Loadbalancer.org Reviews

We're working on a project where our customers use HJ. We utilize their load balancer to evenly distribute the data load between multiple servers, ensuring that one server doesn't become overloaded.

Since I'm relatively new to the load-balancing scene, my current focus is primarily on data load-balancing.        

If all the data traffic is directed to a single server, it can become overwhelmed. Load balancing helps us distribute both incoming and outgoing data loads evenly among the servers, preventing overload on a single server.

We could enhance the security aspects of the load balancer. For instance, when data passes through the load balancer, it could potentially include sensitive files or trade-related data. It would be beneficial to have additional features that help identify and protect against any unauthorized access or file leakage.

I have been using it for past two months.

It is scalable and I would rate it an eight out of ten.

We're not currently using it because I've been testing it for about a month, and so far, everything seems fine.

The choice of environment depends and specific needs and requirements. The setup process for the testing phase typically takes me around 30 minutes to an hour. It involves installing the tool and entering necessary information like SSL details. The staffing requirement depends on the project's size, with a small-scale solution typically requiring only one person to manage. I would rate it seven out of ten.

So far, I would rate it around a five out of ten. 

Loadbalancer.org is highly valuable for organizations dealing with extensive file transfers. It helps prevent server overload by distributing the load across multiple servers, ensuring stability and enhancing security.

I would rate it an eight out of ten.

We use Loadbalancer for balancing loads in our main application.

Loadbalancer is easy to use. It performs well, with low latency. 

I would like it if Loadbalancer had the ability to make rules for specific shared bots.

I've been using Loadbalancer for about two years.

For us, for the company, this is stable. 

You can scale up the core license at any time. It's not a big issue. You just add the license. And if we want to upgrade, we can install a new appliance or a new version then take the backup from the old one and deploy it to the new one. Currently, Loadbalancer is handling up to 10,000 decisions each day.

I recommend paying for a support license. I opened one ticket because one service wasn't working. After that, we ran some diagnostics and determined that we needed to upgrade something, then we integrated everything on our side. We only had one case in a year, so Loadbalancer is good.

We pay a monthly subscription for Loadbalancer.

I rate Loadbalancer.org seven out of 10. I would recommend Loadbalancer for some companies. It depends on the management. It needs to be a good fit for your business requirements. 

It helps us to route the traffic to the available servers. If we didn't have Loadbalancer we would fail to set the end-user and it would cause a failure in the cluster. We protect the cluster with Loadbalancer. It checks all of the nodes in the backend, in the fabric. If you enable the monitor it will set an alarm in the server. When a user gets an application, this alarm alerts the user.

The configuration of Azure is a lot more simple than with Loadbalancer. It was very simple to configure it. There are many features you can set in the backend of Loadbalancer. They should simplify the configuration. The administrator should be able to configure it more simply. How it is now, you can only configure it if you have a lot of experience. 

I have been using Loadbalancer for six months. 

So far we haven't had any bugs or glitches with Loadbalancer. 

I haven't needed to contacted technical support yet. 

The deployment took two to three hours. I did the deployment myself. 

I would recommend this solution. It's a market leader. The admin should know the product well before configuring it. They need experience. 

I would rate it an eight out of ten. Not a ten out of ten because of the complex configuration. 

Load-balancing a web application server. It's a requirement for the application which we're using, which is why we bought the hardware. It does its job. We don't touch it.

We couldn't use our line-of-business software without it. It sits in front of it and it just does its job. It's an unsung hero, I'm afraid. It just does what it does. It plods along everyday, and when it breaks, it gets fixed really quickly.

The SSL Layer 7 load balancing.

Obviously the simple ones like price. Make it cheaper, make it faster. Other than that, it's a spot-on product. It doesn't have any issues; no wishes or wants with it at all.

Originally we had some stability issues with it, so they replaced it with a new box and it's fine.

It's basically as scalable as you want it to be. We're not using it at any great scale so unfortunately I can't really comment too much on it, but it's pretty scalable.

The support is amazing. The product itself is pretty simple to be honest. It's the support which is the differentiator for the product. The company has an excellent support team, 24-hour support. It's excellent, second to none.

Straightforward. I plugged it in and the guys did the rest. Just plug it in, give it an IP address, give it access, and it's done.

The appliances have not really had a measurable effect on our operating costs.

