Wink Offers Posts Fix Options For Hubs Bricked By Update

Wink users who have suddenly found themselves without some smartness in their homes this weekend are probably painfully aware of the blunder that the company made in a recent firmware update. All hope is not yet lost, however. Wink has just posted some instructions on how to get those Smart Hubs up and running and connected to the Internet again. And in case you're not that confident with your technical know-how, they are offering free round-trip shipping to get yours fixed in a few days.

You can opt to have your Hub shipped to Wink and they will take care of everything, including shipping. They will send you a box where you can snuggly put your device in to send to them. This might be the only option for those without the technical knowledge to muck around with their home routers are don't know anyone with that skillset. That said, it does mean you'll have to wait, first for them to send you the box and then to wait for them to return your fixed Hub.

Those with more pressing needs can opt to do the fix themselves. The process simply involves changing your router's settings so that the Hub can connect directly to Wink's servers. Once done, the Hub will automatically download a fix that will bring it back up to working condition. Wink says that it will only take around 10 minutes but, during that time, your router will be practically unusable for any other purpose except fixing the Wink Hub. And users must remember to undo the changes they made once its done so that they can get back to surfing the Web.

While the fixes might be simple and quick from a technical point of view, it still boggles the mind that Wink allowed such a mistake to happen in the first place. Sure, people make mistakes and bugs can get past checks from time to time, but when home safety is involved, there should be very little room for error. Some users have taken this incident as a reason to lose faith in the company's abilities because of such a major blunder.

SOURCE: Wink