As a privacy and freedom oriented PC/Linux user, it scares me how modern day devices are becoming extremely proprietary. Companies are beginning to ship their laptops/tablets with proprietary EFI systems which have some nasty things in them. I recently purchased a Dell Venue 8 Pro(one of many upcoming 8" windows 8.1(x86) tablets) and while i was searching through its BIOS, i noticed that it had the computrace option activated. After disabling it, i decided to try to put coreboot on it, only to find that its non-existent for my device. Although it says that its disabled, i dont trust it one bit. While it is a beautiful, fast and ultra-portable PC, it bothers me how there are no free alternatives for it. These types of devices are growing in numbers and will most likely continue on through the years.
All I ask of you is to try and make EFI alternatives to all these upcoming devices.
On 18.02.2014 06:21, amloerx@tfwno.gf wrote:
As a privacy and freedom oriented PC/Linux user, it scares me how modern day devices are becoming extremely proprietary. Companies are beginning to ship their laptops/tablets with proprietary EFI systems which have some nasty things in them. I recently purchased a Dell Venue 8 Pro(one of many upcoming 8" windows 8.1(x86) tablets) and while i was searching through its BIOS, i noticed that it had the computrace option activated. After disabling it, i decided to try to put coreboot on it, only to find that its non-existent for my device. Although it says that its disabled, i dont trust it one bit. While it is a beautiful, fast and ultra-portable PC, it bothers me how there are no free alternatives for it. These types of devices are growing in numbers and will most likely continue on through the years.
All I ask of you is to try and make EFI alternatives to all these upcoming devices.
All of them? Possible but will probably cost you millions in workforce. If you really want coreboot on some devices that interest you, you'll have to back it up with either work(do port yourself) or money (hire someone, you can post a bounty)
all of these upcoming devices? not practical.
If you care that much, you have to vote with your money, and you have to accept that you'll get something not entirely what you wanted in features.
ron
On Tue, Feb 18, 2014 at 1:01 PM, Vladimir 'φ-coder/phcoder' Serbinenko phcoder@gmail.com wrote:
On 18.02.2014 06:21, amloerx@tfwno.gf wrote:
As a privacy and freedom oriented PC/Linux user, it scares me how modern day devices are becoming extremely proprietary. Companies are beginning to ship their laptops/tablets with proprietary EFI systems which have some nasty things in them. I recently purchased a Dell Venue 8 Pro(one of many upcoming 8" windows 8.1(x86) tablets) and while i was searching through its BIOS, i noticed that it had the computrace option activated. After disabling it, i decided to try to put coreboot on it, only to find that its non-existent for my device. Although it says that its disabled, i dont trust it one bit. While it is a beautiful, fast and ultra-portable PC, it bothers me how there are no free alternatives for it. These types of devices are growing in numbers and will most likely continue on through the years.
All I ask of you is to try and make EFI alternatives to all these upcoming devices.
All of them? Possible but will probably cost you millions in workforce. If you really want coreboot on some devices that interest you, you'll have to back it up with either work(do port yourself) or money (hire someone, you can post a bounty)
-- coreboot mailing list: coreboot@coreboot.org http://www.coreboot.org/mailman/listinfo/coreboot
On Tuesday, February 18, 2014 12:21:38 AM amloerx@tfwno.gf wrote:
As a privacy and freedom oriented PC/Linux user, it scares me how modern day devices are becoming extremely proprietary. Companies are beginning to ship their laptops/tablets with proprietary EFI systems which have some nasty things in them. I recently purchased a Dell Venue 8 Pro(one of many upcoming 8" windows 8.1(x86) tablets) and while i was searching through its BIOS, i noticed that it had the computrace option activated
Well, it's your fault that this concern is growing. You bought a windows device. You paid microsoft to develop proprietary software, and you paid an IVB to develop proprietary firmware, instead of paying someone to develop free software and firmware for your device. The market is rich enough to allow you to make that choice.
All I ask of you is to try and make EFI alternatives to all these upcoming devices.
So, you paid someone to write firmware, which you neither trust nor like, but want me to do it for free?
If software/firmware freedom is important to you, then I suggest you return the device to the store -- assuming you have this option -- and purchase a device which offers you what you want.
Alex
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amloerx＠tfwno.gf -
mrnuke -
ron minnich -
Vladimir 'φ-coder/phcoder' Serbinenko