HP wine waiter customers are re to acquire an unwelcome shock what time they need to inform firmware before apply a service horde. Helpful soon after this month, individuals downloads, which often con important bugs, force require either a current warranty before an extended support agreement.
If you own an HP wine waiter, be there prepared to keep your support agreement up to see. Before in addition.
Opening this month, HP is restricting access to firmware updates and service packs on behalf of its intact ProLiant wine waiter line, a result type with the purpose of spans a broad range of products, from low-cost minor multinational servers like the ProLiant MicroServer (starting cost $359) all the way up to enterprise-class boxes with the purpose of cost tens of thousands of dollars.
Previously, with the purpose of firmware upgrade was open to a person, not considering of the server's warranty status before whether it was under a support agreement.
The newborn course of action was announced by HP’s Mary McCoy, whose title is listed when subordinate President, HP Servers – Support tools Services. Arrived a blog pillar strangely patrician “Customers on behalf of life,” McCoy, a 30-year HP veteran, explained:
This week, HP announced with the purpose of helpful February 19, 2014, we force provide firmware updates through the HP Support crux simply to customers with a authoritative warranty, attention to detail horde Service before support agreement.
This decision reinforces our goal to provide access to the most recent HP firmware, which is valuable intellectual property, on behalf of our customers who include chosen to get the most out of and look after their IT hoard. We know this is a variation from how we’ve complete multinational arrived the previous; however, this aligns with industry unsurpassed practices and is the reasonable decision on behalf of our customers and partners.
McCoy explained with the purpose of customers with servers still under warranty force not need to compensate on behalf of firmware access. And, she added, somewhat defensively, “we are arrived veto way difficult to force customers into purchasing extended coverage. With the purpose of is, and for all time force be there, a customer’s selection.”
The majority activity customers are already accustomed to purchasing extended support contracts; on behalf of them, this variation probably won’t include a serious crash. The newborn course of action force include its biggest crash on the low outcome of HP’s line, which is current in the company of minor businesses and enthusiasts. It force plus unconstructively crash ethics of HP wine waiter products on the resale bazaar and potentially include a devastating crash on third-party support firms.
The HP ProLiant MicroServer N40L, on behalf of illustration (shown here), was open on behalf of trade arrived 2012 next to forcefully discounted prices from online sellers, typically under $300. But this widely used wine waiter, which contains four drive bays arrived a compact box with the purpose of is well under 1 cubic base, wouldn’t run Windows wine waiter 2012 R2 (or, on behalf of with the purpose of subject, Windows 8.1) on behalf of months in the manner of their issue to manufacturing. Windows wine waiter 2012 R2 was released to MSDN and TechNet subscribers arrived September 2013 and was by and large open arrived October 2013. But difficult to install with the purpose of OS on a ProLiant MicroServer resulted arrived a succession of errors, with the organism execution next to thigh boot. The simply workaround was to disable the built-in Gigabit Ethernet controller, a serious limitation on behalf of a wine waiter.
HP released a firmware con on behalf of the back issue arrived mid-November, 2013. The ProLiant MicroServer N54L, a soon after version of the N40L with a beefier central processing unit arrived the same attachment, suffered from the same flaw, fixed with a firmware inform next to the same generation.
But the MicroServer’s hardware warranty is solitary day, and the warranty on behalf of software is simply 90 days in the manner of procure; under the newborn course of action, access to the firmware in the manner of the warranty expires would require the procure of an HP attention to detail horde, next to current prices of connecting $126 and $200, next to slightest partially the cost of the real thing hardware. That’s a heavy cost to compensate to con I beg your pardon? Is arguably a defect arrived the real thing result.
Outcome users who acquisition from resellers might come across their warranties summary devoid of their intelligence. This wine waiter, on behalf of illustration, was purchased arrived dignified 2012, but the warranty regulator happening ticking what time the reseller purchased the hardware from HP the preceding month. It would not include been eligible on behalf of the firmware inform with the purpose of enabled an OS upgrade clearly concluded a day soon after but for the holder paid on behalf of an extended service agreement.
On behalf of other models, the cost of a attention to detail horde is even elevated. On behalf of midrange ProLiant models, a single year’s extended coverage under the attention to detail horde list can cost well concluded $1,000.
The issues with the MicroServer aren’t isolated examples. A only some years back, HP released an urgent firmware inform on behalf of a quantity of of its blade wine waiter models. “Without this important con,” the company held, the affected models, “after being arrived service on behalf of an extended epoch of generation, might potentially fail to complete the pillar process in the course of a few event with the purpose of causes a power disruption to occur (such when power-cycle, cold thigh boot, before power outage). If the failure occurs and the wine waiter cannot complete the thigh boot process, the blade organism board be obliged to be there replaced.”
Any more back issue affected a quantity of ProLiant wine waiter models arrived 2011. Devoid of a necessary firmware inform, which HP characterized when “a important con,” the exploitation of reliable SATA harsh drives might cause data hand on errors. The advisory warned: “Neglecting to act the necessary fighting might leave the wine waiter arrived an unstable condition, which might potentially findings arrived sub-optimal wine waiter performance before data corruption before loss. By disregarding this notification and not performing the recommended resolve, the customer accepts the gamble of incurring coming connected errors.” Although this appears to be there a defect arrived HP’s real thing software design, the newborn course of action would move the cost of the con to customers.
HP’s insistence with the purpose of the newborn course of action “aligns with industry unsurpassed practices” is inaccurate, next to slightest on behalf of wine waiter products aimed next to slighter businesses. The company’s archrival, basin, offers unobstructed access to BIOS and software updates on behalf of its intact wine waiter, cargo space, and networking line. Several readers include pointed to Cisco when a counter-example. It's loyal with the purpose of updates on behalf of Cisco routers and switches require a authoritative service contract. But downloads on behalf of Cisco servers (the Cisco Unified Computing organism, before UCS, line) require registration but not a service contract. (Thanks to charge Shields on behalf of the pointer, via Twitter.)
And when networking consultant Lindsay prominence points on sale arrived a up to date blog pillar, IBM plus requires "entitlement validation" on behalf of "select software products and updates and on behalf of zombie Code (also recognized when firmware before microcode)."
The IBM course of action was announced stay fresh summer. At this time, visitors to IBM con Central get this declaration:
Con Central zombie Code updates are open simply on behalf of IBM technology with the purpose of are under warranty before an IBM hardware maintenance service agreement. Code on behalf of operating systems before other software products is open simply somewhere entitled under the applicable software warranty before IBM software maintenance agreement.
HP’s move looks like a way to bolster margins arrived a bazaar segment with the purpose of is historically not accustomed to paying on behalf of extended service. The added likely findings is with the purpose of it force drive away individuals price-sensitive customers.
Tags : HP
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