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Apple's New Proprietary Software Locks Kill Independent Repair On New MacBook Pros (vice.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: Apple has introduced software locks that will effectively prevent independent and third-party repair on 2018 MacBook Pro computers, according to internal Apple documents obtained by Motherboard. The new system will render the computer "inoperative" unless a proprietary Apple "system configuration" software is run after parts of the system are replaced. According to the document, which was distributed to Apple's Authorized Service Providers late last month, this policy will apply to all Apple computers with the "T2" security chip, which is present in 2018 MacBook Pros as well as the iMac Pro. The software lock will kick in for any repair which involves replacing a MacBook Pro's display assembly, logic board, top case (the keyboard, touchpad, and internal housing), and Touch ID board. On iMac Pros, it will kick in if the Logic Board or flash storage are replaced. The computer will only begin functioning again after Apple or a member of one of Apple's Authorized Service Provider repair program runs diagnostic software called Apple Service Toolkit 2.
Why should anybody be surprised? It's Apple.
Vote with your dollars. Android is better anyway and you get a whole lot more for your money.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
Right to repair laws can't come soon enough.
They're still not evil, right? At least not really evil?
did no one read about the chinese compromise of the supremicro motherboards? and now people are upset that a vendor requires certified parts?
Please... I'd pay extra for that gladly.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Proprietary.
These screwballs will never learn.
Pardon me, my iPhone is ringing.....
All the proprietary hardware, software, and spyware you'll ever need pre-loaded and ready to serve you.
It will be very common down the road to match all the serial numbers on hardware for security reasons. With that said apple better provide a solution for this
Sounds like a feature, anyone messes with my new laptop, I'll know about it.
Easy to use, out of the box security.
Seriously though, if this was an optional thing, it would actually be pretty cool
"Thank you sir! May I have another?"
Most commodity computers can have parts replaced even when the manufacturer no longer supports them officially. The new Macbook Pro? Apple can just say that "our cloud software no longer supports computers over a certain age." Voila! Your laptop becomes a brick if it needs any sort of minor repair (keyboard or LCD are minor for any well-designed laptop).
Bonus points if your laptop breaks in a developing country where the nearest "authorized" repair place is 1000 miles away. Piss on Steve Jobs' grave for pioneering the model of computing as a prison. Screw Tim Cook for perpetuating it and making it worse.
Anyone with more than 2 brain cells to rub together wouldn't by a defective Apple product like these.
If you can't fix it yourself, then you don't own it.
Sorry Apple, not gonna buy it, wouldn't be prudent, at this junc-TURE..
Apple fills their product line with enough junk not fit for me to buy, they will end up with nothing I will be willing to buy. I am confident I am not alone in this.
Apple could require the use of Apple Service Toolkit 2 ONLY until the warranty ended and then get rid of the requirement for the use of Apple Service Toolkit 2 after the warranty ended.
The customer would not be "hurt" by Apple making sure the computer was only repaired by Apple while the warranty was in effect, when the repair was going to be free of charge, and after the warranty ends, removal of the requirement for the use of Apple Service Toolkit 2 would allow the owner of the laptop to choose any repair service.
Car makers will void a warranty if improper parts are installed in a car during the period in which the warranty is in effect. It is not yet clear but Apple may actually be trying to implement a similar scheme.
Postscript : I am more disgusted than many people by Apple's recent antics with hardware design. The removal of the MagSafe connector, the absence of a headphone jack, and numerous other things have got me wondering if I will buy anything from Apple ever again. But at the same time I think it is sensible to consider that not everything Apple does is necessarily part of a plot to fuck the consumer. I honestly don't think Apple is clever enough to always be planning some Machiavellian scheme. If Apple was that clever, they would be doing things better than they have been for a few years now, rather than selling hardware which has obviously been massaged by the "product cheapening department" during the design phase.
I guess since Apple is selling less computers these days*, they have to squeeze more money out of their customers.
*https://www.macrumors.com/2018/08/01/fewest-quarterly-mac-sales-since-2010/
...and I never will be.
