Their servers go down an a regular basis. And I mean ALL servers from FTP to Email to web! Confusing control panel. Customer support is a joke!
The absolute worst hosting ever. My company's site has been down 4 times this week alone! and today down for 12 hours so far! I have lost all 10 of my distributors (every customer) due to their lack of intelligence and poor hosting. I called in, CS rep said it would be back up in 2-3 hours, and what do you know... it wasn't. So i updated the ticket asking what the problem was. Another two hours go by, i do CS chat, they said it will be up in an hour, i update the ticket. This repeats for about 3 or 4 more times, when 10 hours later, a tier 3 emails me and says i have an excess server load. Doesn't say what the issue is, but something was too much. So no viable solution on how to fix it, and again no mention of when it would be up. Instead he said everything that i needed to do (which i couldnt because the server was down) and tells me i was wrong for contacting support too many times in one day. The absolute worst. Do not goto ipower!!!!!!!!!!
I have used iPower for almost 1 year. The first 8 months our start up company was for the most part dormant. Once we started using emails and FTP, both servers would crap out almost daily. The web server would randomly spoof the IP causing browser security issues. Tech support didn't know how or even where to look to solve the issues. Wait time is always > 30 minutes where the sales staff is < 3 seconds of course. I am in the process of transferring and am dreading that process. Based on other reviews, I am glad I didn't experience the multiple and excess billing issues.
I only signed up with ipower because they offered unlimited email accounts and bandwidth. but the ipower experience was the worst after switching from godaddy. I spoke to a customer service rep inquiring about an issue but some how it lead to me mentioning that i don't keep a back up file for my website. 2 days later ALL my website files were deleted from their server including my SQL database file from my Cpanel. I am not crazy and doest not take, i repeat does not take any expired medication. I did not go into my cpanel and deleted my own files. NO ONE has access but me. when i called i power and mentioned it to them they told me that theres no way that files could have been deleted unless i deleted them myself. Minutes later they suggested me to pay $75 dollars to restore my website files that i did not delete. then recommended me to pay $12.95/per year to have my site backed up every 7days. my site was down for 3 days, and i lost a total of $31,000 in those 3 days. this situation was extortion from my perspective. by deleting my files and charging me to restore something that i never deleted. after speaking to customer service they spoke to me like i personally was the problem
From the beginning, iPower created 2 accounts for my 1 company & has tried to bill me twice for everything each time it comes due. Most recently I paid for email svcs that were cut off today b/c of "nonpayment". iPower admitted its own error (it always does & always "deletes" the dual account). No matter, my business will still be without email for "4 to 10 hours" while iPower "fixes" its own problem it created. Additionally, we frequently have email problems where clients' emails bounce back to them & we are advised our mail boxes are full. Tech support usually only picks up the phone after about 30 minutes on hold, & generally do not understand you when you try to explain your issues to them. Billing dept will only admit errors when you can give them a ticket # & dates of emails - otherwise they will tell you there is "nothing" showing to prove what you're claiming; they also will tell you whatever has happened is your fault for not doing something based on what they "can" see. Dealing w/ this company has been a disaster & I have begged my computer tech just this morning to get me away from iPower for good! Don't waste your time or money with this company!
I signed up for iPower as a friend of mine was really impressed by their services. Also they had an offer for a free domain on a yearly signup. I setup my site and everything was going well until 2-3 months in the yearly offer, I started suffering a lot of downtime. They had a problem with their DNS server and they weren't able to fix it for about 3 weeks. During that period, my average page load time increased from 4.5 seconds to about 16 seconds. the uptime was only 60%. Their support on the other hand has been above average compared to the other hosting services. Each of my queries were resolved within an hour. Well they dont have cPanel, but vDeck, their control panel, is quite user-friendly. Some of my friends complained that they had to wait for a month to get the Auth Code for transferring the domain to another registrar, but I had no difficulties. In my opinion, iPower is suitable for people wanting to start with a moderate budget and wont require much of the CPU resources. Overall, I would advice people to avoid this host.
iPower has hosted my web sites for over 5 years and I could not be more pleased. They're hardly ever down and when they do have problems, they send an email to let you know and then keep you posted as the fix progresses. Their "Control Panel" covers about anything you'll ever want to do. In over 5years, I've only had to contact customer service once and that was a mediocre experience. I understand they've since made improvements to the call center. If you email iPower support, the response is excellent.
I would recommend iPower to anyone with the simplest to the most complex web hosting needs.
We are experiencing so many problems with Ipower.com. A little over 2 years ago, they forced a migration to new servers and botched that all up for thousands of customers. Support telephone hold-time usualy exceeds 1/2 hour. Then you get some young girl in Taiwan or the phillipinesnes who speaks broken english with marbles in their mouths. They are obviously following a flow chart and are clueless about fixing computer problems. 2 websites I webmaster have been effected the same way. The email systems of both website are blacklisted and we don't send out any spam whatsoeverIf someone else who uses our same mail server spams, we suffer the consequences. The support staff offers very little help. To talk to an American, this is called premium support and will cost you $14.95. It doesn't guarantee they'll fix the problem. The only thing it guarantees is you are 15 bucks poorer and they are 15 buck richer! We are prepping to move to a new HOST. IPower is a very anti-American company!
