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In their defense, OnHub routers launched late 2015 and was discontinued/rebranded Google Wifi in late 2016, but they did end up supporting the older models for

In their defense, OnHub routers launched late 2015 and was discontinued/rebranded Google Wifi in late 2016, but they did end up supporting the older models for approx. 4 years of updates, including phone support. That was a product that made me trust Google just as Apple was getting out of the router business. Google Home, Nest and Dropcam have all had older products remain supported, so far.

foepys 6y ago
Meanwhile I'm rocking a 10 year old DSL router that is still being updated with security patches. 4 years is nothing in the consumer market with the exception of maybe smartphones. Nobody has the money to buy all electronics new every 4 years and looking at the current Android version distribution, a lot of consumers don't even buy new smartphones every 4 years.
- 14 6y ago
  I was on an iPhone 4s up until late last year. It was a backup phone and of course I broke my newer phone and needed something quickly until I could replace it. They stopped updating it however so I really don’t like to use it.
- sukilot 6y ago
  > 4 years is nothing in the consumer market with the exception of maybe smartphones. Smartphones that expire rapidly is a Google innovation.
  - foepys 6y ago
    6 years in Apple's case is also way too short. Home appliance lifetime is typically measured in decades.
    - syshum 6y ago
      2 at the most... and that is pushing it Home Furnace is probably the longest lasting Home Appliance and it has an expected life of 15-20 years. Common Kitchen Appliances (and most other appliances) are about 10 years...
      - foepys 6y ago
        Maybe I'm the exception but all my home appliances (washing machine, dishwasher, fridge, freezer) are around 25-30 years old with the exception of my oven and stove. Everything is working as expected and I suspect they will last even longer.
    - kps 6y ago
      According to Wikipedia, Apple sold the iPhone 6 until September 12, 2018¹, and it did not get iOS 13, which was released September 19, 2019² — barely one year of OS support. ¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPhone_6 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPhone_6 ² https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS_13 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS_13
      - gruez 6y ago
        >barely one year of OS support. Measuring support spans this way is... odd. It's like saying "ubuntu only comes with 1 year of support" because you installed 16.04 today. If we're going by this metric a lot of electronics have 0 years of support. Regardless, apple is still has the longest support, at least when it comes to phones/tablets.
        smichel17 6y ago
        You're blurring the line between software and hardware support, which is a very important distinction. Ubuntu 16.04 may only have one year of support left, but my current desktop hardware supports both 16.04 and 20.04. It's much more reasonable to sunset old software to reduce maintenance burden while providing an upgrade path than to lock people out of any upgrade path for their hardware. There is also the distinction that Apple sells closed hardware and prevents you from installing a custom OS with longer software support. And that Apple products cost $$ while Ubuntu is free, which leads to different reasonable expectations. But I don't think either of those are needed to make my point.
        gruez 6y ago
        > You're blurring the line between software and hardware support, which is a very important distinction. Isn't hardware support just called "warranty"? That remains the same regardless of when you bought it. >And that Apple products cost $$ while Ubuntu is free, which leads to different reasonable expectations. My point wasn't whether canonical/apple's support lifecycle policies were reasonable, just that that defining support periods as the last day it was sold, rather the first day it was sold was unusual/misleading. If you want something to be supported a long time after you get it, you don't grab the oldest version, simple as that. Consumer products don't have a support subscription like enterprise products do, so limiting support to old products is really the only economically viable choice that companies have.
    - gruez 6y ago
      Not really. In the case of eg. fridges, only parts of it (the compressor, usually) is warrantied for that long.
      - thewebcount 6y ago
        Isn't it the opposite? I thought the compressor was the thing that was not warranted because they break so frequently.
        gruez 6y ago
        So I actually went on bestbuy and looked at what the waranty policy for a few of the refridegrator brands were, and they were nowhere close to "decades" like the grandparent comment claims. samsung: 1 year https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-22-6-cu-ft-french-door-counter-depth-fingerprint-resistant-refrigerator-with-coolselect-pantry-stainless-steel/6355738.p?skuId=6355738 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-22-6-cu-ft-french-door-... whirlpool: 1 year https://www.bestbuy.com/site/whirlpool-25-2-cu-ft-french-door-refrigerator-with-internal-water-dispenser-stainless-steel/5789904.p?skuId=5789904 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/whirlpool-25-2-cu-ft-french-doo... lg: 1 Year General, 5 Years Sealed System, 5 Years Compressor, 6-10 Years Linear Compressor. https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lg-23-5-cu-ft-french-door-counter-depth-refrigerator-with-craft-ice-printproof-stainless-steel/6395328.p?skuId=6395328 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lg-23-5-cu-ft-french-door-count... bosch: 1 year https://www.bestbuy.com/site/bosch-800-series-20-5-cu-ft-4-door-french-door-counter-depth-refrigerator-stainless-steel/6354069.p?skuId=6354069 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/bosch-800-series-20-5-cu-ft-4-d... kitchenaid: 1 year labor, 10 year parts https://www.bestbuy.com/site/kitchenaid-25-8-cu-ft-5-door-french-door-refrigerator-stainless-steel/6472157.p?skuId=6472157 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/kitchenaid-25-8-cu-ft-5-door-fr... >I thought the compressor was the thing that was not warranted because they break so frequently. given the sample above, it seems like at least with LG, that they have a lot of confidence in their compressors and "sealed system" (probably the refrigerant system).