I do not belong to the church of the lowercase 'i'
... that I had purchased to sample the Apple environment --- Apple seems to be interested only in getting as many people as possible onto the hardware upgrade treadmill. Apple stopped supporting my Macmini relatively quickly. The solution was to purchase a new Macmini.
.
I had been using the Macmini as a test bed to see if I wanted to convert my home computing environment from Microsoft to Apple. In hindsight I am happy that I did not spend more to get the MacPro that my friend was pushing.
My experience from using the Macmini was that, even though it was supported briefly, it was one of a lock-in. Those who speak of Apple's walled garden are correct, in my experience.
I am beginning to think that Apple's comments about "we protect your privacy" are more about how Apple has you locked in, than anything else.
Eagerly anticipating Louis Rossman's response to this
Two months before he could have turned 56, Skinny Ennis choked to death on a bone while eating dinner at a restaurant in Beverly Hills in 1963. He was survived by his ex-wife, Carmene, and a son, Christopher
Mac pro is dead unless apple does not add T2 to it and even then it's the end of the road for corp use
Right to repair will force apple to give this software out to 3rd party shops.
Not good enough unless it's made available to all OWNERS. If you bought it, you should be allowed to fix it.
Apple users obviously don't object to proprietary walled gardens else they wouldn't be buying Apple products. This is just a few more bricks on top of the garden wall and I would expect it to be celebrated.
Why is there an "insightful" mod and why isn't it "-1"? If I wanted insight, I wouldn't be reading
This has to be the most lowlife, underhanded, ill-thought scheme I've seen from them yet. The eighthwit (they don't have enough wits to be a halfwit) who thought of this needs to be fired and replaced with someone who has a sense of decency.
Just because Krita is freely available and distributable doesn't mean SOMEBODY isn't paying the bills. Make sure it is you if you are able, or else you might be less happy with the software someday when a company with big pockets coopts the development process, or one of the key authors gets tired of doing it for a pittance.
Having said that, you will have invested a lot less to make most open source software better than proprietary given time and qualified and motivated developers. And nowadays there are plenty of them working on open source.
My little toenail has more journalistic integrity than the entire Vice organization.
Fuck Apple. Fuck SuperMicro, Fuck John Deere, and Fuck any company that locks you out of the product you fucking paid for. I refuse to believe that we're slowly becoming a nation state controlled by trolls whom decide what's best for all of us. Just buying different products is not enough here. We need to vote differently and think differently about how to combat these issues.
The drafters of the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act wouldn't like this at all. They did not, however, make illegal. The Act, in 15 USC 2302 (C), says that the WARRANTY may not be conditioned on using Apple-branded parts. They can't (and don't) void the warranty if you use unauthorized parts. Here's the text of the statute:
https://www.law.cornell.edu/us...
The people who wrote that might wish that they had written "also, you can't arrange for the product to stop working when unauthorized parts are installed", but they didn't write that. Maybe a lawmaker should write that now.
It's possibly unlawful under other laws. There are quite a few different unfair competition laws and some may apply.
Ever since 'Apple;' ILLEGALLY stole the name Apple (it belongs to the Beatles), then paid after the fact to only use it for business activities that did not clash with the real Apple company (which was mostly into music- no suprise), then illegally renaged on that promise and paid again after the fact, Apple computers has been a 100% scumbag company aimed at brainless hipsters (the remaining regulars on this site).
Apple was the first FAUX 'social justice' American new tech giant and led the path for Google, Facebook et al to follow. The measure of a Man can be truly witnessed in his character, and the character of Apple Computers (Jobs AND Woz) is well established.
Apple's greatest crime and perfect Orwellian act was introducinjg the concept of a 'WALLED GARDEN' for the only software you can use on Apple products. Even the politics of the user is a matter for Apple, as the recent bans on the Apple store prove beyond all doubt.
Apple sets the tone (by absolute design and intent) for authoritarian regimes across the planet to copy in their own communication industries and products. If 'laid back' Apple can choose what political pundits its users can follow, every control freak in every land can say to its sheeple- see our new 'fake news' laws are for the 'greater good'.
