useful to me at all.
I had a think about it over the weekend -- I wondered, if we can now only access our equipment 8am-8pm Mon-Fri (30% of each week) and they won't even allow a Dell engineer in out of hours, plus their staff are too busy to handle our requests in a timely manner -- what do we do if something goes wrong?
Worst case scenario is if a server physically broke at 5pm on a Friday and we didn't have the necessary spare part. We have 4hr SLA with Dell so they'd arrive at RS at 9pm but not be allowed in until 8am on Monday.
I decided it would be unwise for us to use a data centre which only allows us access to the building for 30% of the week and we should have been told before we signed our contract that we'd only be allowed in during those times. Being told their staff were cPanel trained bugged me too, especially if what they're selling me is a 'Managed' rack.
I wrote a long ranty email to them to nullify the contract, Paul Tacey-Green phoned me, we had a chat, he said they'd change the access time rules (but he hasn't yet), he mentioned that 2/4 of their staff on that shift had taken the night off sick and offered me some time free to show their commitment, I wasn't interested, I got the contract nullified and arranged to get out of there.
I then called BlueSquare, they provisioned a new rack, got me a new IP range sorted and assured they'd help with whatever I needed.
Getting out of there was interesting, a week later I opened a ticket to go there 19:30 one night, they made an exception to allow myself and a member of my staff in at the same time (only one visitor on DC floor allowed usually as their racks aren't secure).
We got in there really quickly, the tech guy was nice. (But there seemed only to be 2 techs on site, Paul, on the phone told me there should be 4 during night shift) Anyway, we get to our rack and find the servers they'd racked the previous week weren't done properly, firstly they'd randomly been racked in the middle of the rack rather than on top of the existing ones (at the bottom of the rack), and then, quite scarily/hilariously, the bottom one they'd racked (in the middle of the rack), the rails weren't put in at the back, so it was defying gravity and mysteriously HANGING at about a 15 degree angle in the rack!
We packed up our stuff as fast as possible, got out of there. We got into BlueSquare 10mins later, by the time we reached the door there were already BlueSquare techs waiting for us! They immediately took all our equipment out the back of my car and put it next to the rack so we could get it all installed.
Anyway, I thought I'd just share my experience of RapidSwitch - Im sure they have lots of happy customers. I'm just happy we got out of there before we moved in too much kit. I couldn't handle the thought of giving them another chance, them failing and us being forced to move out some busy shared servers at 7:30pm one night! We'll be staying at BlueSquare from now on.
View 5 Replies
View Related
Nov 14, 2008
I just ordered a VPS from SteadFast.net and it comes with Full Managed Support.
What does this really mean? Will they install/configures/manage 3rd party softwares such as XCache, LiteSpeed, etc?
View 4 Replies
View Related
May 31, 2007
i'm beginning my search for a fully managed vps host. I plan on sending an email to each of these hosts and asking questions but i want to inquire here to see if i've missed any prime candidates. I'm choosing VPS mainly because of the security of having your own server + flexibility to do custom stuff down the line if need be. And my site doesn't really need the resources of a dedicated machine.
My current host goes down all the time and has a really long support response. We've also been having lots of connection issues with the clients we have in china. While this may be unavoidable due to the great firewall of china, i think there's got to be a better setup. We'll see.
My website:
This is for a small business (10 or so people) and the website is only used internally for project management, email, and the like. The bandwidth + load are minimal but there is quite a bit of file storage. The main application being used is dot project (mysql + php).
Fully managed:
I just want the OS / basic installed applications (mysql, php, ftp, apache, cpanel, possibly dot project, etc) to be kept up-to-date for security reasons. I don't want to have to monitor each of these to see when a new bugfix comes out. If a service fails (like email) i'd like it to be looked into. I can handle the user management / coding / etc. I don't expect security audits of my website or anything. Yes, i will be asking each host if they will do these items as i understand "fully managed" means a lot of different things to different people.
Requirements:
5+GB space, 5GB Bandwidth (overkill), php, mysql, cpanel would be nice, dot project
Price:
hopefully under $60/month
Here's the hosts that i'm going to look into, please let me know if i've left someone out. Yes, i'll be searching the board for reviews of these hosts as well.
liquidweb.com
rackspace.com
knownhost.com
servint.net
myriadnetwork.com
zone.net
primaryvps.com
rosehosting.com
prohosters.com
mh-one.com
View 4 Replies
View Related
Jan 8, 2009
I may soon be in the market for a VPS, and would like a fully managed FreeBSD VPS. Preferably with either DirectAdmin or Plesk.
