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HP To Charge For Service Packs and Firmware For Out-of-Warranty Customers
New submitter josh itnc writes "In a move that is sure to put a wedge between HP and their customers, today, HP has issued an email informing all existing Enterprise Server customers that they would no longer be able to access or download service packs, firmware patches and bug-fixes for their server hardware without a valid support agreement in place. They said, 'HP has made significant investments in its intellectual capital to provide the best value and experience for our customers. We continue to offer a differentiated customer experience with our comprehensive support portfolio. ... Only HP customers and authorized channel partners may download and use support materials. In line with this commitment, starting in February 2014, Hewlett-Packard Company will change the way firmware updates and Service Pack for ProLiant (SPP) on HP ProLiant server products are accessed. Select server firmware and SPP on these products will only be accessed through the HP Support Center to customers with an active support agreement, HP CarePack, or warranty linked to their HP Support Center User ID and for the specific products being updated.' If a manufacturer ships hardware with exploitable defects and takes more than three years to identify them, should the consumer have to pay for the vendor to fix the these defects?"
... they sure as hell will now.
I'm not an IT person, but weren't there a few companies that tried this crap wwaayy back when? I seem to remember them all failing miserably.
One more reason to avoid buying or recommending HP to would be buyers. The last thing I'd want to deal with is not being able to get a copy of a firmware update for someone's out of warranty system, server or not because I'm not "HP certified support" or whatever. In 2014, there is no fucking reason whatsoever to not have all issued patches available as direct downloads. This is especially true for legacy hardware.
Hewlett and Packard were something special.
Now it's just a bunch of MBAs trying to massage their stock price.
It shouldn't be a legal mandate either. Keeping already released patches available should be a courtesy that all vendors willingly do. The good will encourages repeat buys. Eventually, vendor support will be so expensive and so unappealing that people will just run a free unix on commodity hardware because they get better help from internet forums than they do from vendors.
And they get a perverse incentive to deliberately deliver broken products from the outset.
... but in this case I won't fault anyone if they have to download the essential patches from pirate sites.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
does not qualify as news
This is not pay for support. This is pay for firmware updates. Sure, they can charge for them when nobody else does... but I can also buy elsewhere. Fuck them, and Cisco can suck it too. Correcting bugs in 512k of firmware code is hardly adding a new feature, and doing what you are supposed to anyways is hardly premium support.
We are a small shop and we are running 3 VMs on a single HP Proliant G7 Server. It has enough memory and resources that it could probably run an additional 7 VMs if we wanted to. HP is having to face the reality that the people are buying less hardware because realistically the ratio of VMs to servers is high as 10:1. HP is trying to gouge customers on the warranty because they can't make it up in server sales. Our Proliant DL380 G7 hit the 3 year mark a few months ago and is now out of warranty. The additional cost of the most basic warranty (4 hours/day phone, no onsite) for a single Proliant server is approximately $3000 for three years. That is easily half the cost of the server. And that's the cheapest warranty option. Don't even ask about the 24/7 onsite warranty. This change effectively kills the secondary market for HP hardware. Denying access to firmware means that it will be next to impossible to install or update your OS. I've had to run the HP SPP firmware upate several times to address issues that would otherwise have rendered our Proliant server useless. In fact I have an unresolved issue with our server where it refuses to reboot to the OS, unless I boot from the HP SPP tool first. If I need a critical firmware update in the future, the only option may be the Piratebay. Ugh If HP doesn't reverse this decision, our next server will most likely be a Dell. Unless Dell decides to follow HP into the dark side as well.
Now it's just a bunch of MBAs trying to massage their stock price.
You got that right.
Algorithm:
- Get hired for a big salary and a LOT of stock options.
- Make the company appear more profitable by cutting off investments in the future to reduce costs now.
- Declare victory and what a great guy you are.
- Cash in the stock options and move on to a bigger company where you can repeat the process for even more money and reputation points. PROFIT!
- Your successor inherits the house of cards and takes the blame when it collapses a few years later.
The Harvard Business School has a reputation for graduates who use this algorithm.
Interestingly, boards of directors keep falling for this. (You'd think they'd look at what happens to companies candidates had "turned around" in the several years AFTER they left when evaluating CEO, COO, and CFO candidates. But apparently they usually don't.)
= = = =
Similarly, if a high company official starts enthusing about the book "Crossing the Chasm" and you're an early hire, cash any vested stock options and get out, before you and the other early hires are laid off. (Interestingly, they usually fire them too soon, when they're still key to the company's success, and the company usually falls INTO the chasm rather than crossing it.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
You'd think they'd look at what happens to companies candidates had "turned around" in the several years AFTER they left when evaluating CEO, COO, and CFO candidates. But apparently they usually don't.
No, that is part of the scam. The MBA applying for the new job points out how everything went to shit after they left, so clearly their genuius is worth paying big bucks for and any other merely qualified applicant will surely fail in such a high pressure, highly skilled role.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
I'm not an IT person, but weren't there a few companies that tried this crap wwaayy back when? I seem to remember them all failing miserably.
If you were a reader of slashdot you'd know that Oracle is suing companies for providing patch access to customers without a support contract right now. And people are finding ways not to be an Oracle customer (right now) as a result. Naturally HP thought it would be a good idea, as they have too many customers.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Bullshit. It's not MY job to keep THEIR lights on. If they want to keep their lights on, give me a reason to buy more products from them. These days, better support and customer service will earn more business than trying to nickel and dime everyone. If HP wanted to increase their sales, they should have improved their support and service instead of decreasing it.