        kortilla 6y ago
        Warranty is not the same thing as how long it lasts in practice. I would never buy a fridge from a manufacturer again if it stopped working after a year and a half.
    - coding123 6y ago
      I don't know about anyone else, but I'm using my phone a lot less now that I just stay home all the time.
- lstamour 6y ago
  That may be true for most smart home gear, but I place routers in a slightly different class of home electronics. Like gaming consoles, for performance and upgrades to the latest standards (Wi-Fi 6E, for example) you’ll likely need a new router every 5-7 years. There was a short period where 802.11ac routers were initially not very good and then the second-gen 802.11ac routers arrived and were substantially faster/better chipsets. If I recall correctly, the Apple AirPort Extreme was an example of the former and the Google OnHub an example of the latter. Now we have “mesh router sets” that trade features and performance for smaller sizes and cheaper components. Hopefully in the Wi-Fi 6E timeframe we’ll go back to performance routers that don’t look like spiders. It’s not that I don’t expect devices to get updates, but so much in networking gear depends on working around chipset bugs, I can’t imagine every router manufacturer supports their routers equally well... the number of routers I’ve bought that didn’t last even two years could probably fill a medium-sized box for me. Which highlights how hit-or-miss buying such gear tends to be, I suppose.
  - TedDoesntTalk 6y ago
    You need to replace all of your devices, too, in order to take advantage of those new WiFi specs. Do you buy all new devices when you buy a new WiFi router? I don’t.
    - lstamour 6y ago
      Right now I’m waiting to buy a new router even though I do have 2 of 30 or so devices with support for Wi-Fi 6. Previously I did buy a few new devices to get 5GHz support from an ac router, after I moved to a location that had very poor 2.4Ghz connectivity. It can happen but it’s rare, I’d say?
  - gamblor956 6y ago
    I know plenty of people that get along just fine with their 802.11b routers. And even a 10+ year old b/g router can handle 4k streaming.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
- awill 6y ago
  I agree. 4 years is nothing to brag about. Not for the sorts of devices that people keep for longer. I've had my Asus router for 5 years, and I'm still getting updates. The hardware is still good, so the support should keep up.
- ponker 6y ago
  Your DSL router is getting security patches because the primary business model for DSL routers is for them to be owned by the ISP. It's thus an enterprise product which tend to get decades of support.
ElderKorihor 6y ago
Depends on what you mean by "support". The OnHub never ended up using its smart home radios or built-in speaker for anything. I also ended up needing to buy multiple other boxes to work around Google WiFi's crashy PPPoE implementation and lack of VLAN tagging. And then there was that day Google accidently deleted everyone's router configuration. It worked great as a dumb access point. Everything else was shambles.
- lstamour 6y ago
  True. I stopped using mine because of the PPPoE support & VLAN tagging required for gigabit fiber optic internet was missing/didn’t perform well. And I remember having to reset not just my OnHub but my relatives’ too. But back when I had a standard coax cable connection, it worked great! :) I was able to chat with a live human when I needed support with mesh at one point.
  - ericd 6y ago
    I've been very happy with our home networking since ditching our consumer networking gear for Ubiquiti stuff. It's not very expensive, and it's worked extremely well.
- sukilot 6y ago
  Sad that Google never made amends for that; not even a token gesture like some Play credit.
sukilot 6y ago
Is OnHub no longer supported? Google never told me, and mine still works with Google WiFi app.
- lstamour 6y ago
  I made my statement based on when it was last updated. It appears it’s in a stable, security-fix-only mode. I consider this similar to discontinued products of other kinds — Google recognizes here that there’s more goodwill in making sure OnHub still works, but it really wants you to buy new hardware. This will be more visibly true when a Wi-Fi 6E device appears, I expect.
freeone3000 6y ago
My Netgear router is about 10 years old and works fine. Once a product is released, it should remain supported for it's useful lifetime, not some arbitrary cutoff.

foepys 6y ago

Meanwhile I'm rocking a 10 year old DSL router that is still being updated with security patches. 4 years is nothing in the consumer market with the exception of maybe smartphones. Nobody has the money to buy all electronics new every 4 years and looking at the current Android version distribution, a lot of consumers don't even buy new smartphones every 4 years.

