So I have been using Managed Hosting for almsot 2 years now. It has been quite a rollercoaster. I orginally started off with a VPS account until I was acquiring to many clients and needed more space. SO I decided ot go for the Managed server. I researched for 2 weeks and came across OLM. My main reason for using them was the 24/7 tech support and the price was pretty good. I am on my second server with them now so I dont know what I started off with but that doesnt matter. Im talking about my experience.
So I got my control panel which was ensim and is has been working really good except for some issue with email address crapping out and the spam protection sucks. My client didnt complain about the spam so I didnt do to much about it. Anytime I have an issue with an email account, site was down, permission issues or php issues (server side only) and Mysql (server side only) they were able to help me and they support guys are nice. Got to knwop them real well after a while. One thing about there machines is the server setup was pretty crappy. they had way to many config files which made it a mess. Unless you know linux, you wont be going in there so you have no way of knowing it is a mess. After a year and a half I started getting fed up because the server started crashing alot and emails kept crapping out, so I decided to find another company. Also, if a company doesnt ghave a seperates support line for dedicated server from shared hostign/VPS it isn't good. Hey you pay almost more then people paying $5.00 a month. Managed should get priority.
I moved to superb.net after a recomencdation from my programmerand got a system with Plesk on it. After moving all my sites over ( a major pain ) I started realizing how Plesk was the wrong cpanel to use. For a managed server Ensim was 100 times better and with Plesk you had to do a ton of configuring and it was a mess. Superb wasn't all that helpful and there tech support sucked as they had phone support but they never picked up. It was always by there ticket system and it took way to long to get back to me. Also they had to call Plesk for most issues as they couldnt handle it inhouse which isn't good. So with a crappy cpanel and horrible support I had no choice but to move all sites back to OLM after 2 weeks. I never got rid of the OLM server
I got back to OLM, and get havign the same issues. I asked them to upgrade my spam setign which they do charge for which is understandable. Managed hosting they only support what is on the server. I paid for this upgrade and after they did it my server was destroyed. Every single php website of mine stopped working and they couldnt fix it. Luckily I happened to be in touch with an old friend who works for a hositng company and he was able to fix my server. I was paying OLM, and they couldnt fix it. they refused to refund me for the headache they caused me.
So 2 months later, I decided to buy my own server, and have my friend manage it. I got a dell poweredge 1750, with 4gb ram, 3 scsi hardrivesand now have a gigabyte uplink and my server is colocated. I get my own server and my expenses are cut in half.
I have an amazing setup and shouldnt have the issue the issues other companies caused. Plus my friend really know what he is doing. Also no cpanel this time because cpanels put a lot of stress on the servers.
RECAP: What did we learn here about managed hosting -
1. make sure they have 24/7 phone support
2. make sure they have dedicated phone supprt for managed servers
3. make sure they give you ensim or cpanel (easiest to run)
4. make sure you can handle the stress that you get with having a managed server. Shared hosting was so much easier.
5. you get what you pay for sometimes. I didn't have this issue but if you decide to buy a 70 dollar server, don't do it
6. good luck!!!!
So I got my control panel which was ensim and is has been working really good except for some issue with email address crapping out and the spam protection sucks. My client didnt complain about the spam so I didnt do to much about it. Anytime I have an issue with an email account, site was down, permission issues or php issues (server side only) and Mysql (server side only) they were able to help me and they support guys are nice. Got to knwop them real well after a while. One thing about there machines is the server setup was pretty crappy. they had way to many config files which made it a mess. Unless you know linux, you wont be going in there so you have no way of knowing it is a mess. After a year and a half I started getting fed up because the server started crashing alot and emails kept crapping out, so I decided to find another company. Also, if a company doesnt ghave a seperates support line for dedicated server from shared hostign/VPS it isn't good. Hey you pay almost more then people paying $5.00 a month. Managed should get priority.
I moved to superb.net after a recomencdation from my programmerand got a system with Plesk on it. After moving all my sites over ( a major pain ) I started realizing how Plesk was the wrong cpanel to use. For a managed server Ensim was 100 times better and with Plesk you had to do a ton of configuring and it was a mess. Superb wasn't all that helpful and there tech support sucked as they had phone support but they never picked up. It was always by there ticket system and it took way to long to get back to me. Also they had to call Plesk for most issues as they couldnt handle it inhouse which isn't good. So with a crappy cpanel and horrible support I had no choice but to move all sites back to OLM after 2 weeks. I never got rid of the OLM server
I got back to OLM, and get havign the same issues. I asked them to upgrade my spam setign which they do charge for which is understandable. Managed hosting they only support what is on the server. I paid for this upgrade and after they did it my server was destroyed. Every single php website of mine stopped working and they couldnt fix it. Luckily I happened to be in touch with an old friend who works for a hositng company and he was able to fix my server. I was paying OLM, and they couldnt fix it. they refused to refund me for the headache they caused me.
So 2 months later, I decided to buy my own server, and have my friend manage it. I got a dell poweredge 1750, with 4gb ram, 3 scsi hardrivesand now have a gigabyte uplink and my server is colocated. I get my own server and my expenses are cut in half.
I have an amazing setup and shouldnt have the issue the issues other companies caused. Plus my friend really know what he is doing. Also no cpanel this time because cpanels put a lot of stress on the servers.
RECAP: What did we learn here about managed hosting -
1. make sure they have 24/7 phone support
2. make sure they have dedicated phone supprt for managed servers
3. make sure they give you ensim or cpanel (easiest to run)
4. make sure you can handle the stress that you get with having a managed server. Shared hosting was so much easier.
5. you get what you pay for sometimes. I didn't have this issue but if you decide to buy a 70 dollar server, don't do it
6. good luck!!!!