Hi got an image server with volumedrive but very disappointed about the speeds.
I ordered a 100mbps.
In Lighttpd server-status it cannot go more then 1.10 Mbyte/s...
but at PacificRack the same amount of traffic easily does 2.5Mbyte/s and in past has done 4Mbytes/s not even sweating.
Am I on 10mbps or 100mbps?
I ran mii-tool and it says eth0: negotiated 100baseTx-FD, link ok
I haven't even used my server at all for a few minutes because everytime I want to use it the connection is too slow that I need to change back to PacificRack.
we have 9 rack each rack have 2 cisco switch 2950(1 for internet and 1 for private network) if we try to do a transfer files between two server we can't go over 1mbps, the same if we move the file from the web, every server nic is set to 100mbps the same for swith port, why we get a so slow speed?
I see on their website they have very minimal information. But i would like to know how is their customer backend control panel ? I.e can you restart server from the customer control panel ?
And how is there support response in terms like your server is down and you have to restart it how fast do they respond ? Please honest replies only.
I'm still looking for a new server. VolumeDrive.com has interested me, but so far I've been unable to get a real price quote out of them (four requests).
With the recent problems with a different reseller I want to make sure I don't deal with a reseller.
The VolumeDrive site says they have their own datacenter, but it appears all their traffic is routed via burst.net (hostnoc.net which is BurstNET). I suspect that VolumeDrive is just a reseller for BurstNET, but honestly I don't know for sure.
Anyone know the bottom line on VolumeDrive? I'd like to find out before I give one last attempt to get a price quotation for my config.
Its been a long time since I have been there with VolumeDrive and I think they do deserve a review here.
I started off with volumedrive in November with 1 server and the very next month got another one.
Their uptime has been amazing. I have rather enjoyed their really good uptime. Their prices are really cheap as compared to others but the services offered are really great.
Jeff and Josh make an amazing team and help you out all the time even tho their servers are unmanaged ones. They have great connectivity but the only problem is the BurstNET network they are on. I have had a few problems with BurstNET and that is the reason I am shifting out of VolumeDrive.
They are soon going to be moving to their own datacenter and services (I hope) would only improve then.
This is My Review for VD Server Service..its short because i had the Service only for Month..
In Short Words, it was Very Good Expirence, I had little Truble to Get the DNS to Work, I had Few times Down For Problem with the DA Panel.. But The Service Is Great and the Support is Quick and Helpful. Too Bad i had to Cancel Because i wanted to Gain More Expirence to how Run Server, so i decided to install Linux and Learn it befor Run a Server..But Sure when i come Back i well Sign up again with VD, The Price Very Good and The Server and Support very Good too. so why Not ..
I thought I could share my opinion on VolumeDrive after being with them for a few months. I always appreciated when I could find in-depth reviews from hosting companies when I was looking for one so I hope some peope will find this review useful.
First of all, here my plan with them:
Quote:
AMD Athlon64 3200+ 1 GB DDR2 Ram 120 GB SATA Hard Drive 3000 GB of bandwidth on 100MB port 2 IP addresses Ubuntu Server 8.04 Linux
This package costs me $49.95 per month.
It all started when I contacted them to have more information on their services and what they have to offer. They replied very quickly and sent me a document detailing every offer they have and how their plans work. It's a shame that all that information wasn't available on their website, they proposed roughly 3 different dedicated solutions on their order form when you can actually choose a bunch of other options. Anyway, I asked a few other questions (like if they could install Ubuntu even if it wasn't listed in the available OS, and they had no problem in doing this). Again, they replied quickly. I made my choice and as I made my first payment, my server was online 24 hours later, as stated in their e-mail.
Communication with Volumedrive's staff is always great, I've had an issue one time where my internet connection was realllllly slow. I e-mailed them and it took a few minutes before I received an answer to my e-mail with someone trying to find what was wrong. We exchanged a few e-mails trying to find what was the issue and the issue got resolved in no time. Aside from this problem, I've never had any network or hardware issue (still have a fresh new server though)
I also personnaly think that their prices are far superior to what other companies offer. Their plans are flexible and if I want a hardware upgrade for example I know I can just contact them and we'll work out the details.
