Rackspace has been considered cream of the crop for web hosting for some time. They also charge "cream of the crop" prices for that "fanatical support". I got an estimate from them several months back for a web server for PCMech.com and they quoted me about $750 per month. I get two dedicated servers all to myself at Pair Networks for less than that.
But, you get what you pay for. Or do you?
Rackspace has managed to take two major Internet services offline just recently. Late last week, popular web software company 37Signals went offline for several hours. It turns out the problem was a failure at Rackspace. In December, Rackspace had to take their Dallas datacenter offline due to cooling issues and a rouge truck driver ramming a power transformer and causing a power outage. Now, it seems they managed to kill of Tumblr. And, this time, Tumblr is taking their business elsewhere.
Rackspace is widely considered to be among the best web hosts out there. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt. As the old saying goes: sh*t happens. However, they should definitely look at their systems and see what they can improve. This has been a rough few days for Rackspace. And, with the high-visibility sites that host on Rackspace, they are in a position to catch a lot of flack when a problem occurs.
David Risley is the founder of PCMech.com. He is the brains, the thinker, the writer, the nerd.
Opinions crack me up. Where did you got your “facts”? I watch this company pretty close. Seems that the affected companies have openly disclosed some of their own errors in your noted hiccup. PCMechanics should know the golden rule that it’s not a matter of ‘if’ hardware will fail but simply ‘when.’ That’s what SLAs are for. Nor was their datacenter down as you state. They were able to take down a quadrant of their datacenter before it affected others. That’s pretty cool. Despite the fud-factor seems Rackspace continues to uphold their promises.
First off, judging by the hostname (rackspace.com) coming in on your comment, you have a tight relationship with Rackspace or perhaps even work for them. So, yeah, I bet you do “follow them closely”.
Secondly, relax. Rackspace continues to be one of the more reliable web hosts out there. That said, this IS a PR issue for Rackspace. And, quite frankly, you attempting to more or less blame Rackspace clients for the problem is very unprofessional. I’ll accept that hardware fails, but blaming clients for the “hiccups”? Come on.
Hosting high profile sites means “hiccups” like this are going to be mentioned in the blog world. A proper response would be to NOT point out the fault of your clients.
I’ve been working with rackspace for the past 6 months or so with a dedicated web server and an exchange server. There has been the occasional minor hiccup (the only downtime we’ve experienced was the one major chain of events in texas), but from my overall experience with them, they’ve been very open about what’s happening and they are quick to respond and resolve issues.
Can’t say I’ve been at all disappointed.