Will Windows 8 PCs Shut the Door on Linux?
It seems safe to say that a sizable proportion of Linux PC users in the world today installed the free and open source operating system on hardware that originally came loaded with Windows. After all, while there are preloaded systems available, it often ends up being cheaper to buy a Windows PC and load Linux yourself.
Once Windows 8 starts shipping on PCs, however, that may no longer be possible. It turns out that a new feature included in the operating system in the name of security may also effectively make it impossible to load Linux on officially Windows 8-certified hardware.
“It’s probably not worth panicking yet,” wrote Red Hat developer Matthew Garrett in a Tuesday blog post on the topic. “But it is worth being concerned.”
http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/240347/will_windows_8_pcs_shut_the_door_on_linux.html
This makes me SICK, and I’m hoping that the technical higher-ups in companies such as Intel and AMD are paying attention. I have a friend who works for ASUS International who’s said that many computer engineers are discussing this as a takeover of the microprocessor and chipmaking processes by MS.
If this continues unabated, it would behoove any nascent manufacturers and engineering companies to develop UEFI chipsets specifically targeted at Linux and the open source communities.
I’ve already taken steps to ensure that my family is comfortable in a GUI Linux environment, because I refuse to continue feeding the beast that is MS and will not pay the outrageous prices for an Apple machine when I can install and functionally use most Linux distros on a 5-10 year old PC.
Windows 7 might be the last MS OS I use if they’re going to start with this proprietary chipset BS.