Re:[cobalt-users] RACKSHACK.NET was RE: Colo agreements...

["Jeff" <jeffl@xxxxxxx>]

Jeff-
Please post the following response to the group-

Please allow me to introduce myself: I am Robert Marsh, Head Surfer for
ev1.net, a Houston based ISP and owner of Rackshack.net.  Since our opening
in December of 1998, we now serve over 160,000 users including well over
5000 domain hosting accounts.  A company simply does not reach this size in
such a short period of time by being a "scam". If we were a "scam", these
subscribers would have left us long ago.

Let me be the first to profess the benefits of our free society including
the right to free speech. This right, however, is not absolute when it is
malicious, false, and completely untrue. Such is the case with the recent
post by Carrie Bartkowiak.

As far as being a "scam", I don't think so. The pages that Carrie refers to
were meant to be hidden behind a splash screen while our provisioning and
updating system was developed. The tables that these pages pull from will
not be updated with our inventory until the day before we officially launch.
The tables in question contain the lists of Cobalt Raqs including model,
memory, hard drive, and IP address. These tables are where we "pull" a
Cobalt Raq to be assigned when it is ordered. We loaded these tables with
test data at various times to test the status of the provisioning system.
Once we do launch, the tables will be updated in realtime to allow our
current inventory status to display. Any programmer or webmaster would
understand such.

It is unfortunate that Carrie has chosen to slander my company in this
forum.

Rackshack.net will offer the most aggressive pricing on Cobalt Raqs
available. That is a fact. Our base product, a Cobalt Raq4i, will be
available at only $99. per month with a one time set-up fee of $249. A
package with more memory, back-up services, monitoring, and more will be
available at $169 per month. Also, a number of refurbished Cobalt Raq 2, 2+,
3, and 3i will be available starting at $69. ALL with NO contracts.

We will also offer immediate provisioning of your Raq, automated and
immediate DNS additions and modifications, online trouble ticket entry and
tracking, and most importantly 24/7 LIVE customer support.

These are the facts. Make your own judgment but please do not be fooled by
false, misleading, and inaccurate information posted by someone who is NOT
"in the know".

Robert Marsh
Head Surfer

----- Original Message -----
From: "Carrie Bartkowiak" <admin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <cobalt-users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, January 18, 2001 11:55 PM
Subject: [cobalt-users] RACKSHACK.NET was RE: Colo agreements...


