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Racknerd Review (2020 - 2025) VPS/Shared Hosting/Reseller/Support/Dustin/BF Thread
DeadlyChemist
Member
Since i cant find any racknerd review, here we go:
Hello, I have been using Racknerd since 2020 or so.
First of all, some pre-information: This review is a little bit biased, but Racknerd/Dustin never has a word in my opinion, nor will anyone ever.
Over the years, I’ve sent/received a dozen emails from Dustin. I’ve participated in the BF RN thread every year. I’ve received/won a bunch of resources, VMs, merch, and credits from RN.
However, not all of Racknerd’s VMs are tied to my account(s); some I bought for friends in their names, addresses, cards, etc., so RN has absolutely no way of knowing. This review is a mix of my experiences directly or indirectly when guiding friends.
Let’s kick it off with VPS. All VPS purchased were either:
* New Year sale
* 11.11 sale
* BF sale
* Won from Racknerd’s BF thread
All VMs were under 10GB RAM, mostly around 2GB RAM.
I don’t have any numbers, but it’s solid and reliable. Downtime was usually minimal, if at all. So far, the biggest downtime across all my VPSs (and my friends' VPSs) was some kiddo DDoSing me, so RN had to null-route my IP. Aside from that, over the years, I can’t recall any significant downtime.
The network is good; I don’t have any issues... It works?
The hardware is sometimes a bit older, like the E5-2680 v2 (Q3’2013). I mean, sure, most providers use this or older, but I know Racknerd does have newer Ryzen CPUs. Just letting you guys know. Not a red flag for me.
The software: I’ve never had issues with it. Their NerdVM panel has everything I need. It includes Ubuntu 24 and Debian 13, or you can ask support to mount an ISO (more on that later).
Dustin himself actually responds to emails with brain cells (doesn’t feel like he’s some sentient AI). He often participates in the forum and is chill.
Support: Every time I message support, they either already know what the issue is (they read this forum!) or they just do their job quickly (always within 60 minutes). They’d rather spend an extra minute actually solving the issue than wasting time with escalations.
The support also mounts ISOs pretty quickly. Only bad thing I can find is that once I was hit with a DDoS attack, and support never sent me an email or anything. I was confused as to why my internet was down. Anyway, after a while of me debugging, I asked Racknerd whether they had an issue, and then they told me my VPS IP got null-routed. Bruh, couldn’t you have opened a ticket for me?
Aside from that, I can say their support is good. They do what they should, and they do it quickly. Good job.
Overall, I can say get a VPS with them for like 10-15 bucks, learn Linux, deploy a small app, or just run YABS. With bigger plans, you can deploy something larger. Use Ryzen if you need more juice (though most people don’t).
Well worth the money. I don’t think they’re going anywhere (they have offices, employees, they give away a ton of good stuff, and are one of the top 500 fastest-growing American companies every year). Again, they’ve been around for a few years, so if they were selling meth on the side, they would have already been busted.
I don’t have issues with privacy either. Just remember this is a US-based company, not EU-based. I haven’t heard of many “fuck Racknerd” threads here, nor any crazy exploits or leaks.
If you need dedicated or something with more power, I cannot tell you anything regarding performance. I would say buy for a month and test it yourself. The company seems stable, and support is good, and that’s very important.
Should I need a dedi or VPS, Racknerd is definitely on my list.
cPanel Hosting / WHM / Reseller
Oh boy, where do I start…
I had a cPanel account for my domain (thechemicalworkshop.com) which I cancelled due to issues.
I have a reseller account that I’m giving away for free to friends.
I can’t complain about the WHM reseller, it works fine? My friends don’t complain much. Lately, there’s been a migration, but so far, everything looks good... No complaints from me.
As for cPanel itself, I’m pretty unhappy about the constant nagging regarding storage. If you upload a file that has nothing to do with hosting, you’ll get an angry email that kindly asks you to remove it. So, no keeping backups on cPanel storage... I understand, but if you have a backup/zip of current assets or whatever (I had a zip with a few GB of images/assets), you still get an email kindly asking you to remove it. Maybe I’m the asshole here; this is not a complaint, just a review. They’re free to enforce any rule they create, and I either comply or deal with the consequences.
