> The problem is that you cannot make a hard distinction between hardware and software. An Intel CPU simply isn't going to run without microcode, and having to

> The problem is that you cannot make a hard distinction between hardware and software. An Intel CPU simply isn't going to run without microcode, and having to get rid of microcode would easily set back chip design by a decade. Yes you can make the distinction, and no it doesn't require getting rid of the microcode: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37731829 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37731829 Simply put, if the microcode can be updated by the user or remotely by Intel, then it count as "software", and Intel should stop shipping it. But if those update are either impossible or require a factory recall, then it's "hardware", and Intel can happily continue to ship it. The same logic applies to the USB cable, and even FPGA: if the bitstream is locked into the NVCM, that's hardware. If it's merely written in the rewritable SPI flash, that's software. It's not a property of the bitstream itself, it's a property of how it is stored. Obviously the cost of micro-code bugs will sharply increase. That's kind of a feature though: now hardware vendors must be really careful.