View 3 Replies
View Related
Jan 12, 2009
Do you know which companies offer Fully Managed VPS in european countries with Cpanel?
I need 15-20GB Space, at least 512 RAM and 500GB Bandwidth
View 8 Replies
View Related
Sep 26, 2009
I own a pretty high traffic soccer blog. Nothing out of the ordinary!
It generates an average of 8k unique visitors/day - but can reach 30+ unique/day.
According to the guy who is currently hosting it - it does around 30-50gb bandwidth per day.
I'm not sure if I even need a Dedicated server for this. However, the old host said that the HUGE peaks of traffic in the middle of the day are causing him problems.
I'm not very technical - just the writer of the blog - do a couple of other web developments aswell, but I've never really needed a dedicated server before!
Thus, I need this fully managed - and want it to basically work as a reseller hosting account (if thats possible).
I need this quickly as the website is going to be deleted by the end of THIS month! He just told me today . He was taking the revenue from the site in exchange for the hosting. I'd now like to just cough up and pay for it!
If anyone can give me any advise, do I need a dedicated server? Would a VPS do? What prices am I looking at? Are there any companies which suit my needs?
View 14 Replies
View Related
Sep 4, 2008
We want a reliable and powerful fully managed Linux server (Cent OS if possible) for under $300 a month.
View 11 Replies
View Related
Aug 26, 2007
Does anyone know who provides fully managed VPS that supports Apache2? I am currently hosting with LiquidWeb and I am happy with their service. However, they only support Apache 1.3 on their managed VPS.
View 7 Replies
View Related
Apr 24, 2007
Wondering if anyone can provide me with a few hosts that offer fully managed VPS's with CPanel/WHM control panel? Linux OS.
I dont need high specs in regards to space/bw, but the more the better
Also, budget is less than $30/mo.
View 8 Replies
View Related
Dec 11, 2007
Just am happy to hear that knownhost.com vps provided now has become fully managed .
I was confident about this company but now I am more happy and I definitely recommend them.
View 0 Replies
View Related
Aug 16, 2007
Our company may be going the Linux route, so I'm in the market for a Linux VDS that's fully managed. I've never utilized a fully-managed service, so maybe you guys can help me out here.
I used to have a shared account with LiquidWeb (up until a week or two ago actually), and I didn't have any complaints there. However, I've never used their VDS service.
I've had a VDS at MyriadNetwork for almost a year now, and they're one of the best--if not best--providers I've ever done business with; very prompt ticket responses (less than 10 minutes on normal-priority tickets), very friendly and helpful even if it's your responsibility.
I'm aware that LiquidWeb includes full management in their price, whereas MyriadNetwork offers it for an additional $75/mo. A fully-managed comparable plan at LiquidWeb is about 50% cheaper than Myriad's. I know from experience that Myriad's higher prices are justified with the service they provide, but I'd like to know what everyone here thinks.
Should I choose Myriad and hope their full management service is as good as their VDS service, or should I try LiquidWeb out and hope they deliver? Has anyone used either provider's fully-managed services?
Please move this to the Managed forum if it's more appropriate; I picked this one because my situation deals with two very specific VDS providers.
View 5 Replies
View Related
Sep 18, 2008
I wanted a completely fully managed server -- meaning everything is taken care of and I do not have to hire a server admin -- what would be the least expensive pricing from a reputable hosting provided?
View 14 Replies
View Related
Jun 6, 2008
what exactly it means?
what can i expect if i rent a server like that?
View 14 Replies
View Related
Apr 28, 2008
I would like to hear about sites providing fully managed servers.
View 14 Replies
View Related
Apr 23, 2009
im hosted on futurehosting and truly they rock with gr8 support and instant services, 3-4 small sites but today whole day it was down due to apparently DDOS attack - as per my hosts response. read history here [url]
When i took FH i had done some research and thought its 100% managed VPS - i never knew its not proactive managed service etc! frankly i did ask on WHT and FH was the most recommended and truly they have lived up to it and i have no complains but just that maybe my requirement is a more proactive support service:-)
seems i need to move on - to som1 who can handle DDOS attacks + offer proactive monitoring which FH says it doesn't offer
1. LiquidWeb.com promises DDOS protections under their [url]
2. another option seems [url]
3. am told wiredtree would work well too for a complete newbie like me ?
