11:50AM CST - The Aries server is currently down due to an issue on one of the service partitions causing errors for most dynamic websites. The system is down to run an emergency filesystem check to clear up some journaling issues we were seeing that were the root cause of the error users had seen this morning. We expect the filesystem check process to take around 1 hour and we are monitoring it closely at this time to ensure it completes in a timely manner and to keep updates coming. We apologize for the trouble and inconvenience this may cause for you and your website, and we appreciate your patience as we work through this issue.

12:00PM CST - Judging by the progress of the filesystem check, we expect the Aries server to be back online within 1-2 hours. This is longer than we anticipated but everything is going smoothly thus far and we do not expect any hiccups in the process.

12:52PM CST - Looks like the initial estimate was on target, services should be coming back online within the next few minutes. :)

This post will provide you with the most up-to-date information regarding the scheduled maintenance window for the Chicago DC relocation. You can find detailed information regarding the Chicago DC relocation here.

We ask that our customers in our Chicago, IL data center please refrain from submitting trouble tickets to our help desk in reference to any service interruptions caused by this maintenance during the published maintenance window time frame. The most up-to-date information regarding this maintenance window can be found right here.

04/24/2011 @ 2300 hrs:

Non customer servers, including the server hosting geekstorage.com, are being prepared to be taken offline so that they can be relocated between data centers.

04/25/2011 @ 0010 hrs:

Non customer servers, including the server hosting geekstorage.com, have been successfully migrated between data centers and service has been restored.

04/25/2011 @ 0045 hrs:

The following shared and reseller servers are being prepared to be taken offline so that they can be relocated between data centers.

• Zeus
• Apollo

If you are a dedicated server customer located in the 350 E. Cermak Rd., Chicago, IL data center, your server will be moved during this first batch of customer servers to be relocated.

04/25/2011 @ 0205 hrs:

The following shared and reseller servers have been successfully migrated between data centers. The servers are being turned back online and service should be restored shortly.

• Zeus
• Apollo

If you are a dedicated server customer located in the 350 E. Cermak Rd., Chicago, IL data center, your server has been successfully migrated and service has been restored.

04/25/2011 @ 0230 hrs:

The following VPS nodes are being prepared to be taken offline so that they can be relocated between data centers.

• Node3
• Node5
• Node6

04/25/2011 @ 0345 hrs:

The following VPS nodes have been successfully migrated between data centers. The servers are being turned back online and service should be restored shortly.

• Node3
• Node5
• Node6

Maintenance Complete

At this time, the scheduled maintenance has been completed. Some servers will are still coming back online, however, I can now say that the migration went off without a hitch! The average downtime per server was approximately 1 hour and 15 minutes, far short of our 3 hour estimates.

If you have any questions regarding the maintenance or need technical support, please e-mail us at [email protected].

A network issue has caused about 45 minutes of downtime at the Chicago datacenter, this outage affected the following servers:

Apollo
Node3
Node5
Node6
Zeus

As well as our primary server hosting GeekStorage.com, causing an outage in support channels, as well. Services are restored at this time to all servers, and we are continuing to investigate the cause of the issue. There was a problem with the switch hosting all of these servers that has caused the outage, we are still investigating why & how this issue occurred so suddenly without warning, and we have plans to replace the switch during our planned migration in several days (check the post previous to this one for more details on the migration).

We have finalized migration date for all servers at the Chicago DC to the new datacenter location a couple blocks away. The migration will affect the following servers:

• Apollo
• Zeus
• Node3
• Node5
• Node6

The downtime will last approximately 3 hours per server, after which service will be restored on the same IPs. No reconfiguration or DNS modifications are necessary. The maintenance is scheduled to begin & end on Monday, April 25th, 2011, between 12:00AM and 6:00AM CST. GeekStorage technicians will be on-site to perform the migration and ensure downtime is kept to a minimum.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact our support team at [email protected].

This is notice of an upcoming maintenance window for ALL servers located in our 350 E. Cermak Rd. data center in Chicago, IL.

During the period between April 19^th – April 26^th we will be moving servers located in our cabinet at 350 E. Cermak Rd. to our cabinet at 725 S. Wells St.

We are still in the planning stages of this relocation and will provide a tentative date and time that each server will be moved in the near future. This is a physical relocation of the server hardware from one data center to another. As such, this move will cause downtime for each server when it is moved. The move will be performed in phases and downtime will be kept to an absolute minimum.

In the weeks leading up to this maintenance window, we will be preparing the network and organizing this relocation to be as quick as possible. This move will NOT require any change of IP space. The typical relocation scenario for each server will include a graceful shutdown, physical move, cabinet installation and then server boot.

In the near future, we will send all of our customers a detailed e-mail with the scheduled date, time and anticipated downtime for your server’s move during this maintenance window. We do not anticipate this downtime to be long. The two data centers are 2.3 miles from one another.

We will have personnel onsite at the data center to oversee the hardware relocation.

Why move?

Our data center provider recently built a brand new data center at 725 S. Wells St. Our current data center location at 350 E. Cermak Rd. is near full on capacity and any future equipment would have to be placed in the new data center. This move allows us room to expand and keep our equipment in the same data center, allowing us many options for connectivity between our hardware.

The network is the same at both data center locations.

Have questions?

If you have any questions regarding this upcoming maintenance window, please contact us at [email protected].

If you have service located on a server in our Chicago data center, please keep an eye on your inbox for additional details.