Sheeple (like the morons who think zi-onist Slashdot an 'honest' broker) barely notice events like the (zi-onist ultra West friendly) Egyptian regime imprisoning female activists for exposing the sickening harassment endemic in that nation's culture (it is NEVER mentioned on outlets like Slashdot that the rate of an extreme version of FGM is astonishing across all groups in Egypt- go google it).
Apple pretends its censorship has tpo do with a 'social justice' ideology, while Apple supports the most vile anti-gay anti-female regimes on the Earth, as does Obama, Clinton, Blair, Macron, Merkel et al. They know the dumb dumb sheeple who buy Apple crap in the West in general have a world view formed by MSM headlines only. Today on Slashdot you have your usual 'five minutes of hate' aimed at Russia with zero coverage of Cameron's (ex-UK-prime minister) permission to british security agents to torture and mass murder in their operations across the globe (british police deep infiltration agents actually r-aped women in the protest groups they infiltrated- the fallout from this is still ongoing, but never gets headlines in fake news outlets like Slashdot).
The SJW movement is a stalinist, maosist operation to the max. Authoritarian to the max. Described perfectly in Orwell's Animal Farm. The owners of Slashdot think YOU, dear reader, are so thick you'll fall for it once again. The greatest act of concentrated mass murder in Human History, and the worst act of evil during WW2, was the dropping of two types of nuclear warheads on civilians in Japan, for the purpose of pure scientific investigation. The monsters that rule the West didn't hesitate for one second to end the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocents, and ruin the lives of just as many, in order to seek to perfect their understanding of the capability of their new weapons. All formally approved SJW movements, leaders and companies are joined at the hip to the monsters who directly descend from those who nuked Japan.
When Apple, Facebook, Twitter and so on ban 'wrong think' political people, the people banned all have one thing in common. They encourage followers to question statist corporations, media groups and personalities. Now in whose interest is this silencing taking place? Apple knows its place in the scheme of things, so the authoritian vileness even leaks into things like post sale repair policies. This is a known psychology of authoritarianism.
Oh really? Care to enlighten us on what kernel it's running? Android isn't GNU/Linux, but Android is absolutely Linux. Idiot.
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/apple-is-being-sued-by-australian-regulators-for-forcing-people-to-use-its-repair-service-2017-4
Warranty claims cannot be rubbed out in Australia.
The ACCC seems not to know forced hand repair or supply of parts is also illegal.
I am sure Apples legal defence will say Apple(Ireland) sells to Apple*Caymans?) who sells to Apple(Australia) who sells to Apple(Tied vertical operations) who sells to Apple(Authorised service) who by are completely independent legal entities with no 'Arms length' connections, thus is not a sole repairer, will be one line of argument.
India and China may also resent this this. China certainly took some car dealers to town for blatant over charging in the spares department.
Several years ago I had a thinkpad that had become infested with ants. I used a blow dryer to heat up the computer a little (while it was off) to make the ants want to leave. I left the blow dryer over the keyboard too long and melted the keys off.
Bought a keyboard online for 30 dollars and replaced the old one in five minutes. This wouldn't have been possible with this new MacBook. Sad.
"What lies behind us, and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us." Ralph Waldo Emerson
Louis Rossman should have some entertaining videos about this. I'mma make some popcorn...
Should Apple win its arguments, IRS, and EU and worldwide taxation entities will now have proof/indications of arms length connections if this software does not travel wider.
If Apple obscurant the software with sole licencing of some such rubbish, Tax authorities can argue afresh these creations were made to avoid tax - and whack Apple or at least review things again.
...and Apple Service Toolkit 2 will show up on all Torrent sites soon after, completely negating this 'security' 'feature'.
Just say Apple while holding your tongue.
What we are seeing right now is a horribly misinformed troll. Either too stupid to check Wikipedia for Android, or just really angry that Android is Linux.
Neither am i.
Oh shit.
This sounds like it's basically the same as those "warranty void if removed" stickers that the FTC was telling everyone are unenforceable. It also has anti-competitive implications, since you literally have a company bricking devices unless you go to one of their "authorized" stores. That is just a modern equivalent of the classic shakedown racket. It's only a matter of time before they just do away with the authorized service providers in general.
Android and Linux are not interchangeable. If you don't know that, and don't understand how they're entirely different, you're a moron. Keep denying it, dig deeper Kavanaugh.