The only downsides I can give them is that their website is missing a lot of information. When you are looking for a server you may not want to spend time contacting each company by e-mail to ask question and have more information, you rely on the website to give you a lot of details. Also, their invoice system is not so great. You receive an e-mail saying you need to pay them and they only accept paypal. When your payment is done, you don't receive any confirmation e-mail. It's not bothering me much for a 50$ server, but I'd want a more conventional billing system with automatic renewal if I had a big business going on with them.
All in all, I really like volumedrive! I'd recommend it for everybody looking for a low cost dedicated server, they're fast, professional and helpful. You just need to send them an e-mail to get the plan that works for you so tow thumbs up for Volumedrive!
I have three similar offers from three different companies
1) BurstNET Q6600 2GB RAM 250 HDD 2000GB transfer (not sure if its 10 Mbps or 100 Mbps... I think 10) 5 IP addresses DirectAdmin unlimited domains Basic Management First month free
2) VolumeDrive Q8200 or Q6600 (my choice) 4GB RAM 500 HDD 10 Mbps unmetered Not sure how many IP (I forgot to ask =X) Plesk 30 domain Basic Management
3) Hivelocity Q8200 2GB RAM 500 HDD 1500 GB over 10 Mbps (I wish it was 100 Mbps...) 6 IPs DirectAdmin Unlimited domains Silver Plan management
The prices for all the above are similar (only a few dollars here and there).
VolumeDrive has the best deal spec wise, but I really like the first free month w/ BurstNET (gives me a chance to "try out their service") but I know Hivelocity has the best reputation. Its like highschool drama all over again .
Does anyone have a problem with volumedrive with accessing your sites? I have a dedicated server (no load, consumes around 500Mbytes/month) but I my pages open pretty often slow. Today I even cannot open a page because speed is around 1byte/second. Yes, I can access my server, but I cannot wait when a page finishes loading. I wait and wait and wait. Anyone has a similar problem, probably near to me? My ip range: 66.197.221.XX
I've been with Volumedrive for approximately a year and I have mostly a great experience with them. I currently have 1 server with them which is being used to mirror some patches for a popular MMORPG.Sales 10/10
I was trying to find out how much bandwidth was being provided by VD. The site looks professional but I didn't much information about the connection. I received a reply from Josh shortly after sending them an email, and received a list with the servers that were available along with the bandwidth information. It is unbelievable that 10Mbps is offered at such a low price.
To be honest I was a bit skeptical, so I decided to give them a try. I got a Celeron Conroe and paid a one time fee for the RAM.
The deployment took a while since they were out of stock, since it was nothing urgent I patiently waited.Network 8/10
The network is pretty good at VD, it wasn't all that great when my VD server was still at the BurstNET's location. I was glad to know that VD were now going to be operating out of BurstNET and noticed that they have a link with XO that doesn't seem to go through BurstNET. Outages on Burst's network usually meant my server would go offline, but since the XO peering I haven't had an outage along with Burst.
I did have some network problems recently after they replaced a switch, it seemed like a QoS profile was set and it took some time to fix (server speed was some way capped at 5Mbps). I am having a little network issue at the moment but I'm still trying to figure out (with the help of VD) whether it is something on my server's end instead.Support 10/10
It amazes me that I'm getting a personal level of support from either Josh or Jeff. I hope they are getting enough sleep to keep up with the work! I usually receive replies in few minutes to a max of a few hours (depending on the problem).
I had a hardware issue on around February (hard drive failing). The drive was replaced and my server was up and running by the next day. However this new hard drive seemed to be failing as well (guess a bad batch of them) and it was promptly replaced by a brand new 160GB (I had a 120GB drive) Hitachi.
Reboots are not bad either, ranging from 5 to approximately 20 minutes in my experience so far.Billing 10/10
The billing part is what worries me at providers, I once had my server offline at another provider because I hadn't received that month's invoice. So far no problems at VD, sometimes the usual invoice date passes but I was reassured that it would be sent eventually (and they are).Overall experience from above: 9.5/10Conclusions:
If you are looking for a server with a good level of support, and a bit tight on budget I'd strongly recommend VD. I hope they keep up with the service as they expand.Domain hosted: navarus.org
did not want to mix up my 2 reviews so posting separately for www.Volumedrive.com.
Being their client for about a month or more, using their services for my separate proxy hosting server.
Let me do the rating :
Support: 9/10 (dunno what happened but one of the reboot requests took some time, email issues, or some other isp issue)
Friendliness: 10/10 (Josh seems good enough guy and can handle some my demanding nature i think )
Hardware: 9/10 (well a week or 2 new server lost its Power Supply, so deducted 1, but hoping no other hardware failures occur, was replaced in 30 mins or so if i recall correctly and it was on weekend).