Pricing is great. I couldn't really complain about it. It's all good. They're not the cheapest, not the most expensive, but I think value-wise, they're 100%. 

We evaluated a few beforehand, however Loadbalancer.org was the one which was recommended to us by our software providers. They just told us it was the best one for us, so that's why we chose it.

We evaluated KEMP, F5, and Windows Integrated Load Balancer.

For what it is and what it does, it's not a very glamorous piece of kit. It's a load balancer, it takes the connection and decides where to put it, to another server or somewhere else. It's the speed at which it can do it and the fact that when it does go wrong - and obviously things do happen - how quickly and how well the company resolves it. Those are the two things which make us stick with and recommend it to anyone else. 

Most people, if they need a load balancer, they know that they need a load balancer. It's not something which you can just say, "Oh yeah, I was talking to the guy in the pub, and he said, 'Oh you really need to get one of these.'" It's quite a very specific requirement to have one. But if anyone does need one, absolutely, it's bang on.

Give it a go. They're great.

The Loadbalancer.org appliance sits directly behind our firewall, terminates all of our SSL/HTTP traffic and then directs it to the backend servers depending on the requested service.

This has allowed us to use multiple NATD back end web servers with one single public IP Address and different domain names whilst keeping our services up and running.

SSL Termination with Server Name Indicator option to a Layer 7 back end web farm which allows the client IP address to still be passed.

HTTP API would be really helpful, but they do have a command line api which is used over a SSH connection

We have not, as of yet, had any issues with the stability of the units.

We have not had any problems with scalability.

Customer Service:

The customer service and tech team are basically the same within Loadbalancer.org.

Technical Support:

The technical support at Loadbalancer.org is possibly one of the best that I have had to deal with and it is 24/7, too. They do not always know the answer right away, but you can be sure that they will support you through to a working solution.

HAProxy, we needed a maintenance and the support agreement as we were outgrowing our in-house knowledge.

The basic setup of the unit was straightforward. Once services are up and running, you can then change some of the advanced settings, which are not shown to start with.

The cost of the hardware units was talked over with the sales team, who then helped to ensure that we had the correct unit size and support cost at the start of the project. We have since upgraded our license and this was just the difference between the original and the new license.

We also looked at Kemp. Before this, we were using an in-house version of HAProxy, but ended up needing support.

The Loadbalancer.org product has helped reduce our tech teams time on manual maintenance of our load balancer and the development of the product is ever evolving.

We load balance our customer billing and information system, as well as our Exchange services with it.

We had a requirement for these applications to be load balanced. Without a dedicated load balancer, we would have had to use a Round Robin DNS, which does not have any health checking, notifications, etc. We now get notifications when pool members go down, and we eliminate our downtime by not sending traffic to downed pool members.

A load balancer is a load balancer, in terms of functionality. I need the interface to be easy to use for my team members who have not spent hours working on it, so I am not the only person who can operate it.

I would like a notification when a new version of the software is available. They told me to sign up for their newsletter, but I have not received any notification for a newer software version.

No stability issues.

Not yet.

Their technical support is one of the best experiences that I have ever had. We have even had a need for custom health checks, and they have really risen to the challenge.

We have used F5 in the past. They are incredibly fantastic, but they are so expensive. We went with LoadBalancer.org because we did not need the bells and whistles of F5. Also, we did not want to pay the premium price.

For someone who has never set up load balancers before, I can attest that if you familiarize yourself with the concepts of load balancing (and their documentation lays out these concepts very well), you can set up one of these in a matter of an hour. It really is an easy process.

Since the load balancer appliances are comparatively inexpensive, I imagine they have given us ROI. We paid significantly less for these than we would have for their competitors. However, since the systems we load balance were new systems, it is hard to measure the ROI. 

It filled a requirement for our project, and it did so at lesser cost than their competitors.

It is inexpensive, and even their “unlimited” version, the VA MAX is still far cheaper than competitors. I love that they do not price on some arbitrary throughput rating where you are guessing at what the load balancer is going to handle. These guys make their pricing scheme really easy.

We proceeded a long way down the road with F5, then decided to go a different direction shortly before the production environment was built.

For load balancers, these guys are perfect. If you need a lot more bells and whistles, you may need a more expensive product. Tell the sales guys at Loadbalancer.org your needs, but do your research. Set up a trial device. Make sure you do not need a more full-featured product. Loadbalancer.org is improving their product all the time, but know what you are getting into.

