24 Mar
2000
24 Mar
'00
8:50 a.m.
I heard last night that Netpliance is making
modifications so that people
can no longer do this... they are apparently losing a LOT of money selling
the machines, having expected to recoup it in the service charges...
Can someone confirm this... and maybe confirm the change that they
have done (which I understand is simply removal of the cable connector
for the drive).
Oh, and supposedly back-ordered units will have the mod...
Well, the word from Netpliance is that they've locked out the ability to
modify them. It looks like this is at least in part in the form of the
following blurb, "Modification of the i-opener in any way is in violation of
our terms and conditions". To which my answer is, sorry I don't buy that.
No one knows for sure *what* the modification is, as no one has gotten one
of the modified machines.
My guess is they made one of two changes, either the OS is better locked
down, they removed the Hard Drive connector, or both. Of course it's also
been theorized they did something nasty to the BIOS, that seems unlikely
to me, but unfortunatly is possible.
Zane