Network: 10/10 (so far no problems got some special setup with josh about bandwidth usage and port speeds, no network outages i noticed so far).
Ok after that some comments:
They can improve on maybe confirming what can be offered/ feasible for new server, beforehand . Example, i thought i would get a Hardware Firewall Protection as offered by Josh in initial pre-sale questions, but later i found out that due to Direct Admin that would not be possible, i am sure even in pre-sale discussion was mostly about getting DA. What would have pleased me was to cover it up they could have upgrade DA to Cpanel and tried to get the protection as promised at no extra cost. But i suppose that would have meant no profit and losses for them, so i did not pursue them regarding the same.
Oh one more thing , if only they had a price list for special servers or something on website that would have been great, if VD folks need help i can create a page or something for them, for different servers, after all i am by profession now a webmaster/designer/coder etc etc..
But don't let that alone dilute/corrupt your mind about VD, if they were bad trust me i would be the first one to let everyone know. Cause all good deeds bunny never forgets, and those who hurt bunny can never get away with it....
2nd time now server within 24hrs is down, not sure whats happening. Anyone with volumedrive facing same issues, or i am just being unlucky.
Am still awaiting a thorough reply to last nights downtime. If its server issue i need to know and fix it, but if its network issue, i still need to know to decide accordingly the best route. But am right now in a dark and does not help me much !
Sorry had to ask this publicly but its not VD thats losing money its me.
i'd post an update review on volumedrive. I'm a long standing client with them, varying between 3-5 servers with them at any given time.
Support. On the whole josh and jeff are the friendliest nicest people I know. They are willing to help out with any minor server issues, resolve rebuilds matters rapidly, and know where to point you to in the event of problems.
Network. Probably on the weaker side of their services. using burst.net i've had at least a couple of network complications every month i've been with them. some have been no-notice router updates / upgrades, some have been hijacked IP addresses from other servers in the network (should be resolved in new data center). But on the whole, good network performance, responsive and fast. And you can't complain with 10+mbit unmetered...
Current issues. Here's where the "don't jump on the boat" bit comes in. VD has been incredibly busy as of late shifting to the new datacenter. as a result their customer service and *actual* performance is suffering seriously. What I mean by this is that while they are super friendly, promise to get things done, give very confident and positive estimates as to when they can get a server up or fix some issue, they just don't get anything done.
In the last month I've faced some serious issues regarding this. The most in-your-face one has been an additional harddrive I had requested to be put in 15 days ago today and paid for it. They said they had them in stock. A few days later, still no drive - got an immediate response to my query that they had used up the drives in new builds and they had specifically ordered me one which would arrive on monday, so i'd have it monday evening.
monday evening came and went, tuesday came and went. responses each time are "We will add this for you tonight, I will make sure of it." (actual quote from e-mail sent yesterday, needless to say I don't have the drive yet) or along that tune. About 20 mins prior to this email I sent them an update request, I'll keep you up to date of this saga
Sadly, this has been the case practically everyday for over 2 weeks now.
That's just one example. A celeron which they had in stock which they said would take 2 days to set up took 6 days. A high power xeon that I made a contract with them to have it set up by Monday (this past one, 5 days ago) was happily taken on by them saying it would not be an issue. I said I'd pay on delivery as it was a time sensitive server and if I didn't have it by the promised delivery date (which they said they could definitely meet) I wouldn't be purchasing it. By tuesday I had no word, and obviously didn't end up getting the server and had to go with another company.
Bottom line. Guys please don't misunderstand - volumedrive is an AMAZING company and I've been with them long enough to still trust these fellows, even after being jerked around a bit this past month. The only reason I haven't jumped ship is cause I know these guys will get back on the horse. I'm just hoping it's sometime soon before their business starts suffering - I've been in the web hosting market long enough to know which direction companies take when they start falling through with promises and have demand outgrow what they can supply, and refuse to deal with customer service expansion.
So yeah, basically, keep an eye on these boards. I'm sure when VD is back on the horse it'll be known, but until then I'd be a little weary and realize these guys are under immense pressure and probably won't be able to fulfil your requests in a timely fashion regardless of how many promises they make or emails they send about it being set up by "tonight."