My organization has a fleet of apple computers that we are actively maintaining. The systems we have in service today are about 2-3 years old and we are _not_ replacing them with Apple products entirely because they are not serviceable.
Apple is in the wealth management business now. The designer computers they sell are just fancy toys. Do not buy them.
They are. You can use the terminal, install busybox and run Linux commands on Android with the right bits of software. All the /dev, /proc and /sys files are on Android too.
please don't reproduce
how is it legal for apple to brick my device for repairing it myself.... time for a lawsuit
did no one read about the chinese compromise of the supremicro motherboards? and now people are upset that a vendor requires certified parts?
If they were worried about security then it would only need to alert the user if non-Apple parts are added. Refusing to run even if something is replaced by another Apple part suggests very strongly that the motive is nothing to do with security.
That will not work. The reflash will require a cryptographic signature only obtained by querying an Apple server, and that can't be hacked short of stealing private key from Apple.
If you're an engineer, and you work for Apple, and you specifically work on this, then... ... kill yourself.
No, really. Kill yourself. Sometimes suicide really is the answer.
Do it for humanity.
So I guess the license is the same also, as well as the proprietary blobs...
Is multiple leaked copies so they can be analyzed and stripped together, and as someone else said a gsx account, which means someone hacking and inserting a few extra without anyone doing an audit noticing.
I imagine apple keeps the master keys on a server somewhere and only sends out authorization hashes or private signed data to trigger the part update. Pretty stinky either way and exactly why my computers have been staying older Intel and then AMD. Now, other than migrating to 'unlocked' arm sbcs or the new Talos boards, I have to assume my computers aren't mind anymore.
Seriously are you not the owner of your own equipment anymore?
I can understand them having a bios level warning that can be disabled for this kind of thing. Similar to how you can put a machine into secure boot mode or disable it if you want.
But outright blocking the machine from operating with no "I understand the risk click OK to continue" type of thing is complete anti consumer BS.
What is the point of this? Do they really think it's a long term benefit to their customers?
"You can use the terminal, install busybox and run Linux commands on Android with the right bits of software." - So that makes it Linux? You can do that on Windows since Cygwin forever.
That doesn't make Windows Linux either just because you install Cygwin.
In Capitalist West right to repair taken away from you.
In Soviet Union BK0010-01 approved for you.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
But Cygwin is not Linux.
The machines are already not the most appealing to start with, but this is such a new low disqualifying them entirely for me. Sad. One could already not even swap the SSD anymore at the last gen machines: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... Don't support, don't buy!
Fucking hell. This has gone from "Apples stuff is hard to repair because of wonky design decsions" to straight up malevolence.
I've been using Macs since Vista completely murdered my will to use windows ever again. New laptop, constant blue screens of death on "Certified for Vista" laptop. After being told I had to pay $100+ to upgrade back to XP I threw the towel in and got me big desktop imac and then later a mac laptop. It had unixy underbelly so my BSD background fit right in, it just seemed to work really well, and once I got over the slight behavioral differences (command-C vs Ctrl-C, menu on top etc) it was a system I really enjoyed working with. Ended up with an iPhone too to cash in on the new iPhone dev stuff (I was formerly a Symbian dev, hell on earth). I was the model of an Apple Fanboy. Shit Apple where so good to me that when a fucked up contract that was about to land me in court was caused by app store delays I actully emailed Steve Jobs, and he *fucking emailed me back* and put his personal assistant in charge of getting my shit through the store. Thats how great apple used to be.
But man, modern Apple sucks. My last apple purchase was a 2017 macbook pro to finally replace the trust 2011 MBP, the keyboard *sucked*, it only had those whack thunderbolt-3/USB-C ports which I had precisely zero perhipherals for and all the adaptors where ridiculously expensive and kinda unrelaible, and when I accidently dropped it and cracked the screen apple quoted me well over $1K to repair it.
So I ended up taking it to a third party indian repair dude who fixed it for $400. Not a great job, but at least I could afford it.
Also someone then broke into my house and stole the laptop. Admitedly I can't pin that one on Apple (I think?!).
