juanca2000 wrote:well they might be external solutions some free some not, some working with HW accelaration some just CPU.. but those as said are external and it creates another dependency to other products and other policies that can change from a day to another. (without speaking of compatibility with all devices mobiles / android TV boxes/ apple tV etc...)
What would you say if the company of your HD TV set just disable the HD tuner because they dont want to pay for licencing HD TV and from now on you only can watch SD TV with integrated tuner? Of course you can buy an external tuner and you will be able to watch again through your HDMI input HD TV .. but you bought a TV including HD tuner from the start and pay for it... for me this is the same, we had a functionality which we paid for and probably selected the NAS because that functionality was present and now by software update Qnap has just decided to remove it. Same as my example of HD TV receiver.
I am very greatefull to all of you here giving alternative solutions and workarounds (thanks thanks thanks !!!) Nevertheless Qnap has tricked all existing customers using this feature for a couple of $ and is avoiding to take responsibility for their mistake. Once the NAS is sold it is not their problem anymore.. might be the new policy of Qnap... not sure...
This move of Qnap is extremely unfair to their customers and as said I feel completely tricked in this story. I am not sure why you don't feel the same. While working on alternative solutions we also should strongly put pressure on Qnap to restore the NAS to its original conditions and features. You cannot remove a feature that was present and was part of product specs and commercials and people bought without consequences.. If they refund everybody asking for it as the NAS is not performing as when initially bought, then ok but I have not heard they intend to do so.
Thanks again here for your alternative solutions, advices, workarounds, etc but please don't forget what is the real root cause.
Think of this example...
You have a TV that has a connection for OTA Antenna and it worked just fine. A couple years after you bought it, they changed the standard from analog to digital and now your integrated tuner doesn't work. So to now make it work, you now have to use a separate box for the tuner. Is it ideal... no, but it is functional.
There are Smart TV's that have apps that are no longer supported/maintained by the vendors. In some cases that lack of support has rendered the apps useless as they are no longer compatible with the services (Netflix, Vudu, etc.) they connect with. Maybe the vendor didn't want to spend the $$'s to maintain the app or maybe the HW couldn't support the new changes required. The TV still performs though it's primary function... being a TV.
At the end of the day, I bought the QNAP to be a NAS. The other functions are nice and I leverage them, but when I did my research my first requirement was I needed a NAS. Having those other features may have influenced my decision regarding brand a vs. b, but they didn't change it's core purpose.
Since I have multiple options/workarounds to address a secondary function, I guess I am less inclined to get worked up about it vs. if they broke the boxes primary function (being a NAS).
My assumption is that QNAP would have had to pay Dolby/DTS licensing fees for every NAS they sold where the user COULD leverage that capability, irregardless of whether they actually did or not. Evidently at this point in time that didn't make sense to QNAP to do for whatever reason.
I have suggested, and I hope at some point, they do offer an option to re-enable the functionality through a license add-on feature similar to ExFat. And before assuming that QNAP didn't pay the license fee, I would verify that Dolby/DTS didn't change the rules around WHO has to pay for licenses to make some extra $$$.
At this point, we can debate the right/wrong of things all we want, but it is not going to change anything. This is a COMMUNITY support forum which is not monitored by QNAP (other than the presales area it seems).
You can always provide feedback to QNAP via
https://helpdesk.qnap.com or via your checkbook through your purchasing choices.
PS.
Just as an FYI, not that long ago (within the last couple years from what I remember) Synology users experienced a similar situation around AC3/DTS support changing for their app. Not sure where that stands today.
I just got tricked by the update of codex and have lost transcoding feature. Probably my last Qnap, I can't stand brands that remove features they have used in all comercials / publicity / etc and then just remove it like that. This is fully unaceptable, what is next feature they can remove without consequence for them? Raid.. why not. if they can remove transcoding, why not Raid support tomorrow... i am really furious !