View 14 Replies
View Related
Jul 27, 2009
I'm looking for the decent VPS solution and would like to have the best option ever for this kind of the services. I was suggested with wansecurity VPS and serverpoint
View 2 Replies
View Related
Dec 4, 2007
Does anyone have any recommendations regarding managed hosting providers?
View 10 Replies
View Related
Oct 16, 2009
Need the following specs from an established Managed Windows VPS provider with Ticket and Phone Support.
Server 2003
Helm 4
30-50GB Disk
1TB+ Bandwidth
1024 Memory
MySQL or WinSQL
2+ IP's
View 6 Replies
View Related
Aug 6, 2008
Currently our site resides on a dedicated server that I manage. We are only using a fraction of the resources on the server and I have no interest in trying to sell accounts or resources, just too much headache. We made the move from HostGator to a dedicated server some time ago when it became apparent HostGator was overselling. Our server was seeing reboots way too often, ads and their company branded error pages (although I could have changed this part), and sluggish performance.
What I'm interested in is a hosting company that offers backup solutions and can make your backups available quickly in the event of a failure. Other companies I have dealt with offered this but their response time of 1-3 days is just unacceptable. I will also stay away from any overselling, built in ads of any kind, and companies without 24/7 phone support.
I would like to stay with cPanel so our user's email accounts will not be interrupted or changed when the site is transfered. Of course if there is a full import option to another control panel this isn't an issue.
So my question is this: Does this company/service exist, or are we stuck paying for a dedicated server that we don't need? I'm more than willing to pay, just looking to see if there is an option less expensive that my dedicated server.
View 5 Replies
View Related
Sep 22, 2008
I've had a similar conversation in the past wanted to get more specific.
It's really a personal question.
I want a dedicated server but don't want to pay the extra 70 a month for managed solution.
If i don't have much experience with a linux server and can't use windows server because i need Apache mod_rewrite am i safe just getting a dedicated host and not messing with anything but the cpanel?
Most apps i've hand coded so i don't forsee upgrades, assuming it comes with the standard setup.
Why would i need a hosting manager, I think i can learn things on my own right?
Anyone been in my shoes before and went dedicated non managed?
View 24 Replies
View Related
Jun 18, 2007
I currently have a shared hosting account with a provider. They have been less than stellar, so I'm looking into alternatives.
I'm am designing and hosting Joomla sites for customers. While I can certainly look into using another shared hosting provider, I certainly owe my customers the best most reliable hosting experience possible.
Would VPS fit the bill? At what point do I consider moving from a Shared hosting environment to Managed VPS?
View 14 Replies
View Related
Jan 27, 2008
For reliable managed hosting, with some research, I can find...
Liquid Web
Rackspace
It seems like Liquid Web is definitely the bang for the bucks.. but it also makes me think if it's too good to be true. I feel Rackspace is more "professional" and they're more "high-end". But I definitely love the pricing from LiquidWeb. for the same price, I can get a quad core + 4GB from LiquidWeb, and maybe an AMD dual-core + 1GB from Rackspace..
My question is : Do LiquidWeb and Rackspace offer the same kind of "managed services"? Rackspace told me that they would give me an account manager which makes me feel more personalized. but I also had a live chat with LiquidWeb and the sales kept marketing the "Heroic support"
Let me give you some statistics of my site
Nature : E-commerce
Target : UK/Europe
Daily Visitor : 7000-13000
App : PHP + MySQL
View 9 Replies
View Related
Aug 21, 2009
I have a client looking for a managed hosting facility in Delaware.
Can anyone provide recommendations for a Tier II or Tier III Provider?
