SharkTech Network Maintenance: What Happened and What It Means for Users

Last Friday night, SharkTech kicked off a major network upgrade that didn't go exactly as planned. If you experienced connectivity issues over the past few days, you weren't alone—and here's the full story behind what happened.

The Ambitious Six-Phase Upgrade

SharkTech scheduled maintenance for Friday, April 3rd at 11 PM CDT with some seriously ambitious goals. We're talking about a complete network overhaul: installing a new edge router, deploying a new core router, replacing multiple interfaces, changing their ASN, implementing BGP routing protocols, and adding new upstream providers. That's not just routine maintenance—it's the kind of infrastructure work that sets the foundation for better performance down the road.

The team did their homework too. They ran pre-production tests and mapped out every step. But as anyone who's worked with enterprise networking equipment knows, complex upgrades have a way of revealing problems you couldn't have anticipated in testing.

When Things Got Complicated

Here's where it gets interesting. Five out of the six planned upgrades went smoothly, which is actually impressive given the scope. But that new core router? It started showing performance issues that weren't caught during testing. SharkTech's engineers dove deep into troubleshooting, even bringing in support from Cisco directly to figure out what was going wrong.

After extensive investigation, they made the tough call to roll back the core router upgrade. Sometimes the smart move isn't pushing forward—it's stepping back until you have a solution that actually works. The network is now running normally again, just without that one piece of the puzzle in place.

What This Means for Server Performance

If you're running services on SharkTech infrastructure, the good news is that most of the upgrades stuck. The new edge router, BGP implementation, and additional upstream connectivity are all live, which means the network is actually in better shape than before the maintenance started. 👉 Check out SharkTech's current network infrastructure and DDoS protection capabilities if you're curious about what these upgrades enable.

The core router situation is temporary. SharkTech isn't abandoning that upgrade—they're just waiting until they have a proper fix rather than running with something that causes performance degradation.

Still Having Issues?

Most connectivity problems should be resolved by now, but networks are complex beasts. If your server is still acting up, SharkTech's support team is standing by through their helpdesk system. They're not going to leave you hanging after putting you through extended downtime.

What's worth noting here is the transparency. Instead of going silent or making excuses, they laid out exactly what happened, what worked, and what didn't. That kind of communication matters when you're trusting someone with your infrastructure.

The Bigger Picture

Network upgrades like this are necessary growing pains. You can't improve capacity, add redundancy, or implement better routing without occasionally hitting bumps. The real test isn't whether problems occur—it's how a provider handles them when they do.

SharkTech chose to revert rather than compromise on performance, which shows they're thinking long-term. Those five successful upgrades are already improving network stability and giving them room to scale. The core router upgrade will happen eventually, just with better preparation next time.

If you're evaluating hosting providers or considering where to place your infrastructure, 👉 explore SharkTech's server options and network capabilities here. Recent upgrades mean better routing, more upstream options, and a stronger foundation for handling traffic spikes.

For now, things are back to normal. And sometimes "normal" after a partially successful upgrade is still better than "normal" before the upgrade even started.