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Comment by zrm | Hacker News Reader

That isn't anything inherent to the CPU architecture. We could have ARM (or RISC-V) systems that you could install arbitrary operating systems onto.

The danger is that the transition to another architecture is used as an excuse to not do this, even for devices that have historically been open.

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"Danger" undersells it a bit - it's already happening, quite explicitly spelled out in Microsoft's legalese regarding Secure Boot. A lot of the Linux world was very afraid on the introduction of Secure Boot, as it was seen as the final anti-Linux coup-de-gras - Microsoft could, at their whim, simply turn off the ability to install Linux! This fear was widely mocked as hysterical. Now they have done exactly that, on all ARM devices that run Windows.

I firmly believe that this is their endgame on x86 too. The elevated Windows 11 hardware requirements had the effect of normalising hardware setups capable of end-to-end DRM, which is only a step to the side from Secure Boot restrictions.

Yeah I don't think it has much to do with security as it does securing hardware from competitors.

You can cast doubt on TPM/SecureBoot implementations with evidence, but it very much is real security controlled by the user with mokutil. We need more of this kind of security, that's controller by the user, if we're ever going to get away from locked bootloaders.

https://wiki.debian.org/SecureBoot

They give you the keys now. They could change that overnight if they mandate the same "Secure Boot only with a Microsoft key" that they mandated on early ARM devices. Don't be mistaken. They are very much the Don of x86, and when they choose to alter the deal, you'll be SOL.

That's why I consider alternative ecosystems (that don't have exorbitant prices) like RISC-V and Raspberry Pi to be critical to the survival of general-purpose computing. Once your ability to run on bare metal disappears (via Secure Boot or otherwise), you're in grave danger of simply not having physical hardware to convert new users.

I hope the regulations being discussed right now[1] pass and we can just call SecureBoot what it is instead of fearing what it might become (atleast on x86).

[1] https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/299...

Offtopic, but

> coup-de-gras

Is funny. Gras (pronounced gra) means fat(as in animal fat, not a fat panda), and the real saying is coup de grâce (pronounced gras and means grace). For some weird reason English speakers pronounce coup de grâce improperly, skipping the s sound at the end ( funnily it's usually the French language which cuts sounds), including in movies (like Kill Bill).

That's fair, english speakers often make fun when the French mutilate our language as well :)

Er, yes... the greasy coup... meant it all along!

A lot of people who have lived entirely in the x86 world are completely unaware that a single CPU architecture can have many, many, many different incompatible types of system architecture - x86 means a few sub-types of BIOS + UEFI-based PCs, while ARM, Power, etc have far more variance.

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