OT Has w7 slowed down recently

J G Miller wrote:

Should Samsung stop distributing firmware upgrades to prevent
people from changing firmware and even going so far as to
prevent downgrading back to older firmware to make changing
firmware possible?

What on earth are you on about? I don't care what Samsung do; why
would I? I just want their tellies to work great.

My point was that if Jim is arguing from principle, then he should be
equally vociferous about not being able to swap the OS in his telly for
some other.

Because for most people it's the same thing: their computer, their
mobile phone, and their telly - all are just appliances that do a job.

Why does Jim select computers to make a stand on, whilst not
complaining about being unable to install Linux or RO on his telly?

--
SteveT

J G Miller wrote:

It is irrelevant how important to how few people something is,
whether ot not it is important in principle.

I'm trying to work out where Jim's "principle" comes from. What basis
does he have to support his argument that it is wrong in principle to
lock a computer to a particular OS?

Who says it is? Where does this principle actualy come from? What
authority does it have?

If only a tiny minority of people care about it, then it sounds a lot
more like a personal opinion than a principle. And in that case, it
has no weight at all.

--
SteveT

On Mon, 14 May 2012 20:56:16 +0100, Steve Thackery
wrote:

J G Miller wrote:

It is irrelevant how important to how few people something is,
whether ot not it is important in principle.

I'm trying to work out where Jim's "principle" comes from. What basis
does he have to support his argument that it is wrong in principle to
lock a computer to a particular OS?

Who says it is? Where does this principle actualy come from? What
authority does it have?

I presume it comes from the original open design of the PC
architecture, which was released to the world by IBM on that basis. It
seems to me that locking the PC into one particular OS violates that
priniciple of open architecture.

If only a tiny minority of people care about it, then it sounds a lot
more like a personal opinion than a principle. And in that case, it
has no weight at all.

I think I have to agree with J G M here, a principle is something that
is right or wrong, regardless of the numbers of people involved.
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On Mon, 14 May 2012 20:53:34 +0100, Steve Thackery
wrote:

J G Miller wrote:

Should Samsung stop distributing firmware upgrades to prevent
people from changing firmware and even going so far as to
prevent downgrading back to older firmware to make changing
firmware possible?

What on earth are you on about? I don't care what Samsung do; why
would I? I just want their tellies to work great.

But what if you discovered, say, that their tellies work great from
the inbuilt tuners or a STB, but didn't work so well from internet
streaming. Then you discover that someone has hacked the firmware to
make the internet streaming work properly. What are you going to do?
Not install the non-OEM improved firmware just because it's non-OEM?

My point was that if Jim is arguing from principle, then he should be
equally vociferous about not being able to swap the OS in his telly for
some other.

Well, I haven't tried it with a telly, yet, but my satellite decoder
is running my own bugfix of the standard firmware, and my wireless
router is not running the original firmware either, because the free
replacements on the web are so much better. I've also unlocked my
Netgear Stora device and got it to run NFS, so that periodically I can
back-up the recordings made by said satellite decoder to it.

Because for most people it's the same thing: their computer, their
mobile phone, and their telly - all are just appliances that do a job.

But the great thing about open systems is that you can often get them
to do the job better, or get them to do other jobs as well.

Why does Jim select computers to make a stand on, whilst not
complaining about being unable to install Linux or RO on his telly?

Probably because his telly is already running a flavour of Linux
anyway!
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Steve Thackery wrote:

If only a tiny minority of people care about it, then it sounds a lot
more like a personal opinion than a principle. And in that case, it has
no weight at all.

No no no! This is Jim's personal opinion...

Bill

On Mon, 14 May 2012 20:53:34 +0100, Steve Thackery
wrote:

Why does Jim select computers to make a stand on, whilst not
complaining about being unable to install Linux or RO on his telly?

Because, you clueless halfwit, a PC has always been a general purpose
device that the USER can decide what it does, not the manufacturer.

Micro$oft now want to force you to run M$ operating systems on all new
hardware. Not only that, I shouldn't wonder that they want to force you
to run M$ only apps. on "their" computers.
Once they've got you by the balls, they'll start squeezing even more
and charge you for running apps. you rent from them on the OS you
rent from then on the (what used to be) general purpose computer you
have laid out good money to buy.

Do you get it yet?

Paul Ratcliffe wrote:

Because, you clueless halfwit, a PC has always been a general purpose
device that the USER can decide what it does, not the manufacturer.

Agreed.

Micro$oft now want to force you to run M$ operating systems on all new
hardware. Not only that, I shouldn't wonder that they want to force you
to run M$ only apps. on "their" computers.
Once they've got you by the balls, they'll start squeezing even more
and charge you for running apps. you rent from them on the OS you
rent from then on the (what used to be) general purpose computer you
have laid out good money to buy.

But there's the rub: everything you've just said is pure conjecture
with no evidence to support it. The only case where MS appears to
require mandatory secure boot is on W8 ARM devices.

And these are *not* PCs! ARM will NOT run x86 code, so they won't run
any of the millions of Windows applications out there. They won't run
any OS prior to W8. At the moment, this has nothing to do with PCs.

However, IF Microsoft were ever mad enough to require secure boot with
no option to switch it off on normal Intel x86-based PCs, then I'd be
at the front of the campaign to change it, alongside Jim and yourself.

Until then, we're talking about gadgets - mobile phones and tablets.
Windows-based gadgets have never been sold on a basis of a general
purpose, open architecture. They all are designed to provide a
specific function. (Notwithstanding that some can be hacked, of
course.)

Do you get it yet?

Frankly I rather think I'm somewhat ahead of you. You are upsetting
yourself over an imaginary situation; I will wait until I see some
actual facts.

--
SteveT

Roderick Stewart wrote:

I have a jaundiced view of anything I would be expected to pay for if
something equivalent is available free of charge.

I think this is about risk assessment. If your assessment of the risk
is higher than mine, then it makes sense to pay money for better
protection.

I assess the risk to be pretty low, so I'm happy to trust Security
Essentials combined with the standard in-built firewall.

--
SteveT

Steve Thackery wrote:

But there's the rub: everything you've just said is pure conjecture with
no evidence to support it. The only case where MS appears to require
mandatory secure boot is on W8 ARM devices.

I've just looked at the Windows 8 Hardware Certification Requirements,
that seems to be true.

There's all manner of requirements for mandatory support for UEFI secure
boot and its non-circumvention when enabled, but there's equally a
requirement that it can be disabled by a physically present user, except
on ARM where it must not be allowed to be disabled.

I still don't see how they can justify preventing the owner having this
choice on ARM hardware.

In article , Steve Thackery
wrote:
Jim Lesurf wrote:

Although I would be happier with one where the code was all open
source and to save the millions of pounds per year we export to the
USA for commercial OSs.

Yeah, but let's be fair about this: it's Americans who wrote all our
most popular operating systems (Windows, Linux, OS X, Android).

Not quite. Many people outside the USA contribute to both the Linux kernel
and the many packages that come as part os a distro, etc. I'd be surprised
if there weren't also *some* non-US citizens contributing to the other OSs.

(I should have written "Linux" in quotation marks, because a Linux
distro is vastly more than just the kernel, obviously.)

Indeed. Hence some of the reason for my comments above.

Slainte,

Jim

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