New Release - Firmware Version 2.10.12-129 for My Book Live (3/14/12) [ Edited ]

[Myron]

To demonstrate fairness...  Also maybe some MyBook Live owners have mains power issues and many power-cuts?  Maybe some MyBook Live owners are a bit lazy and simply turn off the NAS without commanding it to shut-down? Maybe some people dive in to the back-end using SSH Telnet and made signigicant changes and here I feel sorry for the Firmware development team as a script what would work on their equipment may trash a MyBook Live what has it's internals significantly changed?  Yes, I've made changed to the internals of my own NAS, but I've been very careful and kept a detailed change-log.  I've actually changed very little.

• Corrected a bug with Safepoint back-up where the dry-run ignores the exclude.txt file.
• netatalk service stopped because I don't need it.
• Added extra exceptions to the exclude.txt file.
• Configured the VSFTP service to be more secure and a lot more frustrating to anyone trying to perform a dictionary attack. If an incorrect password is given then VSFTPD waits for longer then 60 seconds before responding. Promiscuous mode has been correctly configured and only two concurrent connections allowed from any one IP address.

There seems to be a problem performing the firmware upgrade through the Dashboard UI and possibly problems using the automatic update so manually copy the upgrade file to the NAS's Public directory and invoke the script to pick this up and initiate the upgrade.  Just cuts out the Dashboard UI from the equation and this seems to work.

Overall I purchased the MyBook Live to operate as network storage and it actually does this job very well. Curious why people find it slow.  For my own video and auto-editing work the MyBook Live is the disk that contains the projects and had the work-space and temporary folders.  It's quite quick and apart from it's quirks I have to admit it is proving to be quite reliable.

Personally I am giving W.D. a chance to correct the faults. At the same time I also recognise that some of the faults should not be there.  Like a device reset button where the option to factory reset the NAS's operating system is not provided.  The all important SSH back-door to correct faults is disabled by default requiring an RMA if things go really wrong.  There is not even a route in to W.D's own technical support staff.

There should be a very simple TFTP server on the NAS that could be used as a route to send a firmware file to the NAS to replace a corrupted partition.  Actually, keeping that idea for reference but scrapping it because the SSH facility allows the SFTP protocol so files can be uploaded and downloaded from ANYWHERE on the NAS's disc.  Perfect.

That SSH route into the NAS needs to be there.

If SSH is to be disabled by default then at least have it enabled for 10 minutes (more-or-less) after boot-up until it's accessed with a valid login. To which it then remains enabled (as if it was enabled from the Dashboard UI).  If on boot-up of the MyBook Live SSH already enabled then it remains enabled.

With this in place W.D. could write FixIt programs that could be downloaded onto a user's computer, that then logs in to the MyBook Live and makes corrections. Programs like these technologically challenged people will be able to use and make life A LOT more easier for the first level technical support. WDTony and Bill_S will be also be able to lower their daily consuption of Prozac and stop smoking the weed each night. 

I try to be fair with my comments, I try be helpful (proof exists within this on-line community) but I also promise to be constructive critical critic if it's necessary.

After all that, I quite like the MyBook Live.  Plugged it in, it's got it's cool corner in the house and I generally forget it's there.  It just works, does what I want it to do and consumes very little power.  At the moment the advantages of the MyBook Live outweigh the problems which I do believe WILL get fixed.

At that point of time in the future the MyBook Live will be quite an awesome gadget. 

[ThierryB]

@Bill S : 

If you take time to read all my other posts, you'll see they are all constructive and after my issues were solved (thank's to other customers here), I tried to do my best to help other people.

As I said before and I'm not the only one, I was realy disapointed about WD customer support. I'm sure you'll find my questions and answers from your team and then you'll see that where completely out of the subject. You can also find the way I have corrected all the issues.

Just a funny point : I had 2 answers from WD for the message you quoted : one from you and the other one from WDTony, but I never had any WD answer here when I was in troubles with my MBL.

For this update, I'm not enought confident at the moment to install it (and not a NAS or SSH specialist, but should I have to be one to use your product ?), as my drive works well for the moment (I cross fingers ! ;-)). I don't want to take the risk to be in troubles again. This drive is not  hobby for me, just a usefull product for my job, so I don't have a lot of time to correct bugs.

