Dear Customer,
We have scheduled Migration of our existing servers in London to our new data centre in Maidenhead. We realise this is a significant move, and are sending this document out to all clients affected to explain the reasons behind the move, and to address any concerns. In summary, this new website will be a significant step forward in the levels of service we provide you, and an exciting development for eUKhost and its clients. Migration has been scheduled in 3 Batches to ensure 100% safe and secure relocation of servers.
Reasons for move
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There are a number of reasons why we have decided to move a significant number of collocated and dedicated servers from London.
1. TelecityRedbus, the company we currently rent our onsite office and data centre space from, are planning to turn the floor where our office is into data centre space. We believe it is critical to our clients that we maintain our onsite staff presence. This will shortly no longer be possible in TelecityRedbus.
2. TelecityRedbus have increased the pricing of data center space by over 70% in 2006, and have announced their intentions to do a further similar increase in 2007. We have absorbed the initial increases of 2006, but increases in 2007 would lead to higher prices for our clients.
3. There is extremely high demand for data center space in London’s Docklands, and very little supply. Our current clients are constantly asking us to provide them with more services, and to facilitate this we need space to expand services in to.
4. TelecityRedbus have made a number of operational changes, which in general have made it more difficult for us to operate the standard of service we set out to deliver. Additionally, it is widely anticipated that they will change hands to a new owner in 2008, potentially bringing instability.
Benefits of move
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The move to Maidenhead is very exciting for us all at eUKhost, because it will allow us to bring great benefits to our clients. These benefits will concrete our position as providing the best hosting experience in the UK.
1. The most significant change compared with London is that the new website will be manned by eUKhost employees 24/7. We are one of a very small number of UK hosting companies who can make this claim. Most – including our company until recently – relied on “generic” data center onsite staff provided by Telehouse, Redbus, Telecity, etc. These staff were shared between many companies, and weren’t trained or familiar with the individual requirements of the diverse companies. We will now have our own technical support engineers on shift at all times 24/7, who will answer telephone calls, support emails and tickets, and deal with any technical support issues you may have onsite.
2. The new website in Maidenhead is very high specification; it is one of the highest specification data centers in the UK. It is four times better than the average Docklands website, and more than twice the specification of the best TelecityRedbus website.
3. We have a long lease on the physical building, stamped by the UK land registry. This is a self-contained data floor, and dedicated to our company. We have control over security access, and there are no unauthorised third parties allowed to do cabling or other potentially disruptive works. This gives the maximum protection for the data environment and our clients.
4. Unlike the London Docklands websites we are located in at present, there is digitally recorded CCTV on every aisle, and an exterior perimeter security fence. Our employees monitor the CCTV 24/7, providing significantly improved security.
Network/IP Addresses
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Our network in London has already been extended to Maidenhead for some time. We currently have two dedicated 10 gigabit DWDM links, running over fiber directly between London and Maidenhead. The DWDM means we can upgrade this significantly in future, as needs arrive. The two links from Maidenhead run to two different core websites in London, and take entirely separate physical routes in the public highway to protect against failure. The network is entirely redundant, and there is less than a thousandth of a second of latency to the London Internet Exchange (LINX).
The network will perform exactly as you are used to it doing. There will be no change of IP addresses, and no change in the speed of the network. The network experience will be exactly the same as in London, and in fact improved in redundancy and capacity.
Schedule:
1st Rack :
Date: 18th May 2007
Time: 23:00 – 07:00
2nd Rack :
Date: 25th May 2007
Time: 23:00 – 07:00
3rd Rack :
Date: 26th May 2007
Time: 23:00 – 07:00
Procedure:
As covered in the above message, we have gone to great lengths to prepare for and organise the move of your server. Below is the procedure that we will be following on the date and time noted above:
- We will attempt to 'soft' power down your server(s) by logging on and issuing a shutdown command
- Your server(s) will be 'hard' powered down if this fails
- The rack will be safely removed by a team of technicians from its current footprint and wheeled to a purpose-built vehicle and relocated to the new Data Centre
- The rack will then be moved into position by a second team of technicians and connected into the new infrastructure. At this point the servers will be brought up one at a time and their progress monitored until all servers are fully functional in their new location.
How to contact us:
On the night, there is always the possibility that a server may take longer to be brought live than expected, be it due to disk checks or incorrect configuration. It is more than likely that we will contact you first but in the event that you experience problems with your service and have not heard from a technician please do not hesitate to contact us in one of the following ways:
- Email:
support@eukhost.com or open a ticket from
http://support.eukhost.com
- Include details of your account
- The problem that you are experiencing
- A telephone number we can contact you at should this be necessary
- Any further information that you feel may be helpful for us.
- Telephone: 0800 097 4828
- keep a watch on this thread of our Forum
Obviously we have taken great care in the arrangements for this relocation including running smaller moves over recent weeks to highlight any potential problems. We would like to take this opportunity to thank all our clients for their patience and suggestions over recent weeks that have aided us during this planning period and look forward to the mutually prosperous future this large operation will create.
Please ensure that you communicate with your customers and provide them with this information to avoid any inconvenience on respective date. Contact our Support Team from our helpdesk (
http://support.eukhost.com ) to know exact date for migration of your server.
Relocation of Servers to Maidenhead on 18th, 25th and 26th May 2007
