Iomega Drops Windows Home Server
Storage company Iomega has dropped it’s Windows Home Server product because it could not be made at a price low enough for its target audience. The 500GB unit would have sold at approx 600 euros (£450), but price was not the only factor in the decision to drop it from its range. George Melissargos, Iomega’s international product manager for network storage said:
“Microsoft had set such a tight hardware specification that it was hard to source alternative components or to distinguish WHS products from those of rivals. Microsoft was very upset when we dropped it.”
Melissargos also said that Iomega did not rule out offering a WHS in the future.
Story from Personal Computer World.
UPDATE: The article in Personal Computer World has since been pulled by the author due to some misunderstandings from the author and George Melissargos.
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Tight hardware specification? Do hardware partners need to adhere to a differenct spec than custom builders do? I don’t believe thats the case. And for 600 euros..you can build on heck of a unit. Something is not right with what Iomega is saying.
Iomega was right to hold off, until prices come down to Earth.
Who wants to purchase a $800 HP EX475 backup device that’s proven to experience data corruption?
Sort of defeats the whole point of backing up. As for file sharing between WHS and your PC, again there’s a glaring problem, you’re NOT allowed to edit, copy, edit and save files back and forth from your WHS with your PC, unless data corruption is your thing.
So what’s the point of having WHS? Unless, after a year of being a beta tester wasn’t enough, and you don’t mind tinkering around more…
Everyone can do that with free open source, and without paying through the nose for that. By, the way there is NO resolution for WHS KB 946676 and word has it, not until June 2008 if even then…
We Got Served – The Windows Home Server Site reported, “Iomega have decided not to release their planned Windows Home Server product, but will instead release a Linux based NAS product”.
I’m thinking this will be just like how Hewlett-Packard responded to offer HP MV2120, MV2010, MV2020 and MV2040 1TB (maybe even a MV5100) Linux NAS units too!
http://www.linuxdevices.com/files/misc/hp_mv2120.jpg
http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS6307935110.html
HP mv2120 Media Vault
HP MV2010/2020/2120 Media Vault and HP StorageWorks mv2040 Media Vault Pro
Linux is better, cheaper, and without data corruption. Until Microsoft provides a fix for KB 946676 (data corruption) anything else is going to be more attractive! Especially, when it’s cheaper, and without the worries of having your data corrupted.
http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/storageworks/mvpro/index.html?lang=en&cc=us
Check out all the features of using HP StorageWorks Media Vault Pro and see why it’s better! 🙂
What’s the difference between how Iomega dropped Windows Home Server and that of the so called Iomega delay due to marketing conditions? Unless them marketing conditions refers to the fact of just how difficult WHS would be to sell with a known and proven data corruption design flaw in it’s WHS Drive Extender core code.
Maybe, everyone is thinking this DE code cannot be patched, but needs to be replaced? Watch for the size of the resolution… PP1 is being released not just to offer Vista 64bit support, but to prepare ahead for the DE resolution? Remember, how Vista SP1 demanded prerequisites in advance to just install the service pack. Which Microsoft again had screwed up, causing some Vista clients to experience endless rebooting!
Whatever the case, WHS suffers from data corruption, and most definitely needs to be fixed sooner than later. I don’t think anyone wouldn’t want or demand that their WHS product continue to go on without being patched, repaired and or fixed.
One thing is for sure, when using Microsoft software, it’s apparent to everyone just how much so many things don’t work correctly in need of constantly being fixed.
Ask any child or adult using WHS if they can discover or find things that don’t work right. The answer would be, “you mean how many bugs” not that bugs exist.
And who would think data integrity isn’t important? Even if it only happens 10% or just 1% of the time. What 10% or 1% of your files would you want to experience data corruption? That is until much later in time when you made the discovery?
Seems to me, for a business selling storage products, Iomega knows NOT to tarnish it’s reputation unlike Microsoft has done to delay and offer no resolution with a proven flaw design of their WHS product.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t think WHS should be sold with a proven data corruption record, just to make money from those not told. A warning sticker should be labeled on every WHS product telling everyone there is this proven design flaw resulting in data corruption.
Caveat emptor – Latin for “Let the buyer beware”.
Sounds to me that there is no Known Issues to either Linux, Samba, or any NAS built based on these code bases. Can any of you clarify with that?
I’m not a big fan of Microsoft, but to say WHS is less usable because of this bug, is not a fair statement to me.