Lunarpages hosting - The RealityUnfortunately BearCity ( http://www.bearcity.co.uk ) came across the "Lunarpages Sucks page ( http://www.diagnose-me.com/sucks/lunarpages.html )" after we had signed up with them. When we looked more closely at the comments on the site we realised that most of them were about a year ago. Phew we thought, they must be OK now as things seem to have gone quiet. Little did we know... The account was created on 8 December 2005. It only took them a little over 8 weeks to completely decimate BearCity's business. After only a few weeks being hosted by Lunarpages there was the first "DOS Attack", I had never these before; funny then how they seem to be a regular recurrence at Lunarpages! I am a dedicated webmaster and always want to give my customers the very best of service, to this end I was in contact with Lunarpages on a number of occasions to get things right on my site. My traffic was well within my allowed traffic, yes OK my website is a little bit complex, but it is all written with good clean PHP scripts. I look after my site and ensure it runs well, I keep my databases optimised; in short, I am a dedicated and hard-working Webmaster. Clearly this was my downfall with Lunarpages, in that I expected the service for which I was paying! Many of my support tickets that I submitted were not responded to within 12 hours. Suddenly late on the Thursday night (16 Feb 2006) my website went down without any warning. Instantly I contacted Lunarpages. Could not get through on the phone so I sent a ticket, the reply came through a short time later and my heart sank! A feeling of deja-vous from all I had previously read on "Lunarpages Sucks" suddenly came to pass. Unravelling before my very eyes was a well know story. The response to my ticket arrived, it is below (I have highlighted some important points in red for ease of reading):
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| From: "Lunarpages Helpdesk" support@lunarpages.com To: richard@findyourstuff.co.uk Sent: Friday, February 17, 2006 1:06 AM Subject: Account Moved to Abuse Server - bearc2 [6200-YGJX-0255][9c0aa587] Question Created ==== Enter your reply ABOVE this line ==== Dear Ricardas Simkus, The following ticket has been created by a member of our staff for you Your question's details: ============== Title: ================== Account Moved to Abuse Server - bearc2 ============== Message: ============== Hi, Your account is utilizing excessive resources, causing a significant degradation of services on the server. This is a shared environment and we can not allow one user to utilize the majority of the resources on a server as it affects all users adversely. Because of this, you have been temporarily moved to the Sputnik server. A detail of the problem is shown below: [Feb 16th 2006] bearc2 bearcity.co.uk 3.22 8.45 1.1 Top Process %CPU 4.0 /usr/bin/php Top Process %CPU 1.7 httpd [www.bearcity.co.uk] [/includes/msg.php?lngen] Top Process %CPU 1.1 httpd [www.bearcity.co.uk] [/flashchat/getxml.php] We moved you to Sputnik first to solve the issue of the degraded service on the server and second as a courtesy in order to prevent any downtime on your site to allow you time to rectify the situation. Currently, your site is not suitable for a shared hosting environment. Sputnik is not a production server and is not guaranteed to run in the same manner as your old server nor will it support all functions you may have. This is a transitional server only and is not intended to be a permanent placement.Please make a decision on how you would like to proceed within seven (7) days. After seven (7) days, your account will be suspended if no other arrangements are made. You may log into Sputnik using http://sputnik.lunarpages.com/cpanel or https://sputnik.lunarpages.com:2083/ You will not be able to log into Sputnik using the Lunarpages main login page as the server is non-production and not available via that page. You have the following options: 1. You may upgrade your package to our Dedicated hosting plan. For more information on the features and pricing, please see http://helpdesk.lunarpages.com/faq.php?do=article&articleid=400 2. You may take steps to correct the problem. This must be done before the seven (7) days are up. You will need to let the technician know the steps you took to correct the issue and get approval before being returned to a production server. Please note that the above mentioned resource usage is due to PHP processing. Since we do not have the exact scripts to provide (since the manner in which PHP scripts are provided on the server only shows the username and not the script name causing the high usage), you would need to review your account for scripts that may be the cause. Please check ones such as forums, blogs, content management systems, and galleries as these are especially likely to create high usage. Please note that the acceptable usage range for shuttle and voyager plans is1.0% average %CPU or less, 1.0% average %Memory or less and Top Processes below 20%. 3. You may look for a dedicated server or other hosting solution. Please remember that propagation takes up to seventy two (72) hours so if you decide on changing hosts you should allow enough time for propagation. Thank you for your cooperation in this matter. We value you as a customer and want to work with you toward a solution that is mutually beneficial. Please let us know as quickly as possible how you would like to proceed. Do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions. Kyle Hammond support@lunarpages.com Phone: 1-877-LUNARPAGES/1-877-586-2772 (U.S. & Canada - Toll-free) Phone: 0800-072-9150 (U.K - Toll-free) Phone: 1-714-521-8150 (International) |
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Straight away I thought, here we go….. The "good old" CPU usage trick with a message that implies, stop running your website as it is or cough up for a dedicated server! If you don't, you will be deleted !! What a sales strategy!!!! - Promise the earth - Sign them up - Cut them off at the knees - Demand more money or threaten to delete their website. Yes there are some good reviews out there; I would argue that these are either: - Written by Lunarpages. or from sites that: - Have less than 100 hits a day - Do not bother their support people - Run little or no scripts. Such sites are very easy and cheap for Lunarpages to host. It is interesting that Lunarpages always pull this stunt once they think the Webmaster is tucked up comfortably in bed. Unfortunate for them I was not!! I then spent the next 40 hours backing up my entire website and moving all my precious files off the Lunarpages server, after all, they are far too precious to leave there. I then found a new hosting, hopefully more reliable and with a degree of business ethic that is above gutter level! I finally got to bed 2 days after I was shafted by Lunarpages. My site was dead for 12 hours I lost a lot of business and credibility, thanks for nothing, Lunarpages! WebmasterBearCity http://www.bearcity.co.uk Bear chat and personals for bears, chubbies and chasers from all over the world |