Stabilize.
Bring production back online and keep it running.
Case Study
Dental Drill Studio
Rescuing an Abandoned Legacy .NET Platform on AWS
At a glance
Troy and his wife Nicky run Dental Drill Studio on a legacy .NET system hosted on AWS. When their original developer disappeared and the system went down, they had no one to call. The4Loop took over, brought the platform back, fixed its problems for good, trimmed the AWS setup to cut their bill, and has supported them 24/7 since.
- Client
- Troy and Nicky, owners of Dental Drill Studio
- Platform
- Legacy .NET application hosted on AWS
- Starting point
- Production down, previous developer unreachable, no handover
- How we were hired
- Through Upwork, after Troy tested us on his live problem
- What we delivered
- Recovery, full issue audit, permanent fixes, AWS optimization, 24/7 support
- Outcome
- A stable system, a smaller AWS bill, and a client who recorded a video testimonial
The client
Dental Drill Studio is a family-run business owned by Troy and his wife Nicky. Like many small business owners, they are experts in their own field, not in software. Their day-to-day operations depend on a custom system built years ago in .NET and hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS).
That system was built and looked after by a single developer. As long as he was around, it worked well enough, and Troy and Nicky never needed to think about servers, code or cloud bills.
The problem
Then the developer was gone. He stopped responding, left no documentation and no handover, and the system went down. Troy and Nicky were suddenly locked out of the tool their business runs on, with no idea what had broken or who could fix it.
What they were facing:
A system that would not stay up.
Production went down, and nobody on their side knew why.
No one to call.
The only person who understood the code and the servers had disappeared.
An unknown, ageing codebase.
A legacy .NET application with no documentation, built on older technology few developers want to touch.
An AWS account no one understood.
Services kept running and billing every month, with no clear picture of which ones were still needed.
Real money at stake.
Every hour offline meant lost work and lost trust. Industry research puts downtime costs for small businesses as high as $100,000 an hour (ITIC via MEV), and for a small studio even a day offline hurts.
This is a story many small business owners know well. The software works until the one person who built it walks away. At that point the owners need more than a quick fix: they need someone they can trust with the whole system.
How Troy found us
Troy found The4Loop on Upwork. After being let down once, he did not want to hand over his business on promises, so he tested us first: he gave us his live problem and watched how we handled it.
We got the system back up and explained in plain language what had gone wrong. That first fix earned his trust, and the trial turned into a long-term engagement.
Our approach
We did not want to patch symptoms. The system had failed because it was neglected, so it needed a full check-up, and Troy and Nicky needed to understand what they owned.
Audit everything.
Go through the legacy application, its servers and the AWS account end to end.
Build an issue register.
List every problem found, each with its business impact and a priority.
Share and explain.
Walk Troy and Nicky through the list in plain terms, so they could decide with full information.
Fix on approval.
Fix each issue one by one, only after the client approved it.
Fix it once.
Solve each issue at its root, so it does not come back.
What we found and fixed
The audit showed problems at both the server level and the application level. We logged each one with its impact and priority, agreed the order with Troy and Nicky, then fixed them one at a time.
| Layer | Issue | Business impact | Priority | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Server | Services stopping and not restarting | System offline until someone stepped in | Critical | Automatic restarts and health checks |
| Server | Resources running out under normal load | Slowdowns, then crashes | Critical | Right-sized servers and set resource limits |
| Server | Logs and old files filling the disk | Sudden outages with no warning | High | Log rotation, cleanup and disk alerts |
| Application | Unhandled errors in legacy .NET code | Screens crashing mid-task | High | Fixed faulty code paths, added error handling |
| Application | Slow database queries | Long waits on everyday pages | Medium | Optimized queries and indexes |
| Infrastructure | No monitoring, backups untested | Problems found by users, risky recovery | High | Monitoring, alerts and tested backups |
Every fix was explained before it was made and confirmed after. Nothing was changed without the client's approval.
Optimizing AWS and cutting the bill
The AWS account had grown over the years with no one keeping it tidy. We reduced the number of services running to only what the system actually needs, which lowered Troy and Nicky's monthly AWS bill without making the system any less reliable.
Fewer services.
Consolidated and removed AWS services the application no longer used.
Right-sized resources.
Matched server sizes to real usage instead of guesswork.
No paying for idle.
Removed unused resources that were still billing every month.
Cost visibility.
Set up billing alerts so surprises are caught early.
Image 3
24/7 support
Troy and Nicky now have what they lacked before: a team that answers. The4Loop provides round-the-clock support, so if anything goes wrong, someone who knows the system is already on it.
- Monitoring alerts reach our team before users notice a problem.
- Every change is documented, so the business is never again dependent on one person.
- The client gets clear updates in plain language, not technical jargon.
Results
Dental Drill Studio went from a broken system and no developer to a stable platform, a leaner AWS bill and a team they trust.
Area
Before The4Loop
After The4Loop
System status
Down, no one able to fix it
Back online and stable
Known issues
Unknown, undocumented
Every issue listed, prioritized and fixed
AWS
Too many services, rising bill
Fewer services, lower monthly cost
Support
One developer, then nobody
24/7 support from a full team
Owner's peace of mind
Dependent on one person
Clear picture of the system and its costs
In the client's words
Troy and Nicky were happy enough with the result to record a video testimonial for The4Loop.
Key takeaways
When a business depends on one developer, it is one resignation away from an outage.
A full audit with impact and priority lets non-technical owners make confident decisions.
Fixing issues at their root, with the client's approval, builds lasting trust.
Tidying up the cloud account often pays for part of the work through lower bills.
Sources
- The cost of IT downtime in 2025: what SMBs need to know, MEV, citing ITIC 2024 Hourly Cost of Downtime Report