So, I just picked up a Surf SOHO from Amazon (from the Peplink store). Everything seemed OK at first, then I started having an issue that made me rethink my first assessment.
It was shipped by Amazon in a Peplink box. It was sealed with packing tape. I opened it up, everything was in plastic as I would expect. The 3 antennae in the bottom of the box, however, were in individual plastic “cells” in a bag, but i noticed that each cell had a slit in it, as if they had been opened. I didn’t think much of that at the time.
I set up the router, and at first everything went well. I was using the web interface via an ethernet cable, when suddenly the laptop lost connectivity to the router. I unplugged and replugged the cable, both ends. No dice. The lights were out on the back of the router. Rebooting the router got it back up, then it died again.
Okay. Hmm. I moved to the wifi connection to the web interface. It connected. No problem. OK, great. Maybe the router just needs to be rebooted, or needs a firmware upgrade (though, they’re supposed to ship with the latest hardware and firmware versions, per the Peplink Store on Amazon). Sure enough, Firmware is 8.1.0 and the firmware check shows that the current version is 8.1.2 … two versions behind?
Could this be an open-box return (possibly defective), being sold as a new router? Or would that be within the realm of reasonable to still be shipping new routers with a firmware two revisions old?
The SOHOs we received as a “Partner” have antennas sealed in the bags - no slits. (I phrase this in the past-tense because Peplink now bypasses its partners to sell direct to the consumer.) However, I would not be the least be concerned about the router not having been shipped with the current FW – very common and not an issue. The device was likely manufactured during the “8.1.0 era.”
What I would be concerned about is the warranty expiration date. If you want to PM me the serial number I’ll be glad to check for you.
Oh, it was an open box return that was sold as a new router, or something similar. It was registered with Peplink for a warranty in October of 2020. I bought it 3 days ago.
So, how closely associated with Peplink is the Peplink Store on Amazon? I’m slightly annoyed that something sold as new was not.
I would start by contacting amazon, since amazon has lots of sellers selling the same product it’s difficult to determine without the original link to the product page which seller provided the product.
If it was purchased from a partner such as myself or @Rick-DC or others on the forum we would be able to contact peplink on your behalf.
That’s a really good question but I’ll leave someone else to answer it. But I will say when we sell Peplink products we spend considerable time/resources on each and every sale – every sale – regardless of price point. Indeed, we’d like to talk with each customer before each transaction to ensure the buyer knows what they are buying and it will meet their needs. That’s not exactly how it works when buying “product” on-line. As @Jonathan_Pitts said, we can “fix” a lot of issues associated with our sale but can’t when it was bought elsewhere.
That’s a screenshot of the product I ordered through Amazon. Rather than emailing the sales staff at Peplink, I’ll start with the Peplink Store on Amazon and/or Amazon itself first. I’ll let you know how it goes.
Change of plans. I started the Amazon process and was remined of how resolving issues that don’t fit into a neat category can be a bit of chore until you get a live human involved, so I just emailed sales at peplink dot com, and we’ll see what they say.