The second issue was Discord couldn’t load images hosted there, which could be an issue with Racknerd (they said it’s not) or Discord (no clue). I gave up after a few days of trying.
If you want email and website hosting and are fine with cPanel (I prefer DirectAdmin, but you do you), you can go with Racknerd. Just remember to strictly avoid uploading anything else. Plus, you get the good support and, well, the Racknerd brand.
At the end of the day, I terminated my cPanel account and don’t use it, nor do I plan to with Racknerd.
Locations:
Many months ago, I would have complained, but since they have stock in the Netherlands and now have VPS in France, uhhh, if you need Asia, then go complain. But honestly, Ashburn, Canada, and then the Netherlands, and I’m all set (I don’t need Asia), so that’s a pass for me—especially for these prices, with that support, plus a chance to win an upgrade if you’re willing to waste some time on a BF thread…
BF and events: It’s lots of crappy memes and lots of double bandwidth. I know people are frustrated. At the end of the day, it’s free stuff for the low-end community. Some people might win things and actually learn networking/Linux, etc. I’m grateful this exists. I often either ask my friends if they want a VPS if I win one, or I just edit my message so it goes to the next person. Thanks, RN and Dustin, for making these events, even if I don’t have time to camp there 24/7 and get the stuff I want. My appreciation goes to the people you enable to learn.
Alpharacks and all that drama… Go find the thread yourself. In my opinion, Racknerd is not Alpharacks, and Dustin just worked there. Think what you want, but people bet every month that Racknerd will do an exit scam tomorrow. I’m happy to bet against them. I don’t think Racknerd is going anywhere.
TL;DR:
Excellent provider with great support. The locations are good enough (Europe and NA).
The BF thread is a chance for many, and if you don’t care, then don’t click on it.
VPSs are beyond excellent, and I can’t recommend them enough. If you’re a beginner, go buy one and learn Linux. If you’re a professional and want something bigger, buy a bigger package from them or get a dedi. Ask Dustin, maybe he can hook you up with a slight discount or something.
cPanel hosting is a pass for me. It’s not awful; it’s just not my cup of tea.
If you have questions, go ahead and ask. I’m happy to answer.
This text has been cleaned up with chatgpt so you can actually understand it… if you want the raw version, dm me lol
Comments
I picked up two virtual private servers during their 11.11 sale, one in LA and one in NYC.
The LA hypervisor was definitely oversubscribed or had hardware issues, it was incredibly slow and unusable. However, I opened a ticket with support and they had my server migrated to a new hypervisor within an hour. It did require an ip address change after the migration was complete, but that's no biggie.
The NYC server has had zero issues since being provisioned.
Overall, the service seems great so far. Granted its only been a few weeks, but I'm happy with the cost to performance ratio. If I needed to pickup a vps in the europe region I'd definitely use racknerd again.
racknerd vps are solid, a+ across the board.
easily my favorite let provider.
glad to hear, usually on let i see just "provider xy horrible experience" or "provider ab 2 week yabs"
hopefully this brings in more insight...
if they had IPv6 on all locations I would also give them a 10/10 but since they don't, I give them 8/10 for uptime and support !
Fair tbh
(I dont use ipv6 a lot)
They're cheap... But not that special in terms of performance.
When you look at performance it's a bit below average tbh. If. Or, I don't know who else you're comparing them with. I do dig their support and their engagement though. They're fast, and definitely not a one man show. Not likely to fold anytime soon.
No offence, but most in this thread is only about..., I like them, no issues I noticed.
Basically, only opinion, no data to support it. Just fanboys, no offence.
Again, sorry if that offends anyone but couldn't resist to speak up.
Hi @DeadlyChemist, thank you for sharing a raw, honest, and overall positive review of the services we provide at RackNerd. It's always good to see positive reviews, and reviews that help us improve our service offerings, too, as we're truly eager to expand with our valued customers.
