Cartikahosting.com NOT Recommended. Servers and service bad.
I have tried Cartikahosting.com but was very disappointed and found their services to be very poor. We have ZERO interest in working with Cartika and tolerating their server problems and bad customer relations and abuse of their own policies toward their clients.
Here is the summary.
1. Server quality is average. Unfortunately the server often have down time throughout the day though very brief ranging from 30seconds to 2 minutes. In one hour, the down time may happen 3-5 times. We hope Cartikahosting fixes this problem. Other than the brief outtages, the server is okay. I do appreciate that Cartika has helped me reset and restart the server many times to clear out whatever was causing the server to crash.
2. Customer and technical support is poor. The customer support (which I believe is Andrew Rouchotas himself as well as tech support and billing - but he uses the names such as Jonathan, Nick, Dan or Ellen) really could be more friendly and helpful. When a problem happens, such as the control panel not working or the server being down, we were blamed that it was our web page coding. I am hosted on three other hosting companies using the same codes and do not have any problem at all.
3. Billing and prices is poor. When you sign up for an account, everything will seem good for the first 1-2 months. But afterward Cartika Hosting will claim you are violating their TOS (terms of service) whether it be how you are hosting your websites or the use of bandwidth or storage and they will ask you to upgrade and keep pushing you to upgrade. This way they can make more money. I do not agree with this tactic and believe it is not really ethical. After I followed their directions to upgrade I later found that there were some codes placed in my website folders which increased the bandwidth. I asked Cartikahosting.com who had placed these files and they responded that they think I had uploaded it by accident. Come on! Why would I upload a file which only purpose was to increases my bandwidth. The files in the folder appeared to be spamming codes which most likely was spamming my account increasing the bandwidth. Once we had asked Cartika who placed the files in our folder, they got nervous and asked us to close our account. Cartikahosting.com wrote the following: "If you refuse to cancel your services with us, we will be forced to cancel your services. Any further refusal on your part to find a new provider and we will have our legal team initiate action against you for damages and we will immediately cancel all services."
With the quality of the server and customer support, I honestly believe the value of their services is maximum USD 10 per month. Cartikahosting.com belongs in the group of cheap web hosting though they are trying to promote themselves as something more larger. Rather than ask us to close our account shouldn't the hosting company try to solve the problem? I think something is very fishy about Cartikahosting.com aka Cartika Inc and Cartika Hosting Solution Inc.
4. Control Panel often stalls. I have notified Cartikahosting to fix the control panel and they always reply to me that they are working on it. Up to now, the control panel still stalls. However, they have helped me reset the control panel many times which was helpful. I think the Hsphere control panel is very good. Probably this is the highlight of Cartika's services. I do like their control panel but just as long as it is working properly. I would have given a higher rating if the control panel didn't keep stalling and freezing up.
5. Abusing their own TOS. Cartika at anytime may send you an email claiming that you have abused some portion of their TOS. This is their way to get you to upgrade and pay more. However, it is a violation of their own TOS to be pushing and forcing their clients to either upgrade or cancel their account. Cartikahosting will tell you to either agree or they will terminate your services. This is not a smart nor ethical way to do business.
6. When I asked where they were located, "someone" from Cartika said they were located in the USA. I believe they cohost from another company in the USA but after doing research I found out they are from Canada. I see no reason why they should hide this fact or lie to their clients.
Overall, I have to give Cartikahosting.com two thumbs down and DO NOT recommend them to anyone. I believe the company is just a home business somewhere in canada and is run by Andrew and maybe his friend or friends. The problem about trusting your hosting with such a small company or home business is that they can abuse the client's rights and terminate your services at anytime. This is what we personally experienced. A larger more reputable company would not do that. They would try to find the problem and resolve it. When we asked why we were being charged for such high bandwidth and asked if we can have proof, Cartika did not provide us with any substantial evidence except their demand for more payment. Later, when we found a file that might have caused higher bandwidth and asked for the IP and any information on how those files got there, Cartika terminated our services within hours of the email we sent.
For the first two months everything was pretty good but thereafter everything really deteriorated and I didn't find Cartika to be helpful and a bit on the rude side in their email replies. For small websites Cartika might be okay but the price would be expensive for small sites. If you wish for a long term partner and hosting to develop your business and expand, Cartikahosting is not capable of handling reliable and helpful services. You will just find yourself regretting the decision to host with them.
In all fairness, maybe my experience was bad compared to others. Perhaps I expect more than Cartika can offer. Cartika did once write to me that if I want better services I would need to pay USD 1000 per month. If you want to give them a try, ask for a 2-3 month free trial period so that if there is any problem you can get a refund. I found them very helpful and nice in the beginning so maybe there is some hope. They told me they are hosting thousand and thousands of other companies and are very busy to offer such individual attention. Not sure if that is true but through my experience, I have a feeling Cartika is a home office with the owner and maybe a friend helping out on weekends.
My last suggestion is to do your research before signing up for any hosting companies. You can check websites such as
http://www.webhosting.info/webhosts/reports/total_domains/cartikahosting.com to find out trends of the hosting company.
Look for a company that is easily available with helpful customer support. Look for a company that has a good reputation and a growing trend. Of course not all companies are perfect but at least they should be helpful and willing to help. I think that was one of my big problems with Cartikahosting that they were not as helpful and when a problem occurred, they would put the blame on the clients which is not solving the problem but just passing the buck. Look for a company that will not nickle and dime you for everything. Look for a company that will not try to keep pushing you to upgrade by claiming you are violating their TOS. Cartikahosting kept asking us to upgrade and if we did not they would say we were violating their TOS. Once we upgraded, after two months later they asked us to upgrade again.
Good luck and hope everyone finds a good web hosting company!
ps - we just received an update from Cartika about their server problem. Hopefully they will get something right one day.
This thread is located at:
http://cartikaforum.com/showthread.php?p=4954
Here is the message that has just been posted:
***************
Hello,
Our system monitoring software has detected pending disk failures on MSsql2. We will be replacing the disks, 1 at a time, tonight between 6 and 8 PM CT. There is no expected down time and this replacement should be transparent to all users.
We will update this thread when the work is complete.
Dan
***************
CartikaHosting Forum
NONONO
I just logged in to tell you to never host with Godaddy or 1and1 or Bluehost or Dreamhost etc or anything that offers 'unlimited' resources
For the web hosting industry goes by 'you get what you pay for'.
I highly suggest these for your website:
Medialayer.com
Vectorlevel.com
Precisioneffect.com
Cartika.com
If you want to go with a more expensive VPS solution, I highly suggest:
WiredTree.com
Go to Webhostingtalk.com to find reviews about these hosts I mentioned, as well as find negative reviews on 1and1 or Godaddy. Check out nodaddy.com too while you're at it.
If you need more help such as finding a webhosting solution, feel free to PM me and I'll be glad to help!
PS: I suggest using phpBB (3) over vBulletin. For PHP related sites, you may want to try out Medialayer or Precisioneffect as they use 'Litespeed' servers which are a lot faster than standard Apache software in terms of serving up your website.
PPS: For domains, DO NOT USE 1and1. They tend to take your domain off you, especially if you use their privacy whois service. I highly suggest:
Namecheap.com (free privacy for one year (whoisguard))
And Godaddy.com (domains only), if you know how to go through their checkout without adding any extra services with your domain name purchase, such as whois protection and email and whatever.
