Service Disruption - iWeb Montreal Data Center

If there is one thing I hate it is when my clients websites go down. I work hard to keep the server software and client websites software up to date to keep the sites up and the servers running as best as they can. There are things outside of my control that can make all the work I do to keep the servers running all pointless. Unfortunately it was these things that have caused the last two extended periods of downtime for me and my clients.

I choose to host at iWeb for many reasons, like the fact they offer a Canadian data center, they had redundant power and quick hardware replacement. I have been a happy customer with them since 2009, unfortunately that has all gone out the window with their last two periods of downtime.

Both the incident in February and this latest incident started with power problems at the Montreal data center where our servers are located. While I do not get all the specifics of the problems it appears that iWeb has a severe problem with power at the Montreal data center and are unable to keep the power on. The problem in February and this latest problem has cost us and all of our clients 20+ hours of downtime!

This amount of downtime is unacceptable and I have begun looking at alternatives for me and all of my clients websites. In the coming week I will hopefully have a new dedicated server vendor found and will notify all clients of the migration plan. If any clients would like to find their own hosts I completely understand your frustration. If you are considering moving only one website I recommend taking a look at either WPEngine for shared hosting or DigitalOcean if you want more control over your entire website. I will be in touch with each of you over the next week with more information regarding the migration away from iWeb.

Thanks for your patience as I work to get us all more reliable hosting. It is unfortunate that iWeb has become so unreliable after such a long period with them but they clearly have let down all of their customers, and possibly flat out lied on their website regarding power redundancy at their data centers.