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[fordem]

That's an interesting response - given the original question - let me ask another one

does an opensource afficionado really care about the warranty or has he/she gone past that and wants to hack the device, to fix a perceived problem, to add new functionality

and another one

What percentage of the open source community would you guess, have the skill to actually examine the code?

and yet one more - this time getting to the crux of the matter and the reason for my comment.

do you feel an opensource developer would be so naive as to think 5~10 lines of code inserted into the "web interface" would fix the problem and not require testing?

Watching someone else run a few commands through a CLI to fix a problem is a far cry from developing a script that automates the process - one that can provide the logic required to analyze the problem and then issue the few commands required to fix it - we're discussing scripts that partition and format disks, do you really want to change those scripts and not test them thoroughly?

[Sam]

Bought myself a Dell Vostro for 160 EUR (new), ripped out the 80GB disk
swapped in two Seagates, Ubunto 8.04 - and voila a nice storage area with
1gb mem + 2ghz 64 bit dualcore.

I even got a Vista basic licence to use on some of the childrens computers :-)

[espiritu]

That's an interesting response - given the original question - let me ask another one

does an opensource afficionado really care about the warranty or has he/she gone past that and wants to hack the device, to fix a perceived problem, to add new functionality

good point!

and another one

What percentage of the open source community would you guess, have the skill to actually examine the code?

relevance? it only takes one

and yet one more - this time getting to the crux of the matter and the reason for my comment.

do you feel an opensource developer would be so naive as to think 5~10 lines of code inserted into the "web interface" would fix the problem and not require testing?

Watching someone else run a few commands through a CLI to fix a problem is a far cry from developing a script that automates the process - one that can provide the logic required to analyze the problem and then issue the few commands required to fix it - we're discussing scripts that partition and format disks, do you really want to change those scripts and not test them thoroughly?

again relevance? i would be happy to beta test...most companies at least give the option of using the beta product with full disclosure/release of liability

[fordem]

Read leathal's other posts and hopefully the relevance should become obvious

[pingjockey]

I just wanted to say that I am excitied about the new firmware. I am currently using a Windows Home Server to handle a lot of my network storage needs which I think is overkill.

My only concern though is that there is a way to perform off-unit backups via the USB port to an external hard drive. I am sure that the topic of USB port use has been beat to death so I am not going to go into it.

Again thanks for the fine product and so far good support.

[jrbilodeau]

In reply to lethals post. there is alot more to fw 1.06 then just supporting 1.5TB hard drives. if your unhappy that your drives are supported then maybe next time you should look at the list of supported drives of check the forum to see if anyone else is using the drive.

[espiritu]

In reply to lethals post. there is alot more to fw 1.06 then just supporting 1.5TB hard drives. if your unhappy that your drives are supported then maybe next time you should look at the list of supported drives of check the forum to see if anyone else is using the drive.

not that I agree with leathal's posts but d-link's website does say under "Supported Hard Drive Type" in the specs page:

•   SATA –Any Capacity
•   3.5” Internal

http://www.dlink.ca/products/resource.asp?pid=509&rid=1951&sec=0

with no disclaimer, qualifier or footnote.

The responsibility is clearly with D-Link to uphold or revise that statement, not for the consumer to disprove it.

[fordem]

That statement was made over two years ago - before there were 750GB drives - and when I bought my DNS-323, the firmware available at that time did not support 750 GB drives, the current firmware does.

My point here is that development is ongoing - both in drive capacity and in the firmware's ability to support them - a little patience is all that is required.

And one more thing - D-Link does make beta product available to users for testing - I have no idea what the basis is for selection of beta testers, but I know that they do it.

[Tank_Killer]

not being a ****** might be a pre-req for that.

[espiritu]

That statement was made over two years ago - before there were 750GB drives - and when I bought my DNS-323, the firmware available at that time did not support 750 GB drives, the current firmware does.

My point here is that development is ongoing - both in drive capacity and in the firmware's ability to support them - a little patience is all that is required.

And one more thing - D-Link does make beta product available to users for testing - I have no idea what the basis is for selection of beta testers, but I know that they do it.

I understand why they are not able to support hardware that doesn't exist when the firmware was originally released, but any reasonable person would have to agree that claiming to support "any capacity" without a qualifying footnote is misleading.

Don't get me wrong, I use/sell a lot of D-Link products but when a mod/engineer says the firmware will be out soon on Nov 10th:

I am very sorry but we do not have a mailing list for firmware releases. Please just keep posted on the forums or check the support site frequently. It should be here soon.

then next week on Nov 14th:

I would go with weeks if not next week

then next week on the 25th:

I would not expect it until probably next week if all testing has been finalized since this is such a short week for most people.

you kind of have to wonder how many revisions of the eta before there is a revision of the firmware.

[fordem]

Somehow your earlier posts gave me the impression that you had some familiarity with opensource and the whole process of software development - this last post makes me wonder.

There are two approaches to software patches (be it OS or application) - the fast & nasty and the slow & thorough - the first is the approach often adopted by neophytes, we have a problem, so we throw a few lines of code at it, give it a quick test and push it out the door - quite often those few lines of code fixed the first problem and introduced half a dozen others.  The second is the reverse, we spend a little more time looking at how the few lines of code will impact the whole and then test a little more thoroughly.

The first approach is what leads to the wild accusations of insecurity that we have seen - a planned feature (http access to files) was pulled and someone simply removed the web page links that led to it, but left the code that allowed access.

The second approach is what leads to threads like this.

If you were the manufacturer, which road would you choose - the one that jepoardized the users data for a quick fix or the one that allowed you a better shot at releasing a quality product?

What would you as a user choose - a manufacturer who made firmware updates on a weekly basis (which by the way suggests either a seriously flawed code base - or - a product that was rushed to market before it was ready) and whose product you can't trust with your data, or one who took a little longer and a little more care?

[espiritu]

not suggesting `the fast & nasty`just suggesting more accurate eta or better communication. If there is a problem be honest.

[ajslater]

I used feed43.com to make an RSS feed for DNS-323 firmware updates.

It scrapes the firmware page using &origin=1 (USA). It should update when then 1.06 firmware is posted to that page if they don't change the page format too much.

Yo, D-LINK forum moderator. If its within your power, please tell the D-LINK website people that ATOM or RSS feeds for pages that update (like firmware on product support pages) is very nice. Even better would be a 1.07 feature for an option for the DNS-323 to ping home every week and see if its firmware is out of date and email me to update it.

[fordem]

Yo, D-LINK forum moderator. If its within your power, please tell the D-LINK website people that ATOM or RSS feeds for pages that update (like firmware on product support pages) is very nice. Even better would be a 1.07 feature for an option for the DNS-323 to ping home every week and see if its firmware is out of date and email me to update it.

Just a passing comment - several of the Netgear products do this - and over on the Netgear forums, there is a thread, right now, with people upset that their <whatever device> "phones home" without their knowledge.

[ajslater]

Just a passing comment - several of the Netgear products do this - and over on the Netgear forums, there is a thread, right now, with people upset that their <whatever device> "phones home" without their knowledge.

Yeah. It needs to be optional and off by default.