Hello everyone,
Today we are posting an interview between Brian and Admin of NextGenerationServers in order to learn more about there current success in the GSP Industry. As a new company, it is very hard to get a good start but NxG has done quite well for themselves. In this interview Brian will help us uncover why that is exactly.
Looking for quality game servers? Visit
http://www.nextgenservers.com
GSP-Brian: Adam, can you give us a little background information on Next Generation Game Servers as this is our main focus of this interview.
Adam: Well, it all started off with very little financial backing, and I had started off as a previous company called Renegade-Gaming Servers back two years ago. I had always been an avid gamer myself and the rest of my staff are all gamers as well, so I decided why not take the plunge, save some money up and go from there. This was probably about four of five years ago. We started off small and began to grow. During this period, we went through many difficult times having to pay our bills. I pumped about $30,000 dollars of my own money into this business during the last four to five years. That may be some small chump change for some, but going to school and doing this as well played heavily on my finances. I decided to change the name to Next-Generation Game Servers (aka Next-Generation Gaming, LLC) due to the part that we needed a refreshed name, and a new edge to us. I give Johnny, my co owner, a lot of credit, because he helped us, and still helped NxG in some rough patches. Since then with the help of Johnny and our sales/support staff we have grown our company into the top tier provider to host your server with. We continue growing, and will provide the same service we started out with. Our Staff here do the best possible job, and dedicate our time and energy to this. Performance is key to all gamers whether they get the top of the line server or the base bargain they expect a high quality network and knowledgeable help staff. NxG has staff that monitors the boxes and network constantly to provide the lag free environment. As a company we didn't choose Windows because we thought that Linux would suit our needs better, and it offered a wider range of stability and configuration options versus Windows. NxG load balances and keep a standard of 2 servers per core. We maintain a highly customized Linux environment producing the most stable and optimal experience for your server to run in. Now with that being said, Next-Generation Game Servers does and will always provide something many other companies can't. This is friendly, kind, just support and awesome servers that will leave you asking, why don't I have an NxG server? Next-Generation Game Servers is here for the customer no doubt and you will experience what everyone else has. You wonder why we have become so popular; it’s because we offer the best support, the best service and the best performance for the cost. We will never overload our boxes and never leave clients in the dust. We have the staff, the hardware, the network and the control panel to make most customers extremely pleased. NxG is dedicated to provide the best performance and the best quality of service possible.
GSP-Brian: I personally have only seen a cod2 server in use from you guys, what types of servers do you guys offer and are there different quality levels servers you guys offer?
Adam: Trying to be competitive in the industry (as it is hard to do with the entire fly by night GSP's). We mainly host COD2, HL, and HL2 Servers. COD2 has 2 options, a standard and a premium. The premium has CPU priority. Half-life Servers can have from 250FPS to 1000FPS, and ping boosting options from 1-3. Half-life 2 Servers range from 333FPS as a stock to 500 and 1000FPS variants. We also host many different games that I won't get into, but you can always check what we have right on our site!
GSP-Brian: What type of server specifications are we looking at here? Could you get into detail about owning your own hardware and how that makes a difference in the quality of service customers receive?
Adam: You're looking at high end server hardware. We're talking about Dual Quad Intel Clovertown CPU's 5355's and 5335's in most places, 6GB of DDR2 667 RAM and Dual 150GB SAS drives. With the most boxes in Chicago, We run a similar specification, but we have Dual Intel Woodcrest’s 5140's (2.33GHZx4), 4GB of DDR2 667, and Dual 150GB SAS drives. This hardware provided a stabled and optimal performance that no other company can offer. You know that our servers will be that good. We took a look at owning versus leasing our hardware, and I can tell you right now there are some advantages and disadvantages to both. I can tell you that we do own some of our hardware at this point, and continue to do so. I look forward to purchasing more hardware in the future.
GSP-Brian: Adam, how long have you personally been in the server business and what types of experience do you have when it comes to knowing and delivering game server performance?
