FDC Servers is cheaper than GigeNET for 10 Gbps unmetered bandwidth, and it’s in far more cities. On September 29, 2026, FDC’s order configurator had an in-stock 10 Gbps unmetered server in Chicago for $320 a month. Our cheapest 10 Gbps server is $499 on the current promotion. What the extra money buys at GigeNET is a written SLA with a published credit schedule and a support response time we’re on the hook for. FDC’s terms of service don’t guarantee either one.
Every fact here comes from the two companies’ websites, checked on September 29, 2026. We’re GigeNET, and we’ve quoted FDC’s own wording wherever it matters so you can judge it yourself.
The short version
- Choose FDC for the lowest price per 10 Gbps port, servers outside the US, ports of 25, 100 or 200 Gbps, newer AMD EPYC hardware, or a server that’s live 15 minutes after you order.
- Choose GigeNET if your users are in the US and an outage costs you money: SLA credits on a published schedule, a 30-minute support response guarantee, 2-hour hardware replacement and SOC 2 Type II data centers in Ashburn (East), Chicago (Central) and Los Angeles (West).
- If 1 Gbps unmetered is enough, our $159 Xeon D special is the cheaper way into either company. FDC’s dedicated server configurator starts at 10 Gbps ports.
Side by side
| GigeNET | FDC Servers | |
|---|---|---|
| Cheapest 10 Gbps unmetered server | $499/mo on promotion (MSRP $599): 2× Xeon E5-2670 v2, 64 GB RAM, 2× 1 TB SSD | $320/mo in Chicago: 2× Xeon E5-2650 v2, 112 GB RAM, 2× 1 TB HDD. $296/mo in Amsterdam |
| 1 Gbps unmetered | $159/mo Xeon D-1541, 64 GB, 1 TB SSD, in Ashburn, Chicago or Los Angeles | Not offered in the dedicated configurator (starts at 10 Gbps) |
| Port speeds for servers | 1 Gbps and 10 Gbps | 10, 20, 25, 40, 50, 100 and 200 Gbps |
| Locations | Ashburn (East), Chicago (Central), Los Angeles (West) | 23 advertised across North America, Europe, Asia and South America |
| Deployment | Same or next day in stock, custom builds a week or less | About 15 minutes in stock, custom builds “a few days” to “several weeks” |
| Uptime SLA | 99.5% standard, 99.95% managed, 100% with HA Guarantee | No published SLA found; terms say “No Guarantee of Uptime” |
| Support response | 24/7/365, guaranteed 30 minutes (15 managed), with credits | 24/7/365 by ticket, “not guaranteed” without a separate SLA |
| Trial and terms | Month to month, no setup fee on the specials | 72-hour money-back guarantee on in-stock servers |
| DDoS protection | Baseline protection included on every server | Not described on its dedicated server pages |
Where FDC is stronger
Price. $320 against our $499 is $179 a month, or a bit over $2,100 a year per server. The hardware isn’t the difference, either. FDC’s Chicago box runs two Xeon E5-2650 v2 chips and ours runs two E5-2670 v2s, and both are 2013 Ivy Bridge-EP parts. FDC gives you more RAM on that build. We give you SSDs instead of spinning disks. In FDC’s configurator the 10 Gbps unmetered port is a $100-a-month line on top of the server in its US and European locations ($500 in Singapore and Tokyo), which is a very low price for the port.
Newer hardware. FDC sells AMD EPYC and Xeon Gold builds. Its homepage lists an “AMD EPYC 4564P + 100Gbps unmetered, now $1,299.” Every one of our 10 Gbps unmetered servers runs dual E5-2670 v2, so if single-thread speed matters, FDC has the better chips.
Bigger ports. FDC’s configurator goes from 10 up to 200 Gbps per server, and its bandwidth page lists 400 Gbps ports for colocation and IP transit. Our largest listed server port is 10 Gbps.
Locations. FDC advertises 23 locations, including Amsterdam, Frankfurt, London, Singapore, Tokyo, Hong Kong and São Paulo. In North America it overlaps us in Ashburn, Chicago and Los Angeles, then adds Atlanta, Dallas, Denver, Miami, Seattle and Toronto. We’re in three US cities. Our 10 Gbps servers run in Chicago, which puts them head to head with FDC’s Chicago inventory. Our 1 Gbps Special is available in all three of our cities.
Speed and a way out. FDC says in-stock servers can “be ready to use within ~15 minutes,” and it offers a “72-hour money-back guarantee for in-stock servers.” Our in-stock builds are online the same day or the next day.
Where GigeNET is stronger
Almost all of it comes down to what’s in writing.