I have been a customer with them for four complete months, and in that time my experience with them had plummeted from terrible to atrocious.
For starters, there are only two guys who run the entire company - Josh and Jeff. One of them sits at the server at any given time which would make them working 12 hours a day I guess because whenever I mail their support, I get a reply within 5 minutes from either one of them. Yes, 5 minutes. But, that is where the niceties end. Their actual knowledge or work is generally horrible to pathetic. Yes, they attend to simple concerns, but most of the time it is all due to their own fault. And, there is absolutely no privacy because every time the server goes down (which, believe me, is more than 30% of the time), you need to send them your password so they can troubleshoot your RDP. I mean, come on, what could possibly go wrong in a windows server that only I have used, and the only thing I did was setup IIS and even that was working for a couple of weeks fine.
Bandwidth is fine at 10 mbps - you get at least 1 MBps throughput either ways so I have no complaints there. But, downtime is terrible. And, the worst part is that they would not know when their network is down. I have had to mail them 8 times on 8 different occasion to correct their 'loose cable' - as they so eloquently put their excuse, and more than 30 times on other occasions (I have all the mails archived and I just counted through all of them).
Coming back to the privacy problem, once you give your password, the server is not yours. I log back into RDP after 3 days (since it was a weekend) and I see THREE new programs running - all to do with some kind of a mail forward or something. I uninstalled them all immediately at control panel. I mailed them asking what was going on and they denied any knowledge about it. I changed the password. That week, I get a mail from them saying their ISP has received abuse complaints from the server IP for mass mailing. I just could not stand it. I gave them the password to the server to look into it. They said everything is clean and resumed service. I changed password again. Soon after, the server goes down and they need the password to rectify it. I mean, come on, give me a break. Anyway, having no other choice, I did the same, and miraculously everything starts working. Soon after, I get the mail saying that I need to not change the password since they need to monitor the server since the ISP wants them to monitor the exact content of the server. The cycle had repeated over three times in the last four months.
Coming to hardware, trust me, you cannot get crappier hardware than in the 8-year old spares they sell on ebay. TWO hard drives had failed for me in the last 4 months, and I don't even use them that much. The first time was a secondary drive with so much of my data, which they could not recover even one file out of. Then, there was again some problems with the ISP about the server and I was shifted on to a new server with a new IP and a new primary drive. My old primary drive was added as a secondary so I could take my left over data. All these without any prior information to me. And, here comes the kicker: My new primary drive where I had about 10 GB of data stored moved from my secondary and where I had worked on for two days setting everything up and securing it failed in exactly 3 days! Can you imagine yourself in my position? Would you not be more pissed? I got mad. I told them I am terminating the service immediately and so I did. Here I am writing this review for the benefit of anyone who would even be considering them as a viable dedicated host. Boy, did they prove themselves to be the cheapest host! No, I am not talking about price alone. Honestly, one of the worst hosts I have tried.
Over the last 5ish years we have had servers with ServerBeach, The Planet, Layeredtech, and now VolumeDrive. Over the years each has had its share of ups and downs but now almost all of our servers are with VD. First before I start let me say this, Josh and Jeff are two of the best guys that I have ever had the pleasure of doing business with. Each of them know when they get out here I owe them a beer and steak dinner on the strip.
Ordering. 7/10
This is one area that sometimes is a little out there, there website does not work at all for ordering or at least not when I tried last. However ordering is simple, send an email to info and say order this. Get back an email saying OK. Pretty simple. The only problem is pricing, sometimes it takes Josh a few days to get a price for the server, or a bill just shows up and I am like, ok well cool.
Server Pricing. 10/10
This has to be one area where VolumeDrive shines. The prices they offer are almost unbelievable but hey it is there business model not mine. I can vouch anytime anyplace that these servers are 10Mbit unmetered servers. I have had 5 download servers, currently 3 that almost run 10Mbit 24/7. Each servers avg monthly bandwidth usage is around 2500 GB’s +-300ish GB’s and I have never once gotten a bill or even a letter of “dude your sucking down all the bandwidth” nothing; and even better yet I get these download boxes for all of $50/month. I won’t even hint at the great prices I have for Dual processors Quad Core Xeons with 8GB’s RAID1 10k Drives with cPanel.