Heres the thing. Without that cheapo unauthorized repair, I'd have been stuffed. With a nearly brand new laptop, unable to be used.
Apple want to take THAT away too?
Maybe its time I just swallowed my pride and built myself a Linux/Windows dual-booter.
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
Oh really? Care to enlighten us on what kernel it's running? Android isn't GNU/Linux, but Android is absolutely Linux.
Nope. Android is hosted on the Linux kernel. Linux is not part of the user experience, its not even part of the software development experience for 75% of Android developers. If google replaced Linux with their Fucha kernel it would be a non-event for all but a few.
But Cygwin is not Linux.
Fine, the Windows Subsystem for Linux lets you instal Ubuntu, Debian, Suse, Kali, etc from the Microsoft store.
What the hell happens to your hardware when you replace it with the newest latest "iShiny(tm)(r)(c)" 12-24 months down the line, because the church^H because the WWDC showed a slightly new iteration ?
Usually you hand it out to friends or sell it 2nd hand on ebay/craiglist, etc.
5 years down the line, after several owner changes, the hardware might find its path to some 3rd world country.
To you, a 5-7 years old computer is an old piece of junk that's worthless.
To a developing country : it's still pretty much valuable, and you can get pretty much cheap as nobody else is considering (or for free through some charity, donated old hardware, etc.)
And as long as you keep repairing and servicing it to make it operational, you could still use it a couple of years more.
In addition to shoddy build quality, this software lock is yet another nail on the coffin.
Yet another thing that will make it less likely to find a 2nd hand use.
----
That and there might be rich westerner people traveling to developed world. But given their budget, they'll probably just settle for something more sturdy and easy to repair than Crapple
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Not a photo editor.
If you draw and paint, you use the above. If you edit pictures, you use Photoshop.
And yes, Krita is pretty cool. I must say I haven't had the chance to try Painter X though. It looks very sweet though.
You're delusional, if you think, "certified" does not mean compromised.
After all that battling with Apple refusing to unlock iPhones, do you really think they don't just went straight up to Apple with a national security letter, and as a result, "certified" implies compromised?
Frankly, there is likely no such thing as an uncompromised system (eg via the IME), and the TLAs only keep bitching because their right tentacle does not know what their even more right tentacle does.
And if I am compromised, then at least I want it to not be by my "own" government. (Aka dictators that actually have control over me.)
From a security perspective, I'm quite fond of the fact that nobody can open my notebook in the hotel room while I'm at dinner and install something malicious. If this is done well, it could obsolete a whole lot of hardware-based threats.
There is the "right to repair" angle as well and I agree with that. There's just two perspectives.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
1. The instructions will include "Do not let it connect to the Internet" or "Our tool will first run the local server to fake Apple server availability, and then the tool. Fooling it into thinking Apple's verification/snitching server is available."
2. How could the tool even tell that is was "leaked"? It's not like you couldn't do the same things that the "authorized" user is told to do.
3. Even if it snitched... It's still leaked. And one can still get the changed new post-compromise version.
Sorry... it's snake oil. It can never work. Like any DRM. It simply contradicts the basic laws of nature.
Whatever case you can possibly imagine, I can give you one, where your trick doesn't work.
In any case, the tool is only a list of commands, and a bit of attached data. And the instructions for how to read the data must, by definition, be in the list of commands. ... Go ahead. Try to move without him knowing.
And in any case, that list will be executed on the CPU exactly in the way the owner of that CPU wants it to. There is a license check in there? replace it by a NOP. or JMP over the CMP. There is snitching code in there? Ditto. It's as silly as trying to break out of a prison, when the prison owner can not only read your mind in complete perfection, but took the brain out of your body, and sits between the neurons connecting your brain to the rest of your body.
I used to buy Mac's but haven't in years given their snobbish attitude towards everything and the inability to perform any upgrades or even access to clean fans and stuff is ridiculously difficult. Its no wonder Mac sales are going down the toilet.
Or do you think there is a case where a warranty does not cover it not working anymore because of actions done by the manufacturer? Like the products being defective by design.
And yes, non-repairability is a a defect. In this case, it even is deliberate and intentional non-repairability. With Apple themselves openly admitting it.