14 6y ago
I was on an iPhone 4s up until late last year. It was a backup phone and of course I broke my newer phone and needed something quickly until I could replace it. They stopped updating it however so I really don’t like to use it.
sukilot 6y ago
> 4 years is nothing in the consumer market with the exception of maybe smartphones. Smartphones that expire rapidly is a Google innovation.
- foepys 6y ago
  6 years in Apple's case is also way too short. Home appliance lifetime is typically measured in decades.
  - syshum 6y ago
    2 at the most... and that is pushing it Home Furnace is probably the longest lasting Home Appliance and it has an expected life of 15-20 years. Common Kitchen Appliances (and most other appliances) are about 10 years...
    - foepys 6y ago
      Maybe I'm the exception but all my home appliances (washing machine, dishwasher, fridge, freezer) are around 25-30 years old with the exception of my oven and stove. Everything is working as expected and I suspect they will last even longer.
  - kps 6y ago
    According to Wikipedia, Apple sold the iPhone 6 until September 12, 2018¹, and it did not get iOS 13, which was released September 19, 2019² — barely one year of OS support. ¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPhone_6 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPhone_6 ² https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS_13 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS_13
    - gruez 6y ago
      >barely one year of OS support. Measuring support spans this way is... odd. It's like saying "ubuntu only comes with 1 year of support" because you installed 16.04 today. If we're going by this metric a lot of electronics have 0 years of support. Regardless, apple is still has the longest support, at least when it comes to phones/tablets.
      - smichel17 6y ago
        You're blurring the line between software and hardware support, which is a very important distinction. Ubuntu 16.04 may only have one year of support left, but my current desktop hardware supports both 16.04 and 20.04. It's much more reasonable to sunset old software to reduce maintenance burden while providing an upgrade path than to lock people out of any upgrade path for their hardware. There is also the distinction that Apple sells closed hardware and prevents you from installing a custom OS with longer software support. And that Apple products cost $$ while Ubuntu is free, which leads to different reasonable expectations. But I don't think either of those are needed to make my point.
        gruez 6y ago
        > You're blurring the line between software and hardware support, which is a very important distinction. Isn't hardware support just called "warranty"? That remains the same regardless of when you bought it. >And that Apple products cost $$ while Ubuntu is free, which leads to different reasonable expectations. My point wasn't whether canonical/apple's support lifecycle policies were reasonable, just that that defining support periods as the last day it was sold, rather the first day it was sold was unusual/misleading. If you want something to be supported a long time after you get it, you don't grab the oldest version, simple as that. Consumer products don't have a support subscription like enterprise products do, so limiting support to old products is really the only economically viable choice that companies have.
  - gruez 6y ago
    Not really. In the case of eg. fridges, only parts of it (the compressor, usually) is warrantied for that long.
    - thewebcount 6y ago
      Isn't it the opposite? I thought the compressor was the thing that was not warranted because they break so frequently.
      - gruez 6y ago
        So I actually went on bestbuy and looked at what the waranty policy for a few of the refridegrator brands were, and they were nowhere close to "decades" like the grandparent comment claims. samsung: 1 year https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-22-6-cu-ft-french-door-counter-depth-fingerprint-resistant-refrigerator-with-coolselect-pantry-stainless-steel/6355738.p?skuId=6355738 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-22-6-cu-ft-french-door-... whirlpool: 1 year https://www.bestbuy.com/site/whirlpool-25-2-cu-ft-french-door-refrigerator-with-internal-water-dispenser-stainless-steel/5789904.p?skuId=5789904 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/whirlpool-25-2-cu-ft-french-doo... lg: 1 Year General, 5 Years Sealed System, 5 Years Compressor, 6-10 Years Linear Compressor. https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lg-23-5-cu-ft-french-door-counter-depth-refrigerator-with-craft-ice-printproof-stainless-steel/6395328.p?skuId=6395328 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lg-23-5-cu-ft-french-door-count... bosch: 1 year https://www.bestbuy.com/site/bosch-800-series-20-5-cu-ft-4-door-french-door-counter-depth-refrigerator-stainless-steel/6354069.p?skuId=6354069 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/bosch-800-series-20-5-cu-ft-4-d... kitchenaid: 1 year labor, 10 year parts https://www.bestbuy.com/site/kitchenaid-25-8-cu-ft-5-door-french-door-refrigerator-stainless-steel/6472157.p?skuId=6472157 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/kitchenaid-25-8-cu-ft-5-door-fr... >I thought the compressor was the thing that was not warranted because they break so frequently. given the sample above, it seems like at least with LG, that they have a lot of confidence in their compressors and "sealed system" (probably the refrigerant system).
        kortilla 6y ago
        Warranty is not the same thing as how long it lasts in practice. I would never buy a fridge from a manufacturer again if it stopped working after a year and a half.
  - coding123 6y ago
    I don't know about anyone else, but I'm using my phone a lot less now that I just stay home all the time.
lstamour 6y ago
That may be true for most smart home gear, but I place routers in a slightly different class of home electronics. Like gaming consoles, for performance and upgrades to the latest standards (Wi-Fi 6E, for example) you’ll likely need a new router every 5-7 years. There was a short period where 802.11ac routers were initially not very good and then the second-gen 802.11ac routers arrived and were substantially faster/better chipsets. If I recall correctly, the Apple AirPort Extreme was an example of the former and the Google OnHub an example of the latter. Now we have “mesh router sets” that trade features and performance for smaller sizes and cheaper components. Hopefully in the Wi-Fi 6E timeframe we’ll go back to performance routers that don’t look like spiders. It’s not that I don’t expect devices to get updates, but so much in networking gear depends on working around chipset bugs, I can’t imagine every router manufacturer supports their routers equally well... the number of routers I’ve bought that didn’t last even two years could probably fill a medium-sized box for me. Which highlights how hit-or-miss buying such gear tends to be, I suppose.
- TedDoesntTalk 6y ago
  You need to replace all of your devices, too, in order to take advantage of those new WiFi specs. Do you buy all new devices when you buy a new WiFi router? I don’t.
  - lstamour 6y ago
    Right now I’m waiting to buy a new router even though I do have 2 of 30 or so devices with support for Wi-Fi 6. Previously I did buy a few new devices to get 5GHz support from an ac router, after I moved to a location that had very poor 2.4Ghz connectivity. It can happen but it’s rare, I’d say?
- gamblor956 6y ago
  I know plenty of people that get along just fine with their 802.11b routers. And even a 10+ year old b/g router can handle 4k streaming.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
awill 6y ago
I agree. 4 years is nothing to brag about. Not for the sorts of devices that people keep for longer. I've had my Asus router for 5 years, and I'm still getting updates. The hardware is still good, so the support should keep up.
ponker 6y ago
Your DSL router is getting security patches because the primary business model for DSL routers is for them to be owned by the ISP. It's thus an enterprise product which tend to get decades of support.