Adam: I think I got into it in the beginning question, but I personally have been in the game hosting part of it for almost 6 years now. I am a system and networking administrator by trade, and I run multiple operating systems from Windows at home to Linux at NxG. I play Counter-strike Source and some other games occasionally. I was a professional gamer back in the beginnings of Counter-strike beta. I ran my own popular server as well. In terms of game server performance, as many owners of GSP knows that you have to monitor your boxes and the network constantly, many issues can arise. Speaking for me personally, I'm not going to flake out on certain hardware because it’s slightly over our budget. I've been running NxG for almost 5 years now and I never let anyone down. I love to have fun at NxG, and anyone who knows me will agree. I'm goofy, and can get carried away at times, but always can keep a professional level with everyone including staff. I'm a geek, a server geek, I get overly excited about new hardware that is or came out. For example AMD is coming out with their Quad core 4 CPU system. I look forward to getting my paws on that.
GSP-Brian: How many customers do you currently have and what are the ways you are trying to attract more customers to switch over to Next Generation Game Servers?
Adam: Currently we have over 150 clients. People that don't believe this don't know business very well. Everyone looks for a good deal. No matter what it is, no matter what service you sell. NxG constantly brings up awesome offers. I hesitated in this question because even though our deals are pretty good, we don't cut performance. We get you hooked, because once you find that good deal on a server, you'll experience nothing like it. We try to keep our customers happy and for a long term.
GSP-Brian: What can you tell me about your control panel, support system, and staff members you currently have working with Next Generation Game Servers? Also, how many members do you have and how many rolls are you staffed for?
Adam: Well we have all of the above and more. As for the control panel, we have a very good but unknown control panel that I helped the developer develop. I had ideas, he made a base for it, I helped him improve it vastly. The control panel allows you to game switch, add add-ons (like zblock), (stop,start,restart). The list goes on and on.. It doesn't interact with our billing system however, I'd rather set a client up than have a system do it for me. That is just me. I can interact with the client rather than not. We have a support desk built into the control panel, but we do also have ones for non-clients or for clients who don't know how to login to their GCP and add a ticket (laughs). I keep a tidy ship here, we have 3 positions here: Sales, Support, and Tech Support. Johnny, my co owner, does everything, and attempts to do billing (If you haven't noticed by now, I'm very sarcastic). Stephen, our manager here, does both sales and support. He was mainly the sales manager for the time being; however he has eased himself into both. Mike does sales only, he is brand new, so he is just getting into the game here. Robert does the sales scene here as well; he has done a phenomenal job too. Steve does a awesome job too, doing sales work. Michael differs from Mike, because he does technical support. He helps with the boxes as well. I cannot be here without the help of all the mentioned people above. I truly am grateful for all the support they give the company and the customers. There is about 6 staff members total excluding me. I do a lot of everything, mostly support, however people love my charm so I am a pretty good sales staff member. We are a team here at NxG, we need each other, and the clients need us.
GSP-Brian: Thanks for filling out this Q&A. I personally have great feedback from the users of the cod2 server. Is there anything else you would like to touch base on before ending this?
Adam: Before we come to a close I'd like to thank you for allowing me to take this time and speak personally about NxG and what we do here. I think we get overlooked by so many people for others. If you don't personally have a server with us, I suggest you try, what have you got to lose? I want to further NxG into the industry and provide the same stellar performance for everyone. Further the advancement of electronic sports and return the game server provider industry back to the quality and respect it lost back years ago. I hope that current customers that read it, know how much time and effort we put into each work day and NxG hopes that they fully and truly enjoy their servers here.
That's all folks! I want to thank Brian and Adam for providing a great interview. I am sure this will be an interesting read for many people out there. Remember, if you are looking for "stellar performance" servers then talk with the guys from NxGServers. Visit them today:
http://www.nextgenservers.com
Have a good one all!
Interview with Next Generation Servers, Adam Thorn.
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