About a month ago, I got serious about finding a new hosting company for our dedicated servers. Right now we have a couple of FreeBSD boxes with a company called Dedicated Now and while they offer a really good value on their base prices as well as their add-ons, they are less than helpful and informative when something goes wrong. And, it seems that something goes wrong every couple of months or so. Plus, I am not so great on FreeBSD and Debian makes life so much easier for rookies like me that I was on the look for something Debian and something on this side of the country. It didn’t take long for me to read a lot of good things about Server Beach. Server beach is based in Texas (I think) but has a NOC out here in Los Angeles (I think…sorry, not much into fact checking today). I was checking out a site that lists Debian dedicated server hosts around the world (great resource) and Server Beach was at the top (and it seems like for good reason). I actually ran down the entire list. There are some great values on there, especially if you are looking for a box in Europe somewhere, which is on the list for another day. I ended up going onto the Server Beach website and clicking on the Live Chat button. I am sure most of you know that these usually say “nobody available” for most smaller companies these days, but they had someone available.

I started chatting with a guy named Roger Gonzales, who it turns out is their Sales Manager. He was very knowledgeable and up-front….two qualities I am not used to with my current host. We chatted for about 10 to 15 minutes and discussed what I have now and what SB might be able to offer. I told him I would sign up for a Debian box and try them out. I was not disappointed.

I ordered the box at 4:59pm and received a call from someone at ServerBeach to confirm my order and go over the configuration details and billing information. He was very nice as well, and I got the feeling quickly that everyone was on the same page over there…good. We ended the call and by 7:10pm I had my server up and running and had received a few emails with the details and login information. I logged in and and was super fast. The new Debian release, Etch, was installed and up to date.

Since then, I have run a few sites on there to give it a whirl and I have absolutely no complaints. Uptime has been 100%, no network issues and I am back on Debian. I will continue to update this post on progress and the service levels at Server Beach, but I can honestly say that I don’t think there will be any issues that are not resolved quickly and where I am kept in the dark.

Oh yeah, here is the kicker. Server Beach has a coupon code that allows current customers to earn rewards of up to $250 per person they refer. The pricing is exactly the same for referrals, and the person signing up gets $100 off, just for using my code. If the referrer stays signed up for 90 days, everyone gets their money….pretty nice gig, especially from a rock solid host.

My coupon code is NWX3DCU3BW and my name is Jason Golod if you need it…not sure. You can click here to make it all happen

tags: coupon, debian, dedicated server, hosting, server beach