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Synology Reverses Course on Some Drive Restrictions

2 weeks 3 days ago
Synology has released an update to its Disk Station Manager software that removes verified drive requirements from its 2025 model-year Plus, Value and J-series DiskStation network-attached storage devices. The change allows users to install non-validated third-party drives and create storage pools without restrictions. The company had expanded its verified drive policy to the entire Plus line a few months earlier. Synology-branded drives carried substantial price premiums over commodity hardware. The HAT5310 enterprise SATA drive costs $299 for 8TB compared to $220 for an identically sized Seagate Exos disk. Users who installed non-verified drives in affected models faced reduced functionality and persistent warning messages in the DSM interface. Synology said today it is collaborating with third-party drive manufacturers to accelerate testing and verification of additional storage drives. Pool and cache creation on M.2 disks still requires drives from the hardware compatibility list. Synology did not clarify whether the policy change applies to previous-generation products.

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Bank of England smells hint of dotcom bubble 2.0 in AI froth

2 weeks 3 days ago
UK central bank warns of 'sudden correction' in tech stocks

The Bank of England's Financial Policy Committee has warned of the dangers of a sudden correction in the financial markets, owing to the value of tech and AI stocks, and has compared the risks to the dotcom bubble.…

Lindsay Clark

Bonfire of the Middle Managers

2 weeks 3 days ago
American companies have begun cutting middle management positions at rates not seen in years. Google eliminated 35% of managers overseeing teams of fewer than three in August. Fiverr announced in September it would shed managers to focus on AI. Amazon trimmed its management ranks throughout the year and cut positions at its cloud-computing division in July. Meta's Mark Zuckerberg has complained about managers managing managers since 2023. Phrases relating to reducing management layers appeared 98 times on earnings calls of companies in the S&P global index this year, twice the frequency of all of 2022. The cuts stem partly from an uncertain economic environment and President Donald Trump's tariff regime, Economist writes. The pandemic created the conditions for the current retrenchment. Companies furloughed staff during Covid-19 and then hired rapidly to meet demand for e-commerce and digital services. They promoted employees to management positions to retain talent even when those managers supervised only one or two subordinates. Between 2019 and 2024, five of the ten fastest-growing job categories were management roles. Since November 2022, listed American companies have cut middle-management positions by around 3% on average.

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