The SLA pays out on a schedule. Section 15.3 of FDC’s terms of service is titled “No Warranty / No Guarantee of Uptime” and says “FDC does not guarantee that the service will be free from errors, omissions, corruption, attack, viruses, interference, delays, or any other interruption.” We couldn’t find a published SLA or credit schedule anywhere on fdcservers.net. Our SLA lists the credits in advance: on the standard tier, availability under 99.5% earns 5% of the monthly fee, rising in steps to 100% below 85%.
Support has a clock on it. FDC does offer 24/7/365 support, by portal ticket. Its terms add: “Support response times may vary and are not guaranteed unless expressly agreed by FDC in a separate written service-level agreement.” Ours is guaranteed at 30 minutes, or 15 on a managed plan, with credits if we’re late. Our support is US-based and you can call it.
Hardware failures have a deadline. FDC’s terms describe its servers as unmanaged and say its “support obligation is limited to ensuring that the service is online and remotely accessible.” We guarantee replacement of failed parts within 2 hours (1 hour managed), and a 2 to 4 hour replacement on a standard server earns a 5% credit.
Backups and compliance. FDC’s terms say it “does not maintain backups of Subscriber’s data.” New GigeNET orders get free R1Soft backups up to 1 TB. All three of our data centers are SOC 2 Type II, and Ashburn is also ISO 27001 certified.
Is that worth $179 a month? For a mirror or a seedbox, probably not. For a server that carries paying customers’ traffic, one long hardware outage with nobody obligated to fix it can cost more than a year of the difference.
Questions to ask any 10 Gbps unmetered host
Every host selling 10 Gbps ports, us included, connects many servers to shared switches and shared uplinks. The questions that matter are how that’s managed. Put these to FDC, to us and to anyone else on your list:
- What’s the uplink capacity for the rack my server sits in, compared with the ports sold into it?
- What happens when that rack gets busy? Do you add capacity, move me, or nothing?
- Which carriers serve this specific city? FDC names NTT, TATA, GTT and local peering, and says its sales team will “provide details on the exact ISP mix at your preferred location.”
- Is 10 Gbps a guaranteed rate or the size of the port?
- What’s the SLA credit if the network is down, and does anything cover it being slow?
Here are our answers. Access switches are shared, as at any host selling 10 Gbps ports. We watch each rack’s uplink load and add capacity, or stop selling into that rack, before it gets tight. The 10 Gbps figure is the port size, and it’s unmetered: no cap, no overage and no throttling. If you need a guaranteed rate, say so on the quote form and we’ll tell you plainly what we can commit to. Our Network SLA credits availability, not throughput, so a committed rate is something we’d write into your quote. Our Chicago network, where the 10 Gbps servers run, buys transit from PCCW, Cogent, GTT and Zayo. Check the routes yourself on lg.gigenet.com, or pull the 1 GB test file from speedtest.chi.gigenet.com.
FDC’s own FAQ answers the sharing question directly. Asked “Is bandwidth on FDC Dedicated Servers shared or oversubscribed?”, it says “No” and that “each server on our network can fully utilize its port.” That’s a firmer statement than ours. If your workload depends on it, ask them to put the number in your contract, the same way you should hold us to anything we promise.
Who should pick which
Pick FDC if your audience is global, you need 25 Gbps or more on one box, or price per port is the whole decision. It also suits you if you already run your own backups and monitoring and don’t need anyone contractually obligated to answer fast.
Pick GigeNET if your users are mostly in the US and you’d rather pay more for terms you can enforce. And if you’re really pushing a few hundred megabits, skip 10 Gbps entirely: our $159 Xeon D special comes with a 1 Gbps unmetered port, month to month, with no setup fee.
FAQ
Yes, for 10 Gbps unmetered. On September 29, 2026, FDC’s cheapest in-stock 10 Gbps server was $296 a month in Amsterdam and $320 in Chicago, against our $499 promotional price. FDC’s pricing is live inventory, so check its configurator on the day you buy.
We couldn’t find a published SLA or credit schedule on fdcservers.net. Its terms of service include a section titled “No Guarantee of Uptime” and say support response times aren’t guaranteed unless FDC agrees to a separate written SLA. If you need one, ask FDC for it before you order.
At the access switch, yes, as at any host selling 10 Gbps ports. What differs is how much uplink sits behind each rack and what the host does when it fills. We watch rack uplink load and add capacity or stop selling into a rack before it gets tight, and we’ll quote a guaranteed rate on request.
Yes. All three appear in FDC’s location list and live inventory, so a US-only buyer can compare us city for city. FDC also started in Chicago, in 2002.
If you’re comparing an FDC quote with ours, send the spec and your traffic profile through our custom quote form. We’ll reply within one business day with a configuration, a price and a straight answer on what bandwidth we can commit to.