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I find it quite interesting how they whitelisted their own Surface devices but not, say, Thinkpads, despite them having the same CPUs. [1] Surely there's no con

I find it quite interesting how they whitelisted their own Surface devices but not, say, Thinkpads, despite them having the same CPUs. [1] Surely there's no conflict of interest here. Could you explain in what way "DCH driver support" is a "hardware security mitigation" as you wrote? Moreover, doesn't basing this on "DCH driver support" basically let the hardware vendors decide which otherwise-capable CPUs they'd like to make obsolete through software updates? And furthermore, note that the OS isn't even turning on the CPU features they require by default, as the article also mentions. (I'm probably going to just leave it at this, but suffice it to say the evidence doesn't seem in their favor.) [1] https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-T400-T500-and-newer-T-series-Laptops/T470p-Intel-i7-7820HQ-Not-Compatible-With-windows-11/m-p/5153393 https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-T400-T500-and-newer-T-...

coder543 3y ago
> I find it quite interesting how they whitelisted their own Surface devices but not, say, Thinkpads, despite them having the same CPUs. [1] Surely there's no conflict of interest here. That statement seems misleading at best. According to Microsoft's page[0] on that processor, the Dell Precision 5520 is supported as well, which means this support is clearly not limited to Microsoft's own hardware. Depending on how Lenovo configured the BIOS, it is entirely possible that they disabled certain features that Microsoft deemed critical later on with Windows 11. Vendors do plenty of weird things with BIOSes, which can have far reaching impacts on what an operating system is able to do with the hardware. Or Lenovo didn't provide a necessary driver, or whatever the actual problem was here. Dell managed to meet the requirements just fine, apparently. Yes, obsoleting a bunch of hardware sucks, but your claim that this was to help Intel sell more chips is extremely dubious. Your claim that Microsoft isn't doing this for security reasons because they're exempting only their own hardware doesn't mesh with the reality of that Dell laptop. None of the evidence here supports some grand conspiracy here, as far as I can tell. I also found a forum thread[1] where at least one person was struggling to update their Surface Studio 2 to Windows 11, so even that hardly seems cut and dry. [0]: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/design/minimum/supported/supported-systems https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/design/mi... [1]: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/forum/all/windows-11-upgrade-fails-on-compatible-surface/f8632a17-b731-4625-ae4d-36ef6e4e04d4 https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/forum/all/window...
- dataflow 3y ago
  Any responses to the other things I listed? Like how DCH driver packaging is a hardware security mitigation? > Depending on BIOS settings, it is entirely possible "Entirely possible" is quite a big umbrella that covers planned obsolescence quite well, too. It's not like using software to make hardware obsolete is lacking in historical precedent. > There isn't some grand conspiracy here, as far as I can tell. Well, it's "entirely possible", as far as I can tell. Though I'm not even claiming there is one - there isn't a particular need for a conspiracy here. > I also found an entire forum thread[1] of people struggling to update a Surface Studio 2 to Windows 11, so even that hardly seems cut and dry. All of those comments were posted in the span of the first 4 days Windows 11 was officially released. If you dig a bit more you see people have succeeded afterward. [1] So that was most likely just a bug on their side, which isn't surprising given their own device was an edge case they were trying to make an exception for. [1] https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-11/windows-11-on-surface-studio-2/m-p/3164819/highlight/true#M2605 https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-11/windows-11...
  - coder543 3y ago
    > Any responses to the other things I listed? Like how DCH driver packaging is a hardware security mitigation? No, someone else responded to that. I was just here to look at a specific claim and see what your evidence showed. If that claim had been supported by the evidence, it would have been scandalous, but it wasn’t. I’m not an expert in the Windows security model, so I don’t claim to know anything about DCH drivers. If you're going to complain about people not responding to every single thing in your comments, then why didn't you respond to the main point I was making? The Dell laptop was supported as well. Clearly Dell put in the effort, where Lenovo did not. > Though I'm not even claiming there is one - there isn't a particular need for a conspiracy here. Your previous comments absolutely are making claims that there were large conspiracies at play. You claimed that Microsoft did this to help Intel sell more chips, which would be a huge conspiracy between Microsoft and Intel. Claiming that Microsoft lied about their reasons for obsoleting old processors by trying to present evidence that Microsoft wasn’t following their own stated reasons naturally also requires the existence of a significant conspiracy within Microsoft. Perhaps you didn’t mean to claim those things?
Hawxy 3y ago
> I find it quite interesting how they whitelisted their own Surface devices but not, say, Thinkpads, despite them having the same CPUs Because Lenovo did not bother writing DCH drivers, given DCH drivers are the baseline requirement. > Could you explain in what way "DCH driver support" is a "hardware security mitigation" as you wrote? I was recalling a 2 year old blog post in my head, but the point is still that much of the requirement is around baseline security. If you watch the video I linked, the speaker does go over all of this. > basically let hardware vendors decide which otherwise-capable CPUs they'd like to make obsolete through software updates? I'm not sure what you're getting at. DCH drivers were already the default for current-gen hardware _before_ W11 even came out, W11 just made it a requirement. Vendors clearly aren't going to go write some greenfield drivers for a years-old 6th gen intel product just to support W11, as those devices will be 10 years old by the time W10 support ends. > note that the OS isn't even turning on the CPU features they require by default Note that you're still referencing a blog post from 2021. W11 22H2 enables core isolation by default for new installations, and HVCI is enabled by default when using the Windows Enterprise security baseline. https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-security-baselines/windows-11-version-22h2-security-baseline/ba-p/3632520 https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-security-ba...
- dataflow 3y ago
  > If you watch the video I linked I have in fact. It's a nice talk about security in Windows 11, but I haven't seen anything in it answering these issues. He says absolutely nothing about DCH and doesn't give any explanation for the minimum hardware requirements. The closest I recall was he was mentioned of integrating Pluton on chip and making its firmware directly updatable, but I don't believe for example that the 7820HQ and the 7700HQ are any different with regards to Pluton. > I'm not sure what you're getting at. DCH drivers were already the default for current-gen hardware _before_ W11 even came out, W11 just made it a requirement. No, they didn't even make DCH a requirement; Windows 11 runs with standard drivers too. [1] And, again, DCH doesn't imply anything about hardware security mitigations, which was purportedly their reason for this. > Note that you're still referencing a blog post from 2021. W11 22H2 enables core isolation by default for new installations, and HVCI is enabled by default when using the Windows Enterprise security baseline. Because the situation is fundamentally the same since 2021. Core isolation support is not a distinguishing feature between (say) the 7700HQ and 7820HQ, as far as I know. And the Windows Enterprise security baseline seems kind of irrelevant for the millions of average consumer devices out there. A company that cares about consumers or the environment is telling consumers across the planet to turn perfectly good devices into electronic trash now because they might add something that helps security years later? I'm going to let my comments rest here; people draw their own conclusions. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows11/comments/pr4kmr/why_is_windows_11_still_force_installing_the/hdgp8z0/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows11/comments/pr4kmr/why_is_wi...