Maybe the laws are nuts in the US, and Apple would get through with it. But the EU would rip them a new asshole. (Sup dawg, I heard yo like assholes...) ... Yeah, maybe I waste my time a bit. But it's on my way anyway, and it's fun to teach them a lesson. Cause they can't do shit about it, even if they struggle like motherfuckers, every time. It's so funny to see, if you don't give a single fuck. :)
(In the EU, ALL products have two years of warranty. Full stop. I own a shitty products that breaks every couple of weeks, and every couple of weeks I go back to the store, and have it fuckin' replaced. Until it stays working, or they decide to just give me my money back [and maybe damages too]. Even if they stopped selling it long ago.
Linux is not part of the user experience
Maybe fast and reliable and secure and supports tons of hardware and has a great network stack that doesn't stall or randomly disconnect, somehow stopped being part of the user experience, otherwise you are just blowing chunks out your ass.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
When Gates came up with the concept of software as a products.
Before MS, software was just kind of came with the computer. Like firmware nowadays.
It was free, because you needed a (maybe even specialized) computer to run it anyway, and because other than today, everyone using computers was an expert, and hence knew that information is not a product and cannot be owned/sold/stolen/rented/etc anyway.
What you paid for, was *actual work*. (Yeah, unimaginable for the criminal "economy" of today.)
As in: You paid to get software programmed for you.
When it was programmed, there were no rules about what could be one with it. And why would there? It was already paid. Done.
Microsoft came up with a way, to be able to act as if the crime of taking real actual money (that other people actually had to work for), in return for a mere worthless copy *of the software*, was kinda legally OK. :)
I wonder when somebody will come up with at way to put his $100 on the copy machine, and pay with those worthless copies too, using that very same logic. Bonus points for screaming "I WORKED HARD FOR THAT MONEY! YOU PIRATES! YOU THIEVES!" at somebody who refuses to let you pay with your funny money.
But Cygwin is not Linux.
Fine, the Windows Subsystem for Linux lets you instal Ubuntu, Debian, Suse, Kali, etc from the Microsoft store.
Yes but only if you're stupid enough to run Windows.
g'wan, make me.
this just shows you how much Apple is willing to invest in screwing over their customers.
investing research time and money into a 'security' chip that has nothing to do with real security, except for the security that you will need to do your repairs at official overpriced apple stores.
security chip? you keep using that word...
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Apple glues, screws, bolts then welds their machines so you can't replace anything. This is the final step. Now you can't do anything without their permission.
Looks like any hope I had of doing photography is now gone. I'm not going to Windows 10, nor am I paying an exorbitant price for an underpowered system which will be dead in three years and have to be thrown away because I can't change or upgrade anything without someone's permission.
All I'm left with is Linux. All I'm left with is Linux.
And the new repair cost should save them a JUST few hundred bucks over a new replacement Mac. I wonder is there anything that apple will do that dampen the the apple fans spirit? Seriously though, all joking aside. Why is this necessary from a consumer point of view? This seems like an unnecessary fix for a non existent problem with a large cost to the consumer. These (Features, not bugs.) just drive up the cost and reduce reliability. And lets be honest Apple has had a lousy history lately of reliable products. Just my 2 cents worth and not worth any more then that.
"When the free market doesn't produce a result that's great for society you have to ask yourself what do we need to do. And I think some level of government regulation is important to come out on that."
I hope that Apple is forced to run this on any hardware that I would bring into the store and reimburse me for my troubles/gas and time expense for this. Some people don't live close enough to their stupid Apple Proprietary Stores that they need to mail their devices out and it takes weeks and sometimes months to get it back.
I've hated Apple for decades and the relationship only grows with time
This is the same issue that John Deere farm equipment owners now have with their repairs. And the laws were just changed to make this possible.
https://theamericangenius.com/business-news/farmers-cant-legally-fix-their-own-john-deere-tractors-due-to-copyright-laws/
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/mar/06/nebraska-farmers-right-to-repair-john-deere-apple
http://fortune.com/2017/06/29/apple-iphone-repair-john-deere/
Prior to 1995 different vehicles had different systems. This didn't violate the the Warranty Act. In 1990, the Bush administration required that all cars use a standard system, known as OBD-II. Some 1994 model cars have OBD-II, most 1995 models, and it was required on all 1996 models (mostly manufacturered in 1995).