> (Taken from the colo agreements thread)
> <snip>
> ||>charges are.  I'm waiting to see what the RackShack.net will offer plus
> ||>Tera-Byte.com has some really good colo rates starting around
> ||>$80 per month.
> ||>
> ||>John Baine
> ||>jbaine@xxxxxxxxxx
>
> John, since you brought this up, I have to weigh in.
> I waited a full month for Rackshack (I found them on December 10th) to
open
> their doors on January 8th so my customers and I could switch straight to
> another RaQ4i. Come the 8th, they switched their front door to say the
15th.
> I still had links in my history that went behind their front door, and
used
> them. (I'll give them out in a minute.) What I saw when I got inside was a
> pre-set scam already being set into place. They hadn't even opened up yet,
> and already they had their web pages coded to say that *everything* was
> 'temporarily unavailable' except for their most expensive RaQ4r at $169 -
> and guess what? There was only 1 RaQ4r left!! Order now!!
> I don't like that kind of shit.
> I called them up and told them I'd been in their web site and saw what
they
> were doing. Confronted them directly on it. I got an excuse that those
were
> just "test pages" (Yeah right. Don't BS me, I was a webmaster long before
I
> had my own server.) They also promised me, (this is on the morning of the
> 13th) that come Monday morning on the 15th they'd have RaQ4i's available.
> There was a "huge shipment" of them waiting in the back.  Mmmhmm. This is
> after I got transferred from Sales, to Tech Support, to Webhosting.
> I immediately went and ordered a RaQ4r from www.4webspace.com. I had made
my
> customers wait a month to migrate servers just so we wouldn't have to go
> down to a RaQ3, and I was pretty hot, because the company I had waited on
> had now changed their opening date again, AND they were already setting
into
> place a scam system where they were lying to customers.
> I went back and checked on the 15th and sure enough, they had once again
> moved their opening date - this time to Feb. 1st. I went back into their
> site and the only change was that now the page said that everything was
> 'temporarily unavailable' except for the RaQ4i *and* the RaQ4r... but
guess
> what? There were still only 1 left of each.
>
> I won't deal with a host who is setting into place a scam system and lying
> to customers before they even open their doors. That spells T-R-O-U-B-L-E
to
> me... and I don't take well to dishonesty.
>
> Btw, the RaQ4r that I got from 4webspace.com has been running like a
charm,
> connections have been fantastic the entire time, and I've already 'tested'
> out their support with some annoying questions (my 'getting to know tech
> support' routine) and they've been answered promptly, completely, and the
> answers they've give me are completely true.  I'm satisfied.
>
> For anyone who's wondering and who knows I was with CobaltRacks - the
UUNet
> upgrade was supposed to take place on the 10th. Since that time I've still
> been watching traceroutes with times of 1584ms every few hours, around
650ms
> a lot of the time in between, and rarely about 90ms.
>
> Here's the Rackshack links that will get you in to see the scam they're
> setting up. If the buttons on the left still aren't working, just
> right-click and copy shortcut, then paste it into your browser. You'll get
> to the page. Be SURE to do this with the "Signup" form and go through
pages
> 1-10 so you can fully see how they're going to sucker you in with the
> promise of low prices and then scam you into buying a more expensive box
> than you intended.
> Oh, and I also don't have much respect for a company that can't get such a
> simply-structured website up and running with over a month to do it and
> three people working on the web design team for it. That site would've
taken
> me one night - two at the most, with just *me* hand-coding it (in PHP, not
> ASP).
>
> http://www.rackshack.net/details.html
> http://www.rackshack.net/aboutus/index.html
> http://www.rackshack.net/affiliate/faq.html
> http://www.rackshack.net/aboutus
> http://www.rackshack.net/aboutus/doit
> http://www.rackshack.net/aboutus/facil.asp
> http://www.rackshack.net/aboutus/networks.asp
> http://www.rackshack.net/aboutus/testi.asp
> http://www.rackshack.net/aboutus/why
> http://www.rackshack.net/billing
> http://www.rackshack.net/contact
> http://www.rackshack.net/faq
> http://www.rackshack.net/faq/frontpage.asp
> http://www.rackshack.net/faq/raq4.asp
> http://www.rackshack.net/main.asp
>
> That's the main one (above)... see how there is only ONE left even though
> they're not open yet?? SCAM!!!
>
> http://www.rackshack.net/services
> http://www.rackshack.net/signup/wizard.asp?wizard=step1
> http://www.rackshack.net/signup/wizard.asp?wizard=step2&raqtype=ShowAll
> http://www.rackshack.net/signup/wizard.asp?wizard=step3&raqtype=ShowAll
> http://www.rackshack.net/signup/wizard.asp?wizard=step4
> http://www.rackshack.net/signup/wizard.asp?wizard=step5&raqtype=ShowAll
> http://www.rackshack.net/signup/wizard.asp?wizard=step6&raqtype=ShowAll
>
> This goes on and on... just change the number in the 'step' part of the
link
> and you can go all the way through the order form.
>
> http://www.rackshack.net/updates
> http://www.rackshack.net/values.asp
> http://www.rackshack.net/progress.asp
>
> That should be enough to show you... there's more but like I said, all you
> have to do is right-click on any link and copy the shortcut, then paste it
> into your location bar and hit enter to get there.
>
> My gut feeling is to avoid these people with a 40-foot pole. There's a
> difference between inflating your prices a bit so you can make profit, and
> then outright lying to people. I do NOT like liars and refuse to do
business
> with them.
>
>
> Carrie Bartkowiak
> Administrator, All @bout Choice
> admin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> http://www.allaboutchoice.com
>
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