coder543 3y ago

> I find it quite interesting how they whitelisted their own Surface devices but not, say, Thinkpads, despite them having the same CPUs. [1] Surely there's no conflict of interest here. That statement seems misleading at best. According to Microsoft's page[0] on that processor, the Dell Precision 5520 is supported as well, which means this support is clearly not limited to Microsoft's own hardware. Depending on how Lenovo configured the BIOS, it is entirely possible that they disabled certain features that Microsoft deemed critical later on with Windows 11. Vendors do plenty of weird things with BIOSes, which can have far reaching impacts on what an operating system is able to do with the hardware. Or Lenovo didn't provide a necessary driver, or whatever the actual problem was here. Dell managed to meet the requirements just fine, apparently. Yes, obsoleting a bunch of hardware sucks, but your claim that this was to help Intel sell more chips is extremely dubious. Your claim that Microsoft isn't doing this for security reasons because they're exempting only their own hardware doesn't mesh with the reality of that Dell laptop. None of the evidence here supports some grand conspiracy here, as far as I can tell. I also found a forum thread[1] where at least one person was struggling to update their Surface Studio 2 to Windows 11, so even that hardly seems cut and dry. [0]: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/design/minimum/supported/supported-systems https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/design/mi... [1]: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/forum/all/windows-11-upgrade-fails-on-compatible-surface/f8632a17-b731-4625-ae4d-36ef6e4e04d4 https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/forum/all/window...

