URPad DDoS Protected 1GB VPS

[D. Strout]

My last review for this contest is of a URPad DDoS protected VPS in L.A. For $21/year for a 1GB OpenVZ, I was kind of surprised to see DDoS protection advertised, but there it was. The IP is in the ASN of Black Lotus, with a description of "Root Level Technology" (see here). Pretty cool. I received the service on November 30, but the disk speed was not very good. I submitted a ticket about it, and it was quickly resolved. The offer seemed to be popular, and had apparently attracted abusers.

 

Unfortunately, disk problems persisted. I attempted to use it to set up a Wordpress site, but it was so slow that I had to give it up. I let it lie for a while, then recently returned to it. It actually wasn't bad, and since then, I've been happy enough with the VPS. I haven't used the DDoS protection (never been popular enough to be DDoSed ), but I've been using the VPS for some small sites, and it works pretty well. I am somewhat confused as to why, but the URPad client area says the server is in Orlando, FL. Traceroutes, IP lookups, and knowledge of Black Lotus's locations say otherwise, though, so it must just be a glitch.

 

FreeVPS.us Benchmarks:

CPU model :  Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2620 0 @ 2.00GHz
Number of cores : 4
CPU frequency :  1999.953 MHz
Total amount of ram : 1024 MB
Total amount of swap : 0 MB
System uptime :   18 days, 2:23,
Download speed from CacheFly: 52.7MB/s
Download speed from Coloat, Atlanta GA: 1.64MB/s
Download speed from Softlayer, Dallas, TX: 43.6MB/s
Download speed from Linode, Tokyo, JP: 8.09MB/s
Download speed from i3d.net, Rotterdam, NL: 4.89MB/s
Download speed from Leaseweb, Haarlem, NL: 26.5MB/s
Download speed from Softlayer, Singapore: 11.2MB/s
Download speed from Softlayer, Seattle, WA: 55.7MB/s
Download speed from Softlayer, San Jose, CA: 78.1MB/s
Download speed from Softlayer, Washington, DC: 24.6MB/s
I/O speed :  73.6 MB/s

 

[HalfEatenPie]

I haven't used the DDoS protection (never been popular enough to be DDoSed ), but I've been using the VPS for some small sites, and it works pretty well.

Haha. I don't think that's something you want to aspire to.

But great review! Really enjoyed it and appreciate your input on it!

I personally have never been a fan of URPad (even before RTL joined in), but glad everything's working out for ya!

Out of curiosity, how were the support techs over at URPad? Quick to respond? Were incredibly knowledgeable? I only ask because I know they actually have full-time staff available for this work!

 

[wlanboy]

The download speeds from my URPad box are quite slow - sometimes not usable at all.

Disk I/O and CPU are not usable for any bigger Ruby/PHP stuff too.

Support is ok, but only available during office hours.

 

[D. Strout]

Out of curiosity, how were the support techs over at URPad? Quick to respond? Were incredibly knowledgeable? I only ask because I know they actually have full-time staff available for this work!

Looking over my ticket history, they generally did alright. Simple requests were done in 3-4 hours, others took a day or two. Some of my tickets seem to no longer be in the system, in particular I remember transferring several VPSes to other users (sold them), and they were very helpful in getting that done, though I don't remember the timeframe. Those instances, however, were before they were bought out by RLT. Overall, support gets things done, but does not particularly stand out when compared with some of the other companies I've used - especially when one considers that they have a dedicated team for it.

The download speeds from my URPad box are quite slow - sometimes not usable at all.

Disk I/O and CPU are not usable for any bigger Ruby/PHP stuff too.

Support is ok, but only available during office hours.

As you can see, download speeds on this box are excellent, but disk I/O is a little bit wanting. I/O is acceptable, not by no means excellent. The download speeds could well be due to a different network (Black Lotus's) being used here.

 

[D. Strout]

Just an update: if you read you'll likely know that I was unimpressed with their service. They seemed to be dodging the problem, which is a major turn-off for me with any company I deal with. I had another ticket open around the same time, it was a minor issue of an IP change, but it took forever to get done. Since it was minor, the time wouldn't have been a big deal, except there was considerable back and forth about what I actually wanted done, especially when I mentioned the issue of the client area saying the service was in Orlando. It took 16 hours to get the IP changed, then both pieces of information updated in the client area. The actual changeovers took less then an hour apiece, it was the confirmations and explanations I had to (re)send that took so long.

The whole ticket system is also a bit wonky. It's the regular WHMCS system, but the styling is such that it makes it difficult to read through a ticket. Also, the ticket response e-mails showed up as being from "ServerSavior". Finally, by default the tickets are sorted oldest to newest, so for a while I thought my ticket had been "eaten" by the system. All little things, but altogether rather annoying.