SoftLayer, Inc. Reviews

8 User Ratings

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Uptime
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User Reviews – Page 1 of 2

We've 8 SoftLayer, Inc. reviews from real users. Unlike many hosting user review sites, we go for quality - not quantity - and take a tough line on fake reviews. Learn why we're different, or read on to see what our users think of SoftLayer, Inc.…

CHINTAN MODASIA facebook.com

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its an good website giing the offer to developer to upload their data and website to his server and makes his customers that it cant be hacked till they are alive thanks for ur support

K Deeds oldtowncreative.com

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Softlayer has been great imo over the last 3 years. When they first took over Orbit I felt there were issues. I've been coding for 20 years and no matter who you host with there will be an issue or two. If not you are one lucky coder and living in a different world than the rest of us. I give Softlayer high marks, and will say we manage our server, so this doesn't include any of their managed services. Our up-time has been great, their response time to tickets has been fast, and they've given me about 10 hours of the last year of free help and advice when I've had to make server management decisions. We currently have 4 servers with them and really can't dish them at all. I've been with about 8 different companies over the years and feel I've had my fair share of good and bad hosts. Two thumbs up to Softlayer from me. I also will point out if you have clients that are very large and recognized they ask who their site will be hosted with if you are the developer. Spitting out some small companies name they have never heard of can cost you a client from time to time.

Mark Pettit marketpro.tk

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Best host I have ever used and seen. The uptime is wonderful and their support is superb! My host, Empire Hostings, is run through them and I love the server

Allen Shelby collegecreeps.com

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I host at HostGator with SoftLayer data centers, and they definately Rock! I would say uptime is around 98%, if not better. I really cant remember the last time my sites were down (knock on wood) and I host about 250 domains with them! Very economical with awesome service! Thanks guys!!!

Martin Mbugua Kinyanjui vhealthsite.com

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Good support from you guys.
When I got stuck with a domain I was investigating at flippa website Auction, your team was readily available to answer and guide me through out that duration.
I got all the information I need within a very short time, keep it up guys.

Bryan maplecreaper.cz.cc

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SoftLayer is kinda good cuz they have a VERY good support and 95% uptime services.. They're support helpers are almost like 24/7 trying to help all the peoples that needed help. The prices of their hosts are affordable too.

Mark Guertin

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The term "mind-numbing" was used in the previous review. The only thing mind-numbing about Softlayer is the sheer incompetence when it comes to support. On several instances what should have been 1 hour of downtime resulted in catastrophes that resulted in 24 hours+ of downtime, multiple re-installs of an OS (seemingly because they had some random hardware failures), provisioning problems, multiple HOURS of a machine sitting idle waiting for a tech to "get back to it" during a re-install, etc.

If you depend on your hosting machines and turnaround time is important to you you might want to look elsewhere. While their uptime is generally good the next most important thing is problem resolution, and this is an area where they fail miserably.

My last "support" experience went something like this. A lot of mangled TCP/IP packets were hitting our server, filling up logs and generally pointing out either an issue with the NIC or the network serving it. The "support" person first gave us very generic advice (update to the latest of everything) ... ok, fair enough -- even though the issue started well after our last installation or update -- to placate them we updated. Same problems existed. They then processed to "accidentally" knock the server offline for 20 minutes while testing the NIC (and seeming didn't even know until we pointed it out to them). The root of the issue was incomplete/damaged TCP/IP packets coming into the NIC. Their resolution? They DISABLED TOS (which is the option for the NIC to repair the damaged packets). Why? The tech said "Ok, now you won't see all these errors in your logs."

The problem was not the errors showing up int he logs, the problem was that the errors were happening in the first place. Subsequent trouble tickets have been ignored, stating that this was already "fixed". We are seeing massive packet loss to the server now (25% +). Waiting to see what kind of wet blanket fix they come up with for this one as we are searching for a new hosting company.

P.S. This is not on a "cheap" server, nor is it small time. This is a site that pulls in many millions of unique IP's visits a month, not someone's blog.

James Riley jamespriley.com

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SoftLayer is one of those hosting providers that is simply mind-numbingly awesome. They're the only dedicated server provider I've seen that gives you everything from IP KVM to ethernet control, remote power outlet control, automated OS reloads/changes all through the control panel, all with no tickets. They've automated their processes to make it easier for you to manage your business infrastructure with minimal interaction with their tech team, which frees their techs up to handle the more intricate issues on the network and hardware side of things.

Their network is absolutely top notch. You've got the public network, but aside from that there is a private network - all of your servers and services, whether physical or virtual, whether in Dallas, Seattle, or DC are able to communicate securely on your own private VLAN with no bandwidth charges. I have never seen an unplanned network outage affect services in my entire time working with them, and even planned outages generally are set up so well that services are entirely unaffected.

SoftLayer is definitely not for everyone - to take full advantage of their systems you have to be well versed in server administration. They do offer managed services but it's on a per ticket basis with a $3 fee per ticket, so if you're looking for fully managed they're not for you.

Sside from being extremely well versed in what they're doing, the techs some of the most professional support personnel I've ever had the pleasure of working with. Their responses are quick, to the point, and if there's something that needs clarification they're very good at asking the right questions. If you really need to clarify something and typing it out isn't working they're just a phone call away, but tickets are the preferred method of communication. I've only opened up 45 support tickets since 2006 - and while you may think that's a lot, the majority of it was hardware upgrades and just simple questions about the infrastructure to help me better plan my setup. There have been less than 5 instances where support needed to get involved to get something fixed. Whenever I had a problem, working on it with the tools they provide almost always proved to be successful.

Bottom line: If you want a server that you can manage yourself and have fast, fine grained control over, SoftLayer is the host for you. They're more expensive than the competition, but you get what you pay for. Actually, with SoftLayer I'd say you get far more than you pay for!

The only thing I wish I'd known before becoming a customer was that they existed. I'd been through several hosting companies all with several nightmares. As soon as a friend referred me to SoftLayer, I checked it out and was immediately sold. I will not be taking my business elsewhere - nothing compares.

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