Thrust VPS Review

I have to say, I very rarely do bad reviews on this site. Usually I just keep my mouth shut and move on, but the amount of time I have wasted on this particular company is astounding. And given that such simple tasks are somehow outside of their reach, I feel like I should atleast give a small warning to others out there. So here is the Thrust VPS Review.

So first, What is Thrust VPS? Thrust VPS is a (as you guessed it) VPS company that relies on huge servers with 48GB of ram, to provide affordable Linux and Windows VPS’. I guess you could say you get what you pay for, but these guys are atleast well known on various hosting forums, and atleast have enough money for a swanky website design. So I thought, “How bad can they be”?

It all starts with having a 1GB Windows VPS with them. I used the VPS to test automation tools off my own PC, and also to allow me to run applications from work, aswell as home.

Now two mistakes that I made.

1. 1GB of ram is not enough for what I needed.
2. I didn’t install anti-virus.

The latter ran me into trouble as  the automation tool I was using (A scraper of some sort), I was running into a tonne of dodgy sites. Usually these sites are fine because my AV on my home PC (Avast) will block the connection immediately, but alas, time slipped away and I completely forgot about it. Thus, I contracted a virus (The VPS I mean! Not me! :p)

But it is simple to fix right? I upgraded my VPS to a 2GB ram machine, and waited for the ram upgrade to happen. I waited several days and nothing happened. So by this point, I am a little disappointed that a) the upgrade wasn’t instant b) that support doesn’t even realize they have a new order.

I do what anyone else would do. I opened a support ticket asking for the upgrade. Strangely enough, this is the reply I got back :

Please update your plan details with the invoice number.

Ok… Now this worried me slightly. I am logged into my account, opening the ticket, can the support person not already see all invoices/current plans associated with my account?

I reply with my invoice number, and I immediately get flung to the sales department. After getting a canned response from support. I ask, and this is important for the rest of the story to flow :

“While your at it, can we have a complete re-install of the OS? Just to start fresh with the upgraded stats?

Also, is this a genuine windows version?”

The VPS was a slight mess because of the virus, and also because I had to cut down on resources that the VPS would use while being stranded on 1GB of ram. It would have been better for me to simply start a fresh install. They were using SolusVM as a VPS control panel, I know 100% that to re-install is a 1 click process. As for the genuine comment, it was made because if the Windows install was a genuine copy, I could install Microsoft Security Essentials (A decent Anti-Virus) for free.

Approx 5 hours after asking for my VPS to be upgraded, I got this reply :

Sorry for the delay, this has now been done for you. Please could you reboot your VPS via SolusVM so that the new settings can take affect.

Ok, they upgraded the ram. But they didn’t re-install the OS, nor did they answer my question on the genuine windows. I copy and paste my request back in again, asking to re-install the OS, and if Windows was legit.

12 hours later, and approx 36 hours after opening the ticket. I get this reply :

To get your Windows license activated please start a new ticket to support with your IP address and Windows admin password.

Ok that answers my question about Windows being genuine, but what about the re-install of the OS? That was my primary question and 3 replies in a row have skipped over the question.

I reply once again, copy and pasting it in TWICE, just so they can see what they need to do. They come back and reply :

I’m sorry I did miss that part. Re-installing the OS is something you can do yourself rather easily.
http://damnvps.com/wiki/index.php?title=Windows

Christ, so after all that they want me to do it myself. Now look, I am not blowing my own trumpet here. But I am not a computer illiterate donkey. I deal with these sorts of things on a daily basis, but their VNC console would not work for me. I had to reply once again in the hopes of someone helping me.

After asking for help, I get this reply from a braniac called Ryan :

I shall pass this ticket onto support so that they can help you with your issues would you like me to see if they can reinstall the OS to?

No shit Ryan. From the outset of the ticket I have wanted someone to re-install windows. Unfortunately I was asleep so I didn’t get to reply to this ticket, but someone named “karuppu” came to my rescue and replied with this :

Is it OK for you to recreate the server in another node?

Wait what? Why does it need to go onto another node? What is wrong with simply re-installing my existing VPS? I never understood this decision. As I had an existing VPS, all they had to do was reinstall the OS. I reply with this :

Yes, recreate the entire VPS if you want. All we require is a 2003 Windows VPS, and that is it. However you want to get there is up to you.

I mean really. All I want is the VPS setup, however the hell they want to do it is up to them. But unfortunately, even after being put back into support, now they fling me back to sales for some reason. Even after karuppu was about to help me. Finally, after 4 days of back and forth, someone named “Ryan” replies to me ticket :

This has now been rebuilt for you, sorry for the delay.

At this point I was thinking “THANK GOD!”. But alas it was not to be. Here is my reply :

Hi Ryan,

Are you sure? Since the OS is wrong on the existing VPS… And we also asked for Windows 2003 to be installed on the new one, and the new one (apparently) shows 2008.

I will tell you what, I will spell it out for you.

Reply to this ticket, with the exact details, of a Windows VPS with 2003 installed, that I can remote into immediately, that is activated as genuine, that after logging in, I am presented with a blank desktop.

That is all I am after. I am not sure if I am asking too much of you guys. If provisioning a VPS is too much for you guys, just let me know and I will go elsewhere.

Basically, the VPS he had provisioned said that it was 2008 windows (After I had asked for Windows 2003). But my old VPS also said it was 2003 Windows (And it was actually 2008). I could also connect to my old VPS even though from the control panel it said it was shut off, and I could not connect to me new VPS even though the control panel said it was on.

It just seemed like a huge mixup to me. Something that would have never happened had they just upgraded the existing VPS in the first place. After my reply, I sat and waited for someone half-intelligent to help me.

Then, the last straw. Today I receive this absolute peach of a comment from Arun.

Hello,

Shall we go ahead and install Windows 2003-32bit in this vps?

My reaction to this comment was something a bit like this….

It was just inconceivable to me that after telling them atleast half a dozen times to just re-install the VPS, we are still at square one.

And just FYI, I sent messages both to their Twitter, and to the owners Reddit account in the hope of someone just stepping up and doing what is required, but instead I have had the run around non-stop.

They have easily some of the worst support staff in the business, infact the worst support staff that I have ever dealt with in my life, not just in hosting.

If you need prompt replies, and intelligent people replying to your tickets. Stay away from Thrust VPS.