You went into great detail, and I like it, because it relates to what I see in RackNerd and how we're constantly deeply invested in our brand, reputation and improving. Thank You for trusting us with your business, and helping your friends sign up for our services too, that means a lot 👊
As always, we're here to help, so feel free to reach out at any time. We will continue thriving as a company and improving.
Had a RackNerd VPS in Seattle from 2020-2023 (iirc)... VPS itself wasn't anything special, but support was quick to add a Fedora ISO when I asked for it.
Pricing does seem to have improved this year at least, I cancelled my Seattle service over single threaded CPU perf (was a Xeon E5-v2 iirc) but I'm tempted again.
@dustinc any details on the underlying hardware?
Hi @lsun38atft8hq -- Thank You for trusting RackNerd with your business!
It sounds like you had a rough start (and while that isn't usual), I'm glad we were able to resolve the issues you experienced, and since then have delivered flawless service.
At RackNerd, we're truly committed to delivering support that is available 24x7 and service you can rely on that performs as it should. We've invested in the performance of our services, and while hiccups can occur, we're hyperactive with our monitoring, both with in-house proprietary tools and third-party, ensuring services are as smooth as possible. In the event you see any hiccups, please expect us to help and or be transparent via our status page. I say this with the utmost confidence, as I want you to know that we truly care and are invested in you, and RackNerd.
As you continue to expand, please do consider RackNerd for your EU deployments, we got you 👊
@zed 💕💕
Butterflies, butterflies, we love to hear and see this! Thank You for sharing your positive experience with RackNerd, and for trusting us as your favorite LET provider!
Same. I like the location though. Not that many reputable given the price point so I'll keep it running.
I don't need anything beefy there (ns slave) so whatever old hardware, its fine for my usage
Hi @cold - We're so close to the 10! Love to hear that RackNerd is highly rated, and that your experience with RackNerd has been positive too
Hi @Saragoldfarb -- We're open ears here at RackNerd and truly appreciate the positive experiences, reviews, and even areas for improvement.
I would be interested to explore what type of performance improvements you would like to see, and review those personally. Please send me an e-mail [email protected] and I would be happy to comp you for your time too, if it requires a lot of your time. Maybe some food, drinks, swag? I'm not trying to alter your views either, It's simply for your time (as I know that perhaps your deployments may be for fun, and may not encourage you to invest more time beyond your initial experience) but if the comp sounds reasonable, and you're open to sharing more, I would be equally interested investing towards the improvement.
We aren't perfect, nor will we ever claim to be, but I will say that we're committed and probably one of the most active providers here on LEB. When it comes to support, responsiveness, and the commitment to provide stable, reliable services at the pricing we do, it's hard to find another company like RackNerd that will do everything in their power to stay up to date with the market, the community, and the business. All while with the goal to enhance the overall experience.
We built our reputation on this, and we will never allow our brand to go on autopilot.
Lol, might take you up on that and kudos on proving my point. Your support and engagement is out of this world.
Hi @ajgarett - Happy to hear you've tested our services in the past. We'd love for you to give RackNerd an opportunity at your business today.
Since then, we've continued to expand, and while we have a mix of hardware, I will say that a good baseline expectation would be DUAL E5-2680v2, and above. If you have very specific needs, we do have Ryzen configurations and can custom tailor deals. So we're flexible, and customizable.
Just get in touch [email protected] and we'll make something work 👊
Love this, Thank You! We're really all about the expeirence, and our goal is to make sure it's a good one too.
I'm definitely offended.
RackNerd has always been in my good providers list since the day I've came to know LEB/LET. One problem for me is that all the servers locations are far away from Asia, which makes the latency too high and hard to work with. But for the shared hosting? RackNerd would have been my choice.
Hi Socheat! Thank You for keeping RackNerd close, and part of your good provider considerations
As for Asia, our DC-02 location appears to be a favorite for that region but I do understand it's not a one size fits all. Also good to hear that our shared hosting gets love from you too 👊
Read about my bad experience here:
https://lowendtalk.com/discussion/212430/racknerd-bad-experience#latest
i have