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Belated ReliableSite.net (not paid) review + WHT rant - 2 for 1 special
Back in January I reviewed ReliableSite on WHT because while they're a decent provider, their IPv6 support is lacking and I wanted to highlight it for anyone interested in their service. It was not a paid review but got swept by the WHT moderation team because they thought I might get paid for it, even though I said I cancelled my service.
Why am I posting this now? The IPv6 portion is still valid and I want to encourage RS to improve their service. I'm still salty about the review's removal and have wanted to get this off my chest for some time now.
Here is the review:
I ordered a Ryzen 5950X server in LAX from these guys as part of a Christmas/New Year deal they were doing. Its pricing is reasonable at US$127.00/mo for a 5950X, 128GB of RAM, 2 TB NVMe SSD, 1 Gbit port (actually linked up at 10 Gbit and not shaped) and 5 IPs.
Their instant provisioning worked as intended and I was up and running quickly.
The Good:
- Delivered a server exceeding the stated specifications with its 10 Gbit networking
- No VPN required to access the IPMI, they appear to have setup a reverse proxy and you can whitelist yourself via their dedicated server control panel
- Support team is quick to respond
- Sensible AUP.
The Not So Good:
- The product config process has the most confusing IP ordering options. It's listed under "Additional IPs" but then says "5 Total IPs". Once you order, you're given a single IP and have to justify the remaining 4 post-hoc. Just bizarre
- Your client password is synced to the dedicated server control panel, however if you use a complex password, this just doesn't work. Changing my client portal password to something shorter without symbols fixed this.
- The server was delivered with a Samsung 980 Pro that appears to have been affected by the firmware bug as its wear level is at 25%. The firmware has been updated, so at least it won't get significantly worse.
Will I continue to host with these guys? No. The reason is their dogged inflexibility around IPv6 prefixes. In essence I requested 2 /64 prefixes, one with their gateway and another routed to an IPv6 address within the first prefix so I could provide VMs behind my OPNsense router an Internet routable IPv6 address.
They said no and told me "As advertised one IPV6 can be assigned to one server." and sure enough, their site does say this. Initially I interpreted this as a single /64 but re-reading this now, do they actually mean a single IPv6 address? Only one, for an entire box? Honestly ridiculous.
I've requested this same setup with WebNX, IO Flood and a small Australian company I colo with called Ransom IT. They usually advertise they'll provide a single /64 but are flexible to assigning an additional routed prefix.
Lastly, these guys sent out an e-mail 1 week after signing up offering a $25 credit if I wrote a review. They don't explicitly say it must be positive, but it still feels a bit dubious to me. Considering I've submitted a cancellation request, I'm not going to take them up on it.
A few hours after posting this, I received an e-mail saying the post was removed because:
Our rules state this:
"You may not compensate anyone for any review or recommendation. Further, you may not suggest a tone (i.e. "Go talk good about us on WHT")."
Since this company is rewarding reviewers, this is being removed, and we ask that you don't submit any more for them,. or anyone else paying for them. It's not allowed here.
I found this odd since I wasn't compensated and it seems I'm being punished for a provider's behaviour. I appealed it.
I was not compensated for the review and noted this at the end of my post.
Is that rule directed at me or RS? If RS, then why are they allowed to post in the offers section?
Please consider reinstating my post, and if not, perhaps consider pinning a review blacklist to the board.
To which they reply
Since it was noted they offered and here you are posting one, we had to assume the motivation may have been prompted. He went on to say in that thread that he was going to add credit "for your time writing it", so we have no choice but to toss it. Please don't post another, since simply omitting the offer of compensation will still have that hanging over it.
I have e-mail replies turned on and RS never replied to my post, probably never even saw it and I can only assume the WHT mod hallucinated this. I mentioned the paid review offer since had I have known they did that, I might not have signed up. How is anyone supposed to make an informed decision if one must selectively omit information due to a provider's behaviour?
Rest of their reply:
Nothing wrong with them posting offers, it's the offer of essentially paid reviews that's not allowed. I didn't see any of that within the ads, so that's not at issue. As for who it's directed at, both of you. He can't offer it, and you can't post as a result. We had a word with him as well.
A review blacklist?
We don't want to prevent reviews, as they're generally helpful (well, sometimes). We keep track of the providers that attempt this and look into any reviews before and after the occurrence. Any hint of another one, we have a more serious talk with the provider and so on.
So you can post reviews unless you mention the provider encourages shilling, then you'll be punished for the provider's actions as it may have subliminally implanted the thought or you'll be presumed to be acting in bad faith. There is also a chance the WHT mod will eat mushrooms and say that RS offered a credit even though there's no service to credit and RS never replied.
I didn't bother replying to them after this.
Comments
Thank you for posting BUT this forum also does not allow paid reviews.
I hope you're trolling me. It literally says not paid in the title and the entire rant is about WHT removing it because they think subliminally I got manipulated into posting a review because of the offer RS made or that I'm just a lying piece of shit that's saying I didn't accept money but in fact did.
There is a correction I must make to my OP: I did accuse the WHT mod of eating mushrooms because I didn't get an e-mail notification saying RS replied offering a credit, but there is a chance that actually did occur as the forum software will refrain from sending additional e-mails if the thread has not been read.
So there's a chance RS did reply but I literally can never know because the thread was deleted, so the mod was quoting something but I have no clue if it actually happened as I went to bed after writing the original post and only saw the initial reply notification e-mail that was related to another user posting.
This forum does not allow mushroom eating.
About the "Sensible AUP", ReliableSite is actually pretty funky. They don't say they disallow Tor exit relays in written policies (as of last year) but when you ask them they say "No Tor".
ReliableSite is like Cogent: they have decent-ish support but a minimal product line. But if you need good tech you're better off with Lumen, AT&T, GTT or Arelion.
Hmm, I've never been able to find anything one way or the other in their written policies on Tor. I know that Community Lore says they don't allow it (but I'm not sure I've seen it said explicitly one way or the other)
One IPv6 address?
I'm pretty sure they would supply one routed (configured) IPv6 /64 subnet as that's what I have been using right now. I don't know if they'll allow two /64 subnet to one server tho, that might be what they are unwilling to do.
Once you have the subnet, you can use their network manager to generate IPv6 address & configure it on your dedi server. The IPv6 rDNS is a bit tricky but you can get it done as well.
Also, when I reached out to their support they are quite nice and responsive, so I'm not sure what the difference are, might be YMMV.
Yeah they say no tor but their resellers allow it and continue to host it with no issues. I've seen others be able to host it with dedis they bought directly and have no issues.