Old Network. 8/10
First off we all know about the XO/BurstNet turn on that well didn’t so I am not going to beat that horse anymore. The old network was to me “ok” nothing special, and nothing really bad either. I will say that there is less of a “snappiness” in server responses it always seemed to take an extra second for the pages to load or more so the server to respond to a request. At one time I had all 5 download servers on the old network and they all were pulling the bandwidth like it was water, and are shared servers were humming along. I was always able to pull 10Mbit when needed.
New Network. 8/10
The new network to me I have not seen that much difference in performance. I have 2 download servers on the new network and oddly enough the bandwidth usage has decreased and instead a solid green graph via mrtg, I have spikes and dips all over the place. The shared servers on the new network do see to answer faster, and feel much more zippy or snappy. Still able to get all the bandwidth and speeds they offer so no complaint there.
Support. 9/10
I personally don’t think Josh or Jeff sleep, have wives/girlfriends/kids/lives. J They must live and breathe at their DC’s as no matter when I send an support email in, it gets answered in like 5 – 15 minutes even at 11 my time PST and there in EST. I feel that for an unmanaged server provider these guys are amazing, I have asked them to do things that I even offer to pay them, and they do for free. I have had to have 2 servers reloaded, and both times the servers were offline in 15 minutes, the current hard drives, slaved and a new drive placed in the box. Allowing me to move anything and everything from the old hard drive. Now I have to put out a few negative items as well. Sometimes they just don’t know and we kick ideas back and forth, which is not a problem at all but it does show that they are humans and we can’t expect perfection. J I also have an open support ticket with then about inbound speeds for a week that is unresolved, but continued updates, so can’t yell about it at all. Reboots I almost forgot take anywhere between 2 – 15 minutes and the boxes are back online.
Server Delivery. 4/10
This is the one area of VolumeDrive that really needs worked on, and worked on badly. Of the 13 servers I have had 10 currently; I don’t think any of them have been online in less than 72 hours. My servers have been online from 4 – 14 days. If you need a server now, I am sorry Josh and Jeff, VolumeDrive is not the company you need. However email them first as I do know that they get shipments in all the time. Now another problem that I have had is they don’t always get the servers right. Twice now I have ordered boxes that have been delivered without cPanel installed. Minor oversight that I did not freak out and scream, but annoying nonetheless, my last box was well just off by a lot, enough that I did send a not so polite note demanding it is fixed. To which I will admit Jeff had it corrected/upgrade/formatted in about 20 minutes. Now to their defense I have 2 Dual Processor Quad Core Xeons with 8GB and RAID 1, which were online in about a week and setup perfectly. So my two most complex setups were perfect, but some of my basic boxes borked... Go figure.
Server Upgrades. 7/10
I have had a few servers upgrade with new parts, this process is pretty painless I send off an email saying I need such and such for server so and so, and its ordered no questions. That is where the lack of pain stops; from then on it is for us a bit of pain, as several times now I have had to check after a week of no upgrade if the parts were ordered. Then reschedule upgrade times with our customers, this is to say the least an embarrassment a few times as we are left with cake on our faces. Now a huge plus there upgrades are very inexpensive and I have yet to be charged for the upgrade itself.
Billing. 8/10
This two is an area that I personally think needs worked on as they only except PayPal which is not bad, but most of us have our credit/debt cards for a reason. Now a huge plus for at least us, is that every server that has been order is just that; ordered, setup, and online, then a bill is sent. I have never had to prepay for a server, ever. Same with all the upgrades. Now I know that Josh strives for customer service and support first, but sometimes are bills are behind, at least before the PayPal subscripts get setup. Last week I paid out about $600 in past bills because things were behind. Which is not a problem, but from a books point of view in two weeks the bills are coming out again. Again another point where VolumeDrive shines is during this billing mix up which some of it was our fault I am sure, I asked that someone call me because at $50 for some of these servers $600 is a few odd bills, to discuss this. No less than 3 minutes after that email was sent my phone rang, and it was Josh ready with details to go over everything, and after the phone call I received a detailed email of the conversation.
Overall. 7.6/10
Overall I am very happy with VolumeDrive, yes there has been some extended times on delivery that has made us look stupid but once online the services are strong and they just work. I can and will continue to use VolumeDrive for some time to come, the only reason we have another provider is for our higher bandwidth needs and dedicated 20 – 100 Mbit ports. Their prices are simply amazing, and once everything is online and working their service is awesome. Again I am a very happy customer and will continue to be a happy customer for the foreseeable future.