Only if you didn't understand his comment in that Linux absolutely does little for the UI. Linux is the kernel. You can have a great UI or a terrible UI on top of Linux.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Given apples incompetence with hardware I'm sure this new evil system of theirs wont work very well either,
Isn't going to like this.......can't wait to see his video about this...
You're messin' with my Zen Thing, man.....
The T2 chip is all about security and privacy (as is Apple in general). Look through that lens and this is likely about keeping everything secure after a hardware switch out, rather than trying to prevent repair. It’s to prevent a hack for stealing data at rest, or stealing future data (e.g. someone surreptitiously switching in new logic board that adds a remote snoop ability).
Apple devotes a tremendous amount of energy to preventing anyone but an ordained Apple priest from repairing any of their products. I would expect this to generate a huge amount of bad feeling -- it certainly does with me -- but the Apple fanboys and fangirls continue to smugly purchase these overpriced products and wave them around to show how smart they are. It's one of the great mysteries of the universe.
If Apple wants to pay for the repair (e.g., void my warranty and cover the costs under the warranty, and if I do not go by their whims, consider cancelling my warranty if I do something stupid), okay. But I want to own my computer--and part of that is being able to repair it.
I have bought computers in the past from Apple. At the time, they were an attractive option for a computer. (I was somewhat disappointed in the charging cable fiasco.) If this is true, I will not consider buying computers from Apple in the future.
So does BSD, OSX, Solaris, HPUX and since 8 even windows. This is a non differentiator. And yes, Android is not Linux. It is an application environment hosted on Linux.
Pure Linux will be running an X server and something like gnome, step clones or kde.
Only if you didn't understand that it is irrelevant how little Linux does for the UI. It is running , and without it Android wouldn't run. Once Linux is replaced with some other kernel in Android devices, then and only then can it be said to be not Linux.
To be more pedantic, you can say Android devices' kernel is less Linux than some GNU/Linux distributions, but Linux nevertheless. Since the one used in Android is modified more from the one maintained at kernel.org. In which case, "going with Linux" is completely true. Could be a shortcut for "going with modifying Linux instead of writing a complete kernel themselves".
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
Which kernel has a decent application for reading emails ?
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
OK, you pay Apple to put spy chips in your computer. Not me.
Evidently you pay some other manufacturer to put the spy chips in instead. Not really clear what you think you are gaining.
Did you know, many Apple products are assembled in China, using chips made in China?
So does literally every other manufacturer of electronics in the world worthy of the moniker. Apple is nothing unique in this regard so I'm not really sure what your point is. I seriously doubt you can find a non-trivial electronics device without at least some Chinese made chips and other content in it.
Newer cars do have a lot of stuff on the CAN bus, and different cars have different equipment and sensors, therefore they'll have additional PIDs in addition to the standardized stuff. I believe the question was about needing a proprietary tool to clear trouble codes. I believe Service 04, clear codes, is part of the SAE J1979 standard.
I never claimed that Linux is useless to Android. That's a straw man argument. What I claimed is simply that Android isn't Linux. Android is built on top of Linux; however, the default UI for Linux is bash. That point seems lost on the OP.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Android is better, for many reasons. Obviously, 80%+ of the smartphone users in the world prefer it.
That is overwhelmingly because of price and nothing else in most cases. Few prefer it for any technical reason. Apple doesn't sell to the low end of the market so that has been filled in mostly with Android devices in large unit volumes. Apple has close to 50% market share in premium smartphones with Samsung accounting for the lions share of the rest of the segment.
Personally, I like the Android Linux kernel, it's just way better than Apple's Mach kernel.
Unless you are a developer you have approximately zero direct interaction with the kernel so this is just fanboyism. Nobody actually buying smartphones or tablets is comparing iOS to Android is comparing kernel architectures or making vague "efficiency" comparisons. Not even the hardest core geeks. The only reason to make your argument is ideology.
