Dell and HP disable hardware H.265 decoding on select PCs due to rising royalty costs
In a public statement , Asus said that "all after-sales services in Germany remain fully operational, and existing customers will continue to receive uninterrupted support in full compliance with the current court order," adding that it is "evaluating and pursuing further legal action to reach a fair resolution as soon as possible".
The fact that the websites are completely down runs counter to this statement. There's no telling if email support has also been taken offline, but you couldn't even find that to begin with. The fact that — at least for Asus — the blocking also affects German users visiting the U.S. website also seems excessive.
While it's hard to pin down the exact rationale for a complete geo-block of both German websites and German users, it's simply due to unintended consequences. In theory, all the companies would have to do would be to ensure that their respective German online stores are disabled, and that any other regions' stores no longer ship to Germany, but the block is much broader.
It's also not impossible that the injunction's wording could be overly broad, and the companies are playing on the safe side. In the past, Oppo/OnePlus , Vivo , and Lenovo went through similar situations, but reports indicate that their respective websites weren't completely taken offline.
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- https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/SPONSORED_LINK_URL
- https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/acer-and-asus-shut-down-support-for-pc-and-laptops-in-wake-of-patent-dispute-ruling-drivers-and-updates-inaccessible-to-existing-customers-german-website-finds-a-workaround#main
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