Buffalo, seriously....

[Soylent]

   

Why are the firmware updates so few and far between?

 

You guys get constant suggestions on the forums, and obviously your products are selling well (assuming based on the forum traffic and reviews on other sites). However, the reviews would be much better overall if your firmware was more polished and the bugs were fixed.

 

So, why does it take half a year or more to push out a firmware update that could greatly increase the quality of your product? You don't have to make huge changes each update. Can't you just make minor changes, like simply adding password protection to the BT client? That would be a such a small update, but you'd satisfy a lot of customers! 

 

Come on, Buffalo, your products are great, and you actually have a moderator reading and responding in the forums, which is more than most companies can claim. But the buggy firmware is all that keeps your products from being excellent. Give us a reason to upgrade our current Buffalo hardware to future Buffalo hardware (and update those, too).

 

[afifim]

   

I personally would be satisfied with a more open system to remove the reliance on buffalo stamped firmware updates.

Depending on the size of the team, the QA cycle etc... probably means more frequent releases isn't plausible, and smaller patches will be difficult to support

 

There are numerous things that could be done to allow people to help themselves,

 

(Note these are things I found when troubleshooting some performance issues on my machine, more here http://forums.buffalotech.com/buffalo/board/message?board.id=0101&thread.id=13881).

 

• I'd love to see an SSH server running on these machines.  DropBear would be a great SSH server for their firmware images.  The more tech savy end users that care about things like passwords would be able to hop on and modify config files to get what they're after.
• Their firmware include no diagnostic tools, would be extremley handy to include top for e.g. as part of their busy box install
• They've used software raid 5 as default but haven't aligned partitions / stripe sizes and block sizes.  Rookie mistake that's easily fixed without destroying data.

[PCPiranha]

Afifim,

 

This would be the best thread to post something like that:

http://forums.buffalotech.com/buffalo/board/message?board.id=0101&thread.id=13463

[robsonch]

   

Soylent... they don't take us seriously... i am just waiting my new device (not buffalo!!) arrives and sellmy 3 units of linkstation ls-chl and i will be happy... 8 months with bugs... 5 months without updates...oh, yes, update for NEW VERSION, but for last year's model.... just ignore...

As you said, here in forum moderator works fine, i really appreciate... but wait japan to send updates... it is a joke!!!

 

[jeffla]

   

My Ls-xhl was the first Buffalo product I ever bought.  It received fantastic reviews, and it's list of features to price is amazing.

 

The XHL is such a great device, it is extremely fast, sips power, been dead reliable, and is quite.  It offers me everything I want in a NAS (minus a few minor tweaks).  But where the LS-XHL fails is in support.  The mods on here do their best, but I feel they are on a sinking ship.  They read post after post from people needing help, but their hands are tied.   Until Buffalo's home office in Japan gets serious about customer support, I don't see how they can retain customers.

 

I have no plans on replacing my XHL, but some day it will die (hopefully a long time from now), and when that days comes....well you can guess what company I won't be calling.

[kvanryn]

   I agree with every one of your posts.  After waiting forever for the 300NH to actually be released, to get one and then find the firmware to be absolutely pitiful.  Then, to contact them multiple times about the firmware and not get one bit of customer service is causing Buffalo to lose this customer for good and also I will negatively review their products from now on whenever and wherever I can.  Trust me, you guys are not alone in your frustration with this lousy company.  

[Benta]

   

If you need SSH and other features, just put Debian on the machine instead.

 

The installed OS and features does what it says it does but  you can put something else onit if you need to...

 

[robsonch]

   actually i didnt find it for LS-CHL LinkStation Live, only older models :-(

[Benta]

   

http://downloads.buffalo.nas-central.org/LSLIVE_ARM9/

 

I don't have a live myself, so I haven't tried it.

 

Considering buying one, but I need a better router first.

[robsonch]

   still for old version, not for the version now :-( at least i didn't find it so far. anyway thanks!

[matthestar]

   

I have an LS-CHL 1TB (Version 1 apparently) The product is great and has served me well for several months, however there have een quite serious bugs present ever since I bought it and these have not ever been fixed.

 

Based on this experience, I chose not to purchase the latest Buffalo Wireless N Router, and bought a Linksys by Cisco product instead. I wouldn't reccomend these otherwise great Buffalo Products to my friends simply because of the level of support.