Nevertheless, I thank you for this very usefull forum and I hope you will take much care about this usefull community.

In my case, all the issues where real software problems. ;-)

[weetabix]

how long should the update take via SSH? Been waiting a while..

[thegooddoctor]

Good to know - definitely something that I'll be looking into.

I'm not after significant hack/mods, but I am interested in limiting unnecessary components and increasing safety.

---

Myron wrote:

  I've actually changed very little.

• Corrected a bug with Safepoint back-up where the dru-run ignores the exclude.txt file.
• netatalk service stopped because I don't need it.
• Added extra exceptions to the exclude.txt file.
• Configured the VSFTP service to be more secure and a lot more frustrating to anyone trying to perform a dictionary attack. If an incorrect password is given then VSFTPD waits for longer then 60 seconds before responding. Promiscuous mode has been correctly configured and only two concurrent connections allowed from any one IP address.

---

[HumpMan]

I'm not wanting to cause any trouble, but I will post the results of some very simple experimentation I've done.

I undid the "/ext/hosts" fix and then again had trouble getting back to the UI.  I redid the fix and could get back to the UI, but could never get it to show a good connection to the Internet (from the Settings/Network menu.)

Rebooted my router and then tried to shut down the MBL using Quick View.  Eventually the MBL disappeared from Quick View, but the LED on the device never stopped being green.

Did a power cycle of the MBL and it seemed to boot normally.  Quick View did not add the MBL to the menu as I expected.  I updated Smartware and then rebooted my PC.

Everything went back to the initial problem state.  That being the file serving seemed fine, but access to the Dashboard was taking several minutes to succeed, if it did succeed.  Access to the Settings menu took 3.5 minutes.  Access to the Network menu took 1.5 minutes.  But eventually it did say "Good" for the Internet connection item on that menu.  And it did respond that my firmware was up to date when I did a "Check for Updates" from the Updates menu.

the HumpMan

[Myron]

For sure not more than 15 minutes.

---

weetabix wrote:

how long should the update take via SSH? Been waiting a while..

---

[gsdev]

45 minutes on the phone with warrantee holding for the next available service rep for an RMA. Then at 6:59 pm on the dot they hung up with no warning. I imagine they closed, but couldn't be bothered to let me know.

WD, this is getting silly. No $150 device is worth this hassle. Come on.

[gretone]

I bought  my book  live  a week  ago  when i instaled  it i  updeted   to  this  firmware  but  is  very  slow   i reach 11 mb  max   its  very  slow   i was  hoping  for  more  like  40 mb  what  is  the  problem  someone  help  me  i  am  dying  here

[martiansoldier]

---

thegooddoctor wrote:

if you need v124, here is the link (perform a manual update)

http://download.wdc.com/nas/apnc-021009-124-20111113.deb  

---

martiansoldier wrote:

Received my warranty replacement 3TB today. Came with 02.02.02-020 FW, which of course worse than 02.10.09–124 but it works. I did get the update notification, but I have decided to wait it out for a bit.

---

---

Thank you. I just noticed that you had posted a link for me to update to 021009-124, which is what I did manually a few hours after I setup the replacement drive and copied some files over. Update went smooth, moved all my files back the the recertified replacement and noticed that the drive wouldn't sleep at all. LED kept blinking green all day long yesterday. After I returned from work yesterday, I tried to check the power saver settings but I realized that I had completely lost access to the UI for good. Now, WD has opened a 2nd RMA ticket for me to return the "recertified" replacement and send me another "recertified" replacement, which I hope will last longer than 24 hours.

[vertical]

---

gretone wrote:

I bought  my book  live  a week  ago  when i instaled  it i  updeted   to  this  firmware  but  is  very  slow   i reach 11 mb  max   its  very  slow   i was  hoping  for  more  like  40 mb  what  is  the  problem  someone  help  me  i  am  dying  here

---

You are on 100mbps LAN. To go higher you need Gigabit LAN (1000mbps). Get yourself a Gigabit switch and you are done.