ElderKorihor 6y ago

Depends on what you mean by "support". The OnHub never ended up using its smart home radios or built-in speaker for anything. I also ended up needing to buy multiple other boxes to work around Google WiFi's crashy PPPoE implementation and lack of VLAN tagging. And then there was that day Google accidently deleted everyone's router configuration. It worked great as a dumb access point. Everything else was shambles.

lstamour 6y ago
True. I stopped using mine because of the PPPoE support & VLAN tagging required for gigabit fiber optic internet was missing/didn’t perform well. And I remember having to reset not just my OnHub but my relatives’ too. But back when I had a standard coax cable connection, it worked great! :) I was able to chat with a live human when I needed support with mesh at one point.
- ericd 6y ago
  I've been very happy with our home networking since ditching our consumer networking gear for Ubiquiti stuff. It's not very expensive, and it's worked extremely well.
sukilot 6y ago
Sad that Google never made amends for that; not even a token gesture like some Play credit.

sukilot 6y ago

Is OnHub no longer supported? Google never told me, and mine still works with Google WiFi app.

lstamour 6y ago
I made my statement based on when it was last updated. It appears it’s in a stable, security-fix-only mode. I consider this similar to discontinued products of other kinds — Google recognizes here that there’s more goodwill in making sure OnHub still works, but it really wants you to buy new hardware. This will be more visibly true when a Wi-Fi 6E device appears, I expect.

freeone3000 6y ago

My Netgear router is about 10 years old and works fine. Once a product is released, it should remain supported for it's useful lifetime, not some arbitrary cutoff.