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Forum Discussion
Very frustrating tech support (15682575)
I purchased a ReadyNAS Ultra a few months ago. The first unit failed and was replaced by NetGear. I had to pay for the shipping... Almost immediately the second unit started acting up. This has turned into a tech support nightmare. I opened the case 10 days ago. I've done everything requested promptly and to the letter. And there is still no resolution in sight. Right now the unit has been sitting in TechSupport mode (so it's completely off line for use) for the last 3 days waiting as requested, waiting for it to be escalated to level 3.
From my perspective, this tech support experience has been extremely poor because:
1. Lack of continuity and handoff with technicians. When a tech is off, my case languishes. Sometimes for days.
2. Communication via personal email. Techs leave for training or days off, and my responses sit in their email boxes.
3. I have absolutely no access to case notes or status, since the case was initiated over the phone.
4. I receive emails that say "After reading and agreeing to the terms, reply to this email, quoting the policy...", but they are from "do-not-reply@netgear-support.com". I reply anyways... what else can I do? When I call to find out my case status, I'm berated for not updating my case notes on-line, which I can't access. Catch 22.
I've probably invested 10 hours of my time calling tech support, waiting on hold, setting up my cable modem/router for remote access, etc.
If I had access to the case status, and could easily see exactly what is (or more likely IS NOT) happening with my case, then this would not be quite so frustrating. I could make sure my responses were being promptly recorded into the case, instead of going into a black hole, and having to repeat emails multiple times with different techs.
I have to say, I'm very disappointed with my NetGear ReadyNAS purchase at this point.
James
From my perspective, this tech support experience has been extremely poor because:
1. Lack of continuity and handoff with technicians. When a tech is off, my case languishes. Sometimes for days.
2. Communication via personal email. Techs leave for training or days off, and my responses sit in their email boxes.
3. I have absolutely no access to case notes or status, since the case was initiated over the phone.
4. I receive emails that say "After reading and agreeing to the terms, reply to this email, quoting the policy...", but they are from "do-not-reply@netgear-support.com". I reply anyways... what else can I do? When I call to find out my case status, I'm berated for not updating my case notes on-line, which I can't access. Catch 22.
I've probably invested 10 hours of my time calling tech support, waiting on hold, setting up my cable modem/router for remote access, etc.
If I had access to the case status, and could easily see exactly what is (or more likely IS NOT) happening with my case, then this would not be quite so frustrating. I could make sure my responses were being promptly recorded into the case, instead of going into a black hole, and having to repeat emails multiple times with different techs.
I have to say, I'm very disappointed with my NetGear ReadyNAS purchase at this point.
James
46 Replies
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- Please continue to work with Tech Support on your case.
- Shortly after the reboot yesterday, the system failed drive 4, so now I'm back to showing 2 drives failed. Angelo worked on it overnight after having me install the ToggleSSH add-in. Sent me an email in the middle of the night asking me to put it back into Tech Support mode, as the logs were locked up. He indicated in his email it was being escalated to engineering, but I haven't heard anything more from anyone all day...
- So Angelo and engineering worked on it last night, and said the RAID level of the operating system partition was different than that of the Data partition. How could that happen???
As requested, I rebooted the system this morning.
Good News:
All four disks are showing on line.
I think the data is still present. I'm not sure, as I can't access some of it due to missing user accounts.
Bad News:
Most of the rest of the config looks like it's been blown away.
The hostname of the unit has been cleared.
User accounts and permissions are gone.
Volume maintenance settings have all been wiped out.
Share info is present, but most AFP share restrictions have been reset.
TimeMachine settings have been reset.
NTP settings wiped clean.
Etc.
In other words, the system appears to have been almost completely reset to defaults.
Not sure if the system is finally stable or not... waiting for information from tech support. Probably take another day to get an answer... And how did the system ever get messed up like this? Is this going to happen again? I'm feeling very uncomfortable about this ReadyNAS unit. I was really optimistic when I bought the unit based on positive reviews... I'm sure not now. - Just tried resetting the hostname, so I could back up my computer. Received an error: "Unsuccessful setting hostname". Am I stuck with the default??
- Got the following email at 1AM last night:
Hi James,
Here is the breakdown on what have been done on your ReadyNAS Unit and what we need to do next.
1. Initial problem: Disk 1 and Disk 4 shows up as DEAD drive
Reason: The Disk 1 was not loaded in the Operating System RAID group and Disk 4 lost its partition.
2. Disk 1 and Disk 3 showed up as Drive
Reason: the NAS didn’t load the Disk1 in the Operating System RAID group and Disk 4 lost its partition. This does not usually happen and I later found out that the RAID groups for the Operating System and SWAP has different RAID name from the Data Raid. This was resolved by recreating the Operating System and SWAP RAID. After this was done it triggered an OS reinstall.
3. Unable to change Host name
Reason: The OS reinstall was not complete and hindering us to change some settings in the ReadyNAS unit.
Our next step for this NAS is to trigger another OS reinstallation and if this doesn’t take care of the problem we will ne to re-flash an updated firmware on the NAS.
I hope this explains the issues on the and why we are encountering it. This kind of problem does not commonly happen and I hope you can bare with us while we resolve your issue.
Regards,
Angelo
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Did the OS reinstall - still unable to set the hostname. Did the re-flash - still unable to set the hostname. The above explanation does not make me feel better about the ReadyNAS... apparently the ReadyNAS just occasionallly, randomly scambles up its partitions.
Another day goes by with a broken system... - I assume that there is no backup, current or otherwise. How much data is at risk?
- This sounds like a very rare problem to me.
I would suggest you continue working with tech support. - With as many people you have helped over the last few years mdgm, if you haven't seen it before, it must be. We do see similar problems crop up from time to time, but this is a new one on me as well.
JamesHaskell, I know it can be frustrating, but I think it is a new one for TS as well. Normally, once they log onto a members NAS it is fixed very quickly. The fact that they haven't been able to solve the problem is probably vexing them as well. - No word from anyone at NetGear since yesterday...
- L2 tech support called me a couple of times today saying the case has been re-escalated to L3, but they see no indication whatsoever in the case notes that anything has been done today at all. Geez... just amazingly poor service.
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