Donhost Vs Rackspace

[HomerJ]

Looking for a dedicated windows box..(need 24/7 UK tel support)

Shortlisted Donhost and Rackspace..but their is about £150 per month price difference per month (rackspace more expensive)

Is it worth? Rackspace also want a contract ..12 to 36 months..If I sign the contract then the price difference reduces a bit. Not sure whether a long term contract is a good idea. But if I find the right company, dont mind staying for long.

Bit confused :..Any advice or thoughts from you all would be appreciated.

Cheers

[pricethat]

Rackspace are supposed to be great but then you have to pay for it, i always though that when you get to that quality of hosting you are almost borderline on being able to do all the hosting yourself.

As in, by a server yourself, get the dedicated line into your house and an airconditioning unit and you are probably not that far out, then you do not need to rely on anyone and you have the asset of your server.

Not heard much about donhost.

[UKOffer]

I use Rackspace and they are brilliant. I have no technical abilities whatsoever so their 24/7 freephone support hotline is a real blessing and the main reason why I went with them.

[justhomdotcom]

We use donhost (have the hyper velocity freebsd server with them but am probably going to move to the Hyper Sonic if we keep growing as we are).

They are fine and i've had little problem with them (and if i did it's usually fixed within 30 mins) but although they say 24/7 support if you have a problem out of office hours you get put through to a support company (rather than to donhost themselves) and they are limited to what they can do for you.

Also remember that donhost are now owned by pipex so depending on your thoughts about them (so people like them, some people dont).

If I was starting from scratch I would of probably gone with rackspace just because they are deemed to be the best.

[Dynamoo]

I use Donhost, but for a reseller account and not a shared server. I joined way before they were taken over by Pipex, but I've never had any kind of problem with them. Tech support issues are dealt with very promptly.

[pistol101]

Don Host are excellent, i've used them for years.

[matbennett]

Rackspace are good, but no-where near as good as they continually tell you they are. Their "fanatical support" seems to mostly be fanatical about telling you how great they are.

Frankly I would rather they drop the whole "we're great" thing and just quietly get on with it. If I have a problem then I would rather them say "OK - we're on it" than keep you on the phone for an hour whilst they spell out exactly what they are doing and spout on about how clever they are. It was exactly this that chnged out minds about moving our main servers to their care.

[Rich]

Originally Posted by pricethat As in, by a server yourself, get the dedicated line into your house and an airconditioning unit and you are probably not that far out, then you do not need to rely on anyone and you have the asset of your server.

Don't do it!!
The costs of the servers are quite negligable compared to the costs of building and maintaining a reliable hosting set up. Think multiple internet links, multiple power sources, etc. Yes, people will host their person sites at home now, but if your running enough sites that you need a dedicated server (lets say more than 2) then you'll also need that server to stay online.

[jklondon]

we ditched donhost for rackspace a few months ago - we were doing some "exotic" things with the Apache setup and they didnt really handle the support that well plus the out-of-hours is rubbish it just goes to some basic support guy at Pipex. Rackspace are good but I am getting a bit annoyed with all the promotional stuff and customer surveys they keep sending to me - as ive told them - "if you want one suggestion do what you currently do but at a lower price point" Simple really

[Paul]

We have been with Rackspace for nearly 2 years, and I have always found their service to be excellent. We used to host our own webserver before that, but as previously mentioned unless you have back up power supplies and back up leased lines then I wouldn't go there as even a small amount of down time can end up costing you a fortune.

Paul
outdoorgear.co.uk

[dmorison]

If you don't need to do anything too funky, Mosso (which is a venture backed and hosted by Rackspace) looks like a really interesting alternative to a dedicated server.

http://www.mosso.com/

[HomerJ]

Thanks for your advice so far everyone..still contemplating..

dmorrison, thanks ..I did look at mosso..but looks like they dont support ssl and you cant have your own nameservers, dedicated IPs etc.,