I have been using Peplink devices for 10 years yes and do swap them out as mentioned in my previous post these 2 were only put in 2-3 years ago. I still have another 2 in HA mode now and only wonder when they will also fail.
You do know hardware can die? There is a reason they offer extended warranty with extra licenses which also offer a ton of extra features. This is very common in hardware and not unique to Peplink. With other vendors you might need to pay a lot more for certain software features.
Out of warranty service with any network brand is non existent.
If you would still have warranty on your products, Peplink would help you with your problem and/or an RMA process for your product. Depending on where you bought it, you can also contact your distributor.
We’ve been using Peplink for almost 10 years now and have a fleet of over 200 different units over the years. We rarely have a defective unit or one needing RMA. But we have our own stock of ‘spare’ units we can replace one directly so we can do the RMA in our own time and have our customer back up as quick as possible.
We do the same for our Aruba switches and Ruckus wifi AP’s.
padaco-daniel: I agree with you and i do not agree with you. Not everyone will have the ability to have spare routers like you do. For some smaller clients and the balance 20/30 i do have spare routers but those actually have never had an issue. The balance 305 and 380s and higher versions cost more money and you would think by using High availability you should be highly unlikely to have both routers non-operational.
Thanks for your advice on having the warranty which again at midnight when your router is not working wont magically bring you a new one or fix that one. Thanks.
Of course no one likes it when a product fails, but hardware failures happen with all brands.
I never said it would magically bring you a new one. You already did the logical step in a more critical environment of putting in a HA pair, but hardware can still die.
That both of them failed at the same time sounds like there might be something else going on that influenced the cause. Or maybe a product defect, but if you’re out of warranty I don’t think Peplink can help you with that.
You could try it through your distributor, maybe there is a known issue with a specific batch of this model. We’ve never deployed this specific model only lower and higher models.
And yes for higher end models we might not have a spare laying around, depending on how high end it is. But you would always be able to bring the customer back up with a lower end unit and then process the RMA and later on exchange it again. Especially if you’re using inControl2 many of the configuration options can be pushed easily.
Peplink recently started offering PrimeCare+/EssentialCare+ for Advanced Replacement warranty, which could speed up this process as they can ship the replacement first.
Daniel, thank you for all the input regarding this. As previously mentioned i can agree with a lot of your points. As all IT people know my self included things do fail no matter what but after 5-6 years of different SMB models failing and even after having HA.
The key component is broken which is my trust in their product.
I do work with Sonicwall, and other routers as well and i like the peplink product but this type of strange failures and consistently after 2-3 years are unacceptable. Again i agree with you on most points but i think for me personally as an IT professional it’s time to learn something new from these failures. One of those things: never put all your trust in one product.
Are the 380s the only units you have had an issue with?
What hardware revision are they?
How long were they in service before they had an issue?
How hot was the area the units were used in?
Did you investigate internally the unit for any components that appear to be damaged?
I hate to see you stop using peplink because of a few 380s had an issue.
In many thousand of units we had , I had an issue with 1 305 (replaced under warranty) , 1 580 , bypassed fan(Peplink Balance 305 boot issue - #17 by SotYPL) to get it to work, and a few mini’s.
We have only had maybe 5 or so units that we have ever RMA, we have found the units to be very reliable.