Without any comment from Lenovo or Microsoft this guy is speculating the same as everybody else.
Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
31–40 of 257 posts
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#32Also worth noting Lenovo's official statment on the matter http://www.techrepublic.com/article/lenovo-denies-deliberate... confirming that they have not blocked the installation of alternate operating systems. It was a shame to see the initial posts this morning hit the top of the page without any more evidence than a single customer support rep. who was unlikely to realistically have inside knowledge of some kind of…
The fact that it took a blow up in the media for Lenovo to comment justifies the tactics used by commenters in the forums.
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#33Also worth noting Lenovo's official statment on the matter http://www.techrepublic.com/article/lenovo-denies-deliberate... confirming that they have not blocked the installation of alternate operating systems. It was a shame to see the initial posts this morning hit the top of the page without any more evidence than a single customer support rep. who was unlikely to realistically have inside knowledge of some kind of…
Why should someone not consider the reply from a lenovo rep as legitimate (although absurd)? There was a problem and lenovo said that the problem was because of the signature edition windows. Your comment about requiring more evidence is valid but rebuttal requires some time, and here we have it. I doubt lenovo would have cared about it had it not hit media. Note that the problem is still not solved. You cannot insta…
A low level rep. from a company is very unlikely to be party to something considered "secret" at a corporate level. So given that it wasn't a stated policy, that side of the story just didn't seem likely.
Indeed you can't install linux on that machine, but that's a technical problem and a deficiency in Lenovo's setup, just not a conspiracy by Microsoft.
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#34Yeah, sure, Microsoft is now all white and fluffy. Best friends forever. How about we pay some attention to the second part of: Lenovo's firmware defaults to "RAID" mode and ** doesn't allow you to change that ** Power savings or not, but locking down storage controller to a mode that just happens to be supported by exactly one OS has NO obvious rational explanation. Either Lenovo does that or Windows does. This has…
Quote from the article: Why not offer the option to disable it? A user who does would end up with a machine that doesn't boot, and if they managed to figure that out they'd have worse power management. That increases support costs. For a consumer device, why would you want to? The number of people buying these laptops to run anything other than Windows is miniscule
Well, the minuscule group they just shat on is the same group of people who make purchasing decisions and recommendations for a ton of consumers. Even if someone doesn't run Linux, laptops that support it have often proven to be more reliable and have a higher resell value.
For everyone asking me what laptop they should buy, I'll be sure to let them know how disorganized and confused Lenovo support tends to be.
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#35Yeah, sure, Microsoft is now all white and fluffy. Best friends forever. How about we pay some attention to the second part of: Lenovo's firmware defaults to "RAID" mode and ** doesn't allow you to change that ** Power savings or not, but locking down storage controller to a mode that just happens to be supported by exactly one OS has NO obvious rational explanation. Either Lenovo does that or Windows does. This has…
Lenovo may have set power saving standards for the laptop based on what they want to market. It's Intel that dropped the ball here. They need to submit patches for RAID to upstream Linux. Or it could just be a firmware bug.
Wait, does RAID actually save power over AHCI (single-drive RAID)? If so, how?
For one thing, no benchmarks I've seen of nvme SSD has shown them to be significantly faster if the BIOS is set to RAID, but I've not heard any thing for or against the power savings benefits of it.
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
It was fascinating how quickly people condemned Microsoft without applying any critical thinking to the issue. I tend to not read commments on articles anymore, where Microsoft is blamed for something. Reminds me of Slahdot.
Well, when a Lenovo rep says: "This system has a Signature Edition of Windows 10 Home installed. It is locked per our agreement with Microsoft," it doesn't exactly require a bomb-throwing partisan to reach the conclusion.
But the idea that a random customer service rep. would have information about something that was not a public position of either Lenovo or Microsoft, to me, seemed unlikely.
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#37Their spin that it is "our super advanced Intel RAID chipset" really plays in their favor, given that their BIOS uses a single goto statement to intentionally block access to the ability to set this chipset into the AHCI compatible mode that the hardware so readily supports, as evidenced by the REing work and the fact that other OSes detect the drive after the AHCI fix using the custom-flashed BIOS.
So, why are they reluctant to just issue their band-aid patch to the BIOS -- after all, it's really the path of least resistance here?
Yes, there has been some deflection of blame here. The argument that every single OS except Windows 10 is at fault for not supporting this CRAZY new super advanced hardware doesn't make much sense.
"Linux (and all other operating systems) don't support X on Z because of Y" doesn't really apply when "Z modified Y in a way that does not allow support for X."
To state it more plainly, this "CRAZY new super advanced hardware" has a trivial backwards compatible mode that works with everything just fine, but it is blocked by Lenovo's BIOS.
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may be because people have a hard time trusting Lenovo now after being caught with backdoors multiple times over the past few years. http://www.geek.com/chips/spy-agencies-shun-lenovo-finding-b... http://thenextweb.com/insider/2015/02/19/lenovo-caught-insta... http://www.techworm.net/2015/08/lenovo-pcs-and-laptops-seem-... https://www.engadget.com/2016/07/04/critical-security-flaw-f...
I don't see it having much impact. People were attacking Microsoft, not Lenovo.
To be fair, signing an agreement like that wouldn't look good for Lenovo too. Considering Microsoft's history, it's also not that outlandish.
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#39Also worth noting Lenovo's official statment on the matter http://www.techrepublic.com/article/lenovo-denies-deliberate... confirming that they have not blocked the installation of alternate operating systems. It was a shame to see the initial posts this morning hit the top of the page without any more evidence than a single customer support rep. who was unlikely to realistically have inside knowledge of some kind of…
The fact that it took a blow up in the media for Lenovo to comment justifies the tactics used by commenters in the forums.
that's a view, but did anyone actually ask Lenovo for official comment before posting the story as gospel truth? From what I've read, I saw no evidence that they had. I'd just suggesting a slightly more measured approach might have worked just as well....
Re: Microsoft aren't forcing Lenovo to block free operating systems
#40Yeah, sure, Microsoft is now all white and fluffy. Best friends forever. How about we pay some attention to the second part of: Lenovo's firmware defaults to "RAID" mode and ** doesn't allow you to change that ** Power savings or not, but locking down storage controller to a mode that just happens to be supported by exactly one OS has NO obvious rational explanation. Either Lenovo does that or Windows does. This has…
Quote from the article: Why not offer the option to disable it? A user who does would end up with a machine that doesn't boot, and if they managed to figure that out they'd have worse power management. That increases support costs. For a consumer device, why would you want to? The number of people buying these laptops to run anything other than Windows is miniscule
Since when is it firmware's business to care about dumb users well-being and, more specifically, to disallow switching perfectly capable storage controller into standard AHCI mode?