We are a supplier of medical healthcare IT solutions with a focus on radiology departments. We use it to create a redundant solution with automatic failover.

We use the hardware and the software version of the Loadbalancer.org product line.

The load balancers have an easy installation and a relatively simple, easy user interface to use, which is valuable because it is not the core business of our engineers to configure network devices. With basic network knowledge, our required system functionality can be configured and maintained.

The automatic refresh of the System Overview webpage: It sometimes has an extra webpage reload (after a change) before you see it is executed. This can be confusing.

Also, possibly a more graphical overview page (with colors) to give a two second overview to see if everything is working fine.

Not so far. It seems to be very stable. In the past, we had issues with the Secure Digital (SD) cards which got corrupted and prevented the system to restart. I think this is better with the new line.

No scalability issues.

Their technical support is very supportive and knowledgeable.

No previous solution was used.

The initial setup was straightforward.

I do not know if my company evaluated other solutions.

Web filtering and load balancing.

They balance a lot better than the last set that we had. The previous load balancers made some bad decisions with allocating the load, and they would basically overload one of the single nodes behind. These, from loadbalancer.org, tend to balance it on a much better basis. The two factors, or the two features, you want in a load balancer, mostly, are high-availability and balancing the load. The last ones and these ones are both high-availability, but these ones balance a lot better than the last ones did.

The most important feature is the fact it was recommended by the supplier. The previous load balancers weren't a very good match for what we were trying to do.

They work. It just keeps going. The vendor will set them up, and they've just been trouble-free. They've just worked. They just keep going. That's what the principal purpose of the load balancer is, to work around and be available when there's any outages with the cluster behind. They just keep going, which is exactly what we want them for.

They're mostly designed to balance a particular type of traffic. I wanted to load balance DNS, and they just don't do it the way that we wanted to. So they're not used as DNS load balancers, whereas the previous ones were.

In terms of balancing other traffic, that they don't already balance, that would be a useful thing. I actually logged a call with their support, because I needed to try and work out how we were going to do it. That's when they came back and told me, "No, we don't actually do that." But it's something they're planning to do in the future.

They've been rock solid. They're stable, we definitely use them within their capabilities. They are very good on that.

No issues with scalability, not at all. They are very capable. We only use a tiny fraction of what they're capable of doing. 

It's absolutely outstanding. They have a web chat feature, which I've used a number of times. And they've always been very responsive and very knowledgeable. They've sorted things out on the spot.

We did have a previous solution. We switched because of the supplier's recommendation, which we don't regret. Not at all. These are much better. The other ones weren't doing the job very well.

The "original, original" setup was very complex, and in the it end didn't work. We run a Smoothwall cluster behind the load balancers, which is for web filtering. The original design that was implemented didn't work the way that it was meant to, because of interactions with the firewall. We did things differently to the way they normally do things, and that actually broke their design. 

So we basically had to roll it back to a simplified setup. But that wasn't any fault of the load balancer, or any fault of the Smoothwall. It's just the way that the whole project was done. We didn't tell them exactly what we wanted, and they went on what they thought it was going to be, and that just didn't match.

So the setup is notably complex. We did need their support for the original setup as well.

In terms of saving money, they haven't really made a difference to our operating costs. It's not a cost-saving device.

I have no idea, because I don't have anything to do with pricing. It was basically, "We need these, we need these," and then that's what happened. We got them. I had nothing to do with the negotiation on the price.

Basically you've got load balancers in the front and then you've got a number of machines that sit behind it that actually do the work. The load balancers just allocate out the work. So the people that manage the system behind the load balancers, this is their preferred solution. They managed to get us them for a very good price.

We had load balancers from before, that were just kicking around, so we used the ones that we had before, and they weren't a very good match. Then the supplier said, "Use these instead," and that's what we did. They were afforded somehow, (I have no idea how that money was found, or how much they cost or anything like that). But we switched over to what they said and haven't looked back.

Plan your specifications and features carefully. It's about doing proper planning to make sure that they will actually fit your requirements.

The owner of the company writes a very extensive and detailed blog. I would suggest any other potential customers read it, that they read the owner's blog, to understand what the company is focused on and where their priorities lie. Beyond just the product marketing and materials, you can actually see where the owner of the company wants them to be going, and what they're doing. And that might help focus you on whether it's the right product for what you're trying to achieve.