dataflow 3y ago
Any responses to the other things I listed? Like how DCH driver packaging is a hardware security mitigation? > Depending on BIOS settings, it is entirely possible "Entirely possible" is quite a big umbrella that covers planned obsolescence quite well, too. It's not like using software to make hardware obsolete is lacking in historical precedent. > There isn't some grand conspiracy here, as far as I can tell. Well, it's "entirely possible", as far as I can tell. Though I'm not even claiming there is one - there isn't a particular need for a conspiracy here. > I also found an entire forum thread[1] of people struggling to update a Surface Studio 2 to Windows 11, so even that hardly seems cut and dry. All of those comments were posted in the span of the first 4 days Windows 11 was officially released. If you dig a bit more you see people have succeeded afterward. [1] So that was most likely just a bug on their side, which isn't surprising given their own device was an edge case they were trying to make an exception for. [1] https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-11/windows-11-on-surface-studio-2/m-p/3164819/highlight/true#M2605 https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-11/windows-11...
- coder543 3y ago
  > Any responses to the other things I listed? Like how DCH driver packaging is a hardware security mitigation? No, someone else responded to that. I was just here to look at a specific claim and see what your evidence showed. If that claim had been supported by the evidence, it would have been scandalous, but it wasn’t. I’m not an expert in the Windows security model, so I don’t claim to know anything about DCH drivers. If you're going to complain about people not responding to every single thing in your comments, then why didn't you respond to the main point I was making? The Dell laptop was supported as well. Clearly Dell put in the effort, where Lenovo did not. > Though I'm not even claiming there is one - there isn't a particular need for a conspiracy here. Your previous comments absolutely are making claims that there were large conspiracies at play. You claimed that Microsoft did this to help Intel sell more chips, which would be a huge conspiracy between Microsoft and Intel. Claiming that Microsoft lied about their reasons for obsoleting old processors by trying to present evidence that Microsoft wasn’t following their own stated reasons naturally also requires the existence of a significant conspiracy within Microsoft. Perhaps you didn’t mean to claim those things?

Hawxy 3y ago

> I find it quite interesting how they whitelisted their own Surface devices but not, say, Thinkpads, despite them having the same CPUs Because Lenovo did not bother writing DCH drivers, given DCH drivers are the baseline requirement. > Could you explain in what way "DCH driver support" is a "hardware security mitigation" as you wrote? I was recalling a 2 year old blog post in my head, but the point is still that much of the requirement is around baseline security. If you watch the video I linked, the speaker does go over all of this. > basically let hardware vendors decide which otherwise-capable CPUs they'd like to make obsolete through software updates? I'm not sure what you're getting at. DCH drivers were already the default for current-gen hardware _before_ W11 even came out, W11 just made it a requirement. Vendors clearly aren't going to go write some greenfield drivers for a years-old 6th gen intel product just to support W11, as those devices will be 10 years old by the time W10 support ends. > note that the OS isn't even turning on the CPU features they require by default Note that you're still referencing a blog post from 2021. W11 22H2 enables core isolation by default for new installations, and HVCI is enabled by default when using the Windows Enterprise security baseline. https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-security-baselines/windows-11-version-22h2-security-baseline/ba-p/3632520 https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-security-ba...

dataflow 3y ago
> If you watch the video I linked I have in fact. It's a nice talk about security in Windows 11, but I haven't seen anything in it answering these issues. He says absolutely nothing about DCH and doesn't give any explanation for the minimum hardware requirements. The closest I recall was he was mentioned of integrating Pluton on chip and making its firmware directly updatable, but I don't believe for example that the 7820HQ and the 7700HQ are any different with regards to Pluton. > I'm not sure what you're getting at. DCH drivers were already the default for current-gen hardware _before_ W11 even came out, W11 just made it a requirement. No, they didn't even make DCH a requirement; Windows 11 runs with standard drivers too. [1] And, again, DCH doesn't imply anything about hardware security mitigations, which was purportedly their reason for this. > Note that you're still referencing a blog post from 2021. W11 22H2 enables core isolation by default for new installations, and HVCI is enabled by default when using the Windows Enterprise security baseline. Because the situation is fundamentally the same since 2021. Core isolation support is not a distinguishing feature between (say) the 7700HQ and 7820HQ, as far as I know. And the Windows Enterprise security baseline seems kind of irrelevant for the millions of average consumer devices out there. A company that cares about consumers or the environment is telling consumers across the planet to turn perfectly good devices into electronic trash now because they might add something that helps security years later? I'm going to let my comments rest here; people draw their own conclusions. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows11/comments/pr4kmr/why_is_windows_11_still_force_installing_the/hdgp8z0/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows11/comments/pr4kmr/why_is_wi...