The company was founded in 2001 and currently has more than 700,000 customers. CEO Thomas Gorny was born in Poland and also runs a private investment company. As of 2007, iPower has been controlled through the Endurance International Group after a 2011 valuation of a reported $1 billion. In an unusual move for an EIG host, Gorny’s picture and name still appear prominently on the site.
According to the company’s Jobs pages, it has four US offices spanning four US states.
iPower Hosting Plans
For the purposes of easy comparison, I’ve split iPower’s plans into three sections.
Shared hosting comes in the form of three plans: Starter, Pro and Pro Plus. All three appear to be Linux-based, although it’s not specifically mentioned. Starter is a limited plan with no free domain name. Pro and Pro Plus include one and three dree domains respectively, unlimited domain hosting, 25 databases and different ShopSite capabilities, depending on the plan you choose. Across the board, Pro is more restricted than Pro Plus and that is also reflected in the pricing. The monthly cost drops slightly over longer contract terms of 24 months or 36 months.
Windows users can choose Windows Pro Hosting, a low-cost hosting plan with unlimited disk space and bandwidth. Generally, any limits that are set are high enough not to inconvenience a small business user. There’s a small price advantage when signing up for 24 months rather than 12 months.
Finally, iPower offers two VPS plans, 20 GB and 60 GB. Data transfer and memory are higher on the 60 GB plan, as you’d expect. Again, the price drops if you choose to take out a longer contract.
iPower Uptime/Downtime
No claims are made about uptime on the iPower website, so it’s difficult to say whether they offer an uptime guarantee. If they do, it’s not obvious. Customers can choose to use SubmitNet’s Uptime Monitoring tool to check that their site is online.
Its data centres are equipped with 24/7 security monitoring tools, CCTV, secure entry systems and more. Customers are provided with daily NetApp Snapshot backups, and backup power is provided via UPS and diesel generators. This information appears to have be unchanged since the merger/ acquisition by EIG. There’s no indication of where the data centres are located.
The company’s plan pages do specify that the company offsets its data centre power consumption through wind power credits.
iPower Support
On the iPower website, users are provided with a knowledgebase, user guide, tutorials and support channels. Most of the documentation is geared towards beginners and people who are new to site building and hosting.
Support is provided via an online ticketing system, live chat and email forms, plus US-only telephone numbers. Although these numbers are toll-free, there’s no international alternative offered. The support department is open round-the-clock on a daily basis, but it’s not clear where their support teams are based.
iPower in the News
While looking for press on iPower, I didn’t find anything significant that would suggest a high-profile problem with the service, such as downtime or hacking.
iPower Control Panel
The control panel iPower uses is vDeck. It’s a custom control panel which will take some getting used to if you’ve previously been provided with Cpanel. The interface is functional but reasonably basic; unfortunately there’s no demo that you can try out before you buy.
iPower Extras
New iPower customers receive a mixture of free gifts, including a drag and drop site builder tool, $50 in Facebook ad credits, $25 for Yahoo!/Bing advertising and $100 in Google ad credits. It’s also possible to sign up for a free listing on YP.com and claim a toll-free number via Nextiva.
In addition, there’s a Marketplace where customers can buy top-up services to enhance their plans, such as SSL certificates, SEO services and online backup tools. In terms of scripts, only one is offered: EmailBrain, a mailing list application.
New customers also receive one free domain name on some plans. This is topped up to three domain names on the more expensive plans.
iPower Money Back Guarantee / Cancellation Policy
There’s no money back guarantee with iPower. If you want to cancel the service, you’ll need to give one month’s notice and pay a $35 minimum cancellation fee. If you do happen to sign up for a plan with a 30-day money back guarantee, the cancellation fee won’t be applied, but you’ll need to pay your subscription via credit card to be eligible.
Any costs associated with free domain names will be applied and/or deducted from the refund, unless you want to surrender the name, in which case iPower won’t charge you for it. This is an unusual clause which is worth noting.
iPower Summary
As with many Endurance International Group hosting providers, it’s difficult to find a distinction between iPower and other shared hosting providers. The custom control panel will be a downside for many people, and the lack of international phone numbers could also be a concern for customers outside the US. Pricing is competitive, particularly over longer terms, but the cancellation fee for early termination could make any savings negligible. However, iPower is backed by an enormous hosting provider, so the chance of having a truly serious issue is likely to be slim, and 24/7 live chat support is definitely a good option to have if things do go wrong.
Fast growing shared hosting provider, BlueHost, offers a plan with plenty of features and unlimited domains.
Read our BlueHost Reviews
Web Hosting Hub offer an incredible deal: unlimited bandwidth & disk space, plus phone support, for $4.95/mo. What's not to like?
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InMotion Hosting was founded in 2001 and is co-owned by Sunil Saxena and Todd Robinson. Today, the company trades under the company name of InMotion Hosting.
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Coming from godaddy, ipower are extremely fabulous! My domain had expired but they held on to it for more than 6 months at no extra cost!!!!