Rackspace Review – Web Hosting Service

Rackspace is a fully-managed, customizable web hosting company that focuses solely on dedicated servers and public and private cloud hosting servers. Their target customers include large agencies, game servers, and large enterprise website that need to store thousands of large or sensitive documents and files. If you were hoping for a budget-friendly hosting company, Rackspace is definitely not for you.This Rackspace review provides a detailed overview of their main features and relevant information regarding all of their services.

We will also give some excellent recommendations should you still be looking for a web host that is right for you.

Rackspace Overview

Rackspace has been around since 1999. They do not clearly define their pricing on their website because of the way their buying process is setup. Rackspace fully expects interested clients to contact their sales team via chat on their website and discuss with them directly about what they need. This way they ensure that everyone gets exactly the hosting services they need and nothing they don’t.

Their uptime guarantee is 99.99% and while they usually meet that, there have been several exceptions. Over the last year they have had 10 months with 100% uptime, and 2 months with less than 99.99% uptime. Still, the whole year averages at 99.99%.

Pricing Information

Rackspace charges by the hour for their services. Their Cloud Services have a minimum monthly service charge of %50/mo for managed infrastructure and $500/mo for managed operations. The difference is that they will manage the entire cloud for you so you don’t have to do it yourself.

For their dedicated servers, you’re going to be looking at starting cost of $449/month for a single processor, $640/month for a dual processor, and $879/month for a quad processor. For more information regarding your exact needs, it’s easier to contact Rackspace via their sales chat and ask for a quote.

Security & Risk

Rackspace has many features that are customizable, so you can virtually get any type of security you want. Their power source is fully redundant so that the servers never go down because of a power outage. They have 6 data centers all over the globe to help with latency for your visitors.

Because every service is customized by the client with their sales representative, dedicated servers will have one of 9 different dedicated Cisco firewalls. Cloud servers can also choose from security tools such as Cloud Security Groups and private network capabilities. You can also set up real-time monitoring alerts.

Usability & User Friendliness

Their main user-friendly feature is the fact that they allow you to customize your hosting services right from the start. With Rackspace you will never have to start in a confining starting package before having to completely shift everything later. Their services are also completely scalable. Some are even auto-scalable. For simple websites, they can be deployed within 5 minutes.

Customer Support & Additional Info

Rackspace calls their support team “Fanatical.” They are detail-oriented and results-driven. They are available 24/7/365 by phone, email, and chat. They also have a large database to assist with those who like to self-diagnose and troubleshoot.

While they do not have a disclosed risk-free trial period, Rackspace does promise that if you are ever down, they will apply a 5% credit of your monthly fee for each 30 minutes your network is down all the way up to the entire monthly fee of the affected server.

Rackspace Overall Rating

Here are the top features, and the worst features, that we would like to point out.

What we like:

• Excellent Sales Support – While their site is a bit hard to navigate, the sales team will hook you up with a server that fits your needs.
• Great Uptime – You won’t experience a lot of downtime with Rackspace.
• Completely Customizable – Even if you’re not sure exactly what you need, Rackspace will help you discover that.

What we don’t like:

• No Budget-Friendly Options – $50/month is the lowest you can ever expect to pay.

Rating

Web Hosting Plans & Prices: 4/5
Security & Risk: 5/5
Usability: 5/5
Customer Support: 5/5

Rackspace Top Alternatives

If you are still unsure about Rackspace after this review, check out these three competitors.

• Bluehost – Bluehost has a structured pricing plan that is clearly listed on their website. While they do not offer full customization for most of their plans, the Dedicated servers are completely scalable. If you’re looking for a host to start out small with, Bluehost has many budget-friendly options to help with that.
• LiquidWeb – LiquidWeb offers the same price variation as Rackspace, but they have several plans you can choose from. They also have the option to fully customize a plan for you if you prefer.
• GoDaddy – Much like Bluehost, GoDaddy has a variety of hosting plans from shared and business hosting to fully dedicated servers.

Our Verdict

Rackspace has an unlimited amount of potential. The fully customizable nature of their sales system is perfect if you don’t want to have to pay for extra features that you don’t need. We highly recommend Rackspace for all enterprise websites, agencies, and those needing large networks for their businesses. Those looking for budget-friendly hosting should look elsewhere.
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