If you like Android better that's fine. There are some excellent Android devices out there and they work great. If you want to argue it is superior to Apple's offering for a given purpose that's fine too but please make better arguments. There are a lot of good ones to chose from. No need to be a blind fanboy.
Right to repair will force apple to give this software out to 3rd party shops.
Right to repair will force apple to give this software out to 3rd party shops. Hardly. Most proposed laws require them to make it available, but at what price? The same thing with parts. Sure you can order them, but manufacturers cans imply price them at a point where a 3rd party repair is as expensive as the manufacturer's. If you look at car repairs, you can buy tools to diagnose issues. Some are affordable, around $500; but a mechanic can spread that around a lot of work. How many Mac repairs will a shop get? Apple could produce a special mac version that runs the software and sell it as a single device, much like many car diagnostic tools are. Will a shop drop 2K for such a device hoping to get enough repairs to make a profit? In addition, right o repair does not address the issue of a 3rd party part or repair from causing other damage which would not be covered by a warranty. I like the concept of right to repair and would like to see a law with teeth; but the reality probably will not be what most people expect.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
lol
Don't you have some lint to pick out of your navel, pedant?
I used to be a very loyal Apple customer. Not anymore! Apple just locked me from any purchase of said Pro Mackbook for sure, and if this is the writing on the wall, any Apple ever. Too bad Apple! I hope this isn't the way all manufacturers are going!
The original point is this : https://slashdot.org/comments....
It is not only lost on you, you seem to never have found it. The whole idea of UI is irrelevant here. Which is why I explained "going with" Linux.
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
Intel's anti-theft technology chipset ("Intel AT" - under the vPro/AMT umbrella) used to provide something similar on x86 Windows. If a device was "tampered with" (e.g. hardware was modified) the hardware would lock down, rendering the device useless to whomever was tampering with it.
However, that feature had to be consciously switched on by the end user (by running a software package) and the end-user could turn the anti-tampering protection off again if the device was going into service. So it was opt-in, and user-controllable. Sounds like Apple has removed that piece of the equation.
This is why I now refuse to offer Apple repairs as a service. Over the last few years it's become annoying to impossible to do anything to our own machines. Apple has gone down the toilet since Steve Jobs died. Tim Cook - you've ruined Apple.
Right to repair will force apple to give this software out to 3rd party shops.
Not until years are spent in court with someone who has enough money to sue them for it.
Android is built on top of Linux; however, the default UI for Linux is bash. That point seems lost on the OP.
Probably because it's wrong. The default UI for a Linux distribution is whatever you get at first login if you just hammer enter or next throughout the installation. For most distributions, that's something graphical.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I believe the question was about needing a proprietary tool to clear trouble codes. I believe Service 04, clear codes, is part of the SAE J1979 standard.
Again, you clearly don't have any real world experience. Many codes won't even show up with a generic tool, let alone clear when asked nicely. Try reading and calibrating the F1 transmission system on a Ferrari 360 with a Walmart scanner and let me know how it goes... The best tool currently out there if you want a relatively inexpensive unit that can work with the vast majority of modern cars are the ones from Autel. They start at about $500 and go up from there. But even those aren't perfect.
Well, I guess it's time to hackintosh a thinkpad.
... to avoid Apple products like the plague...
The warranty applies if the machine stops working due to a manufacturing defect, not if the customer broke it.
There are basically three scenarios.
---
Scenario A
You have a device that is under warranty.
It failed in a way that is covered by warranty.
You'd get it fixed under warranty. There's no third-party repair with knock-off / non-original parts, and no issue.
---
Scenario B
It's under warranty and you step on it, breaking the keyboard.
Now it's broken and the warranty doesn't apply.
You get a non-Apple keyboard to try to fix the damage you caused. If it doesn't work, that sucks for you. The damage you did doesn't magically come under warranty because you tried to fix it after you broke it.
Note that the warranty does NOT guarantee that a Ford engine will work just fine in a Toyota car, and doesn't guarantee that a ChongKey keyboard will work in an Apple laptop.
It says only that if the keyboard stops working, and you didn't break it, Apple will repair or replace it. If you broke it, Apple has no warranty responsibility related to the damage from breaking it.
--
Scenario C
Suppose