View 0 Replies
View Related
Oct 27, 2008
I'm currently using a SiteGround virtual private server with the following spec:
OS:CentOS (Linux)
cPanel: yes
Support:24/7
RAM: 512 MB
Accounts: 1 main
Traffic: 1,000 GB
Price/mo: $99.00
I'm hosting x2 Joomla 1.5 sites using PHP v5 with the following extensions:
Sobe2
OpenX
Community Builder
Fireboard
Virtumart
The problem is that both sites have several sizable databases, each in excess of 100k records. After uploading the first 90k records to mySQL it became apparent that performance was going to be an issue. I'm therefore considering a dedicated server, tuned for returning fast DB results.
Firstly, would a dedicated server solve my performance issues?
Secondly, what are the critical components, spec wise, that would ensure superfast DB calls?
Like everyone, I'm looking for the best value, meaning solid support, uptime and a low monthly cost. I have been recommended the following hosting partners, but would like everyones input:
site5.com
rackspace.com
iweb.com
singlehop.com
servepath.com
superbhosting.net
Rochen.com
View 14 Replies
View Related
Sep 16, 2008
I tried searching around but maybe someone can steer me in the right direction.
I, as probably many other people, are in an interesting predicament.
I love my VPS right now...however obviously since I started with my VPS I'm about to out grow it, with the amount of power that I need.
What I'm looking for is a server which is completely managed, completely secured (some sort of active virus scanning), however I can get in there and have complete control like I would with my VPS, but obviously with more resources.
What I'm looking for is:
2-4GBs of ram
Pentium D (minimum) up to a Xeon 3220 SINGLE processor
1000 - 2000TB / bandwidth
100mb/s uplink
Windows 03 would be great, I'll settle for CentOS though
Budget max is $170/mo.
View 13 Replies
View Related
Apr 11, 2008
if there are any recommendations on managed database hosting services. This will be used for a fairly large project running on Mysql DB. Due to the size and complexity of the database a lot of resources are being used, so I prefer to find a company which specializes in dB hosting.
View 8 Replies
View Related
Apr 25, 2007
I am just considering to relocate one of my four sites from the current Ipowerweb shared hosting to a managed VPS one. I am fed up with their ftp upload speed problems and level of customer service and I want to upgrade to something sort of "semi dedicated".
Please consider that I am a beginner in VPS and i do not know anything about Linux other than it is an operating system. I have a few questions:
1) Managed or Unmanaged VPS
I guess as a beginner I would preferably have to opt for a managed VPS solution? Do you agree?
2) Easiest and most secure Linux Operating system to choose for VPS
I do not wanna end up having to fine tuning security issues or setting command line OS options (just want to reboot the server if needed and accomplish simple operations whithin the control panel). For example VPSlink at [url] shows me so many OS choices (centos, ubuntu, debian, fedora, opensuse etc. ) that make me confuse .
As a beginner which one is the easiest and most secure Linux Operating systems to choose?
3) Easiest VPS Control Panel
I am currently using Ipowerweb vDeck and aPlus control panels. What is the easiest VPS control panel to choose?
4) VPS Unlimited domains hosting
Does that mean that i can host unlimited domains or just park/redirect domains like in the shared hosting?
5) Preloaded PHP, MYSQL and other plugins/addons
Do they come included in the package like in shared hosting or do I have to install them myself?
6) VPS Dedicated IP and Search Engine Optinisation (SEO)
If I have one single VPS dedicated IP and many hosted websites do they share they same IP? How this affect the SEO effort if, for example, Google see all the websites sharing the same IP and linking each other? How would the announced Host Gator SEO Hosting [url]overcome this issue (no idea what multiple C classes are )?
7) VPS Hardware / resource selection
What minimum resources would you recommend for the following website profile?
Size: 45MB
Type/Features: Static pages, no forum or dynamic database driven pages
Daily Unique visitors: 4,000
Max bandwidth: 1,5 GB per month
8) Which cheap managed VPS to choose under 30$ a month?
Considering all the above, which cheap and managed VPS solution (possibly under 30$ a month) would you suggest to a beginner?
I noticed good reviews for KnownHost and they offer a basic semi-managed 20$ a month plan. Would a semi-managed plan good for a beginner like me? Any similar offers, with strong Customer support, you would suggest to look into?
View 14 Replies
View Related
Jul 8, 2008
The Planet has expanded its focus to add a suite of managed services, which it calls "Planet Northstar" and has rebranded its dedicated server offerings as "Planet Alpha." It's also redesigned its site with a Web 2.0 look.
View 14 Replies
View Related
