Criteria for Selecting a provider.

Corey

At ydgh we are constantly improving on our services, but I was wondering what the community thought about their ideal criteria for selecting a provider?

Boltersdriveer

A provider standing by their service, standing by their product and standing by their support would be one that would turn out to be great.

raindog308

I use the criteria on this site:

http://www.vpsadvice.com/

However, I'm biased because I wrote it :)

Liam

Being open and knowing theirs a real person at the end of the email/ other end. Fran/Aldryic, Tim, kujoe etc do a job of that.

Evidence of treating the clientele well, for example not naming names, but some hosts around here are quite grumpy/rude. I like the 6sync, buyvm, edis etc happy way and community aspects. I'd never go with burstnet as theirs nothing human about them, they blame the client for any issues etc.

Providers who own their own hardware is a must really, it shows long term commitment.

Providers who aren't in heavily occupied / "cheap as chips" datacentres (OVH,Burst,singlehop,hetzner,redstation,continuum, kansas city etc).

Providers who are registered companies is also a huge bonus!

Corey

@liam burstnet is probably one of the reasons I got into this business :P... I hate them.

Singlehop isn't cheap last time we were in there :P

Jacob

The facility burstnet use in manchester is not by any means a cheap as chips datacenter(telecity), The area is quiet and pretty nice. Temperatures on Hard Drive are usually at 28 C.

Not sure about the US Datacenters, I would say FDCServers is worse in the US.

@liam said: Providers who aren't in heavily occupied / "cheap as chips" datacentres (OVH,Burst,singlehop,hetzner,redstation,continuum, kansas city etc).

MrAndroid

RedundantDNS is a must.

Also, if their website is on shared hosting, I gather they don't have the technical skills to run a web server, so I would then seriously doubt they have the technical skills to run a physical server.

Corey

@Daniel what do you mean redundant dns? Redundant dns on the providers site? There is a website around here somewhere that tells you if someone is on shared hosting, anyone care to share?

MrAndroid

@Corey said: @Daniel what do you mean redundant dns? Redundant dns on the providers site? There is a website around here somewhere that tells you if someone is on shared hosting, anyone care to share?

Means the name servers for the website are on completely different servers and data centres (e.g. http://who.is/dns/landofdaniel.com/).

http://www.whoishostingthis.com/

jcaleb

If I can do it all over again:

I will choose providers that has been long around and with no stock. And then watch out everyday if they have stock =)

Francisco

We find our customers demand high pony/$ ratios when purchasing.

Francisco

jarland

I want excessive performance on network and hardware. I've no intention of using much of it. The point is I want to feel as though the guy next to me has got to be one heck of a jerk to leave me with an unreasonable allotment of CPU, disk I/O, and bandwidth.

I like good templates. I enjoy seeing the cool premade OpenVZ templates made by people like Francisco. Update them, make or add new ones every now and then. Don't be like the company that can count to 3 and just let them be as they are forever.

jcaleb

Depends on where I will use my vps. If only for testing/playing/personal use, I choose cheap offer with reasonable resources (io=30mb/s, cpu not throttled, etc), and the provider that gives monthly payment, to reduce risk.

I for production, Provider must be giving vps service for at least 2 years. I read a lot of thread to have a feel about the reputation of the provider. Usually, it is a red flag if provider ask stupid technical question. It is a good sign if the provider gives good answer to technical problems here in leb. So community participation plays part, because there you can gauge if provider is technically capable.

Of course, location, templates are important too.

Corey

@jarland I feel you there, that sounds like a very reasonable request.

@jcaleb there are indeed a lot of people that startup in this market and do a hit and run. So the 2year rule is a good one.

Ivraatiems

@Fransisco Don't forget adequate thrusts/second ratio, and 2^32 IPs per VPS.

Corey

@lvraatiems sorry, I don't understand what your talking about.

jarland

Titty sprinkles?

Corey

What about openvz/kvm/xen and burst/vswap?

jcaleb

@Corey said: What about openvz/kvm/xen and burst/vswap?

depends on what i need. if i want to study/experiment, i use ovz and xen because its so easy to reinstall. if for production, i will choose xen or kvm. but perhaps i prefer kvm more.

HalfEatenPie

@jarland said: Titty sprinkles?

BuyVM has that on their control panel.

eastonch

Personally,

Cheap rates, decent support, somewhat decent ToS which helps us as much as it helps you.

Oh, and active community members like yourself.

Corey

@jcaleb Ahh, we are thinking of launching kvm soon anyway :)

@eastonch ToS is a little touchy - usually they are there to help the company or there wouldn't be a ToS. Half of the ToS usually protects other customers if a single customer is abusing and what not. Think of it this way, usually if the ToS is helping the company succeed, it is helping the customer succeed indirectly.

HalfEatenPie

I'd look at ToS as this: Its more of a tool the company can use to help protect their customers. Sure they can use it to the full extent and screw you over but I highly doubt a company that wants to succeed will do this.

Of course I could just be idealistic and stupid.

Corey

@HalfEatenPie I think you are right, but it protects the customers and the company at the same time.

HalfEatenPie

I mean its basically should be set-in-stone (metaphorically) what your company will offer, and what you expect of the customer. Now some companies just talk about what they expect the customer to offer (e.g. not upload this not do that) but never really touches up on what they're willing to do for the customer's cooperation.

I was on pieserv.com and one thing I really liked came up. They gave a basic overview of what they expect (basically everything on the list literally) and what they'll provide (refunds within 5 days, they'll try to fix whatever problem happens if you open up the ticket, ).

Or like how Site5.com on their Terms of Service includes a blurb about exactly what does 99.9% uptime mean and such.

I might be babbling a little bit here but in agreement with your statement, I believe that Terms of Service should protect the customers and the company. A mutual agreement between the two for the exchange of service-currency.

Taz

Friendly staff, Noob friendly panel ( if they are using custom) or well documentation, good response time. Do not need 10 min but atleast an hour or 2 is fine.

Corey

@NinjaHawk an hour or 2 would mean that they would need 24/7 support wouldn't it?

Taz

@Corey yes indeed. 24/7 but not instant. Quality is better then quantity.

Corey

@Ninjahawk we thought about putting 24/7 support back in but only for simple requests - anything higher than level 1 tech would need to wait. That sound reasonable?

Taz

@Corey being a provider my self, I understand the l3 issue. As long as I know some one is aware about my issue and they will take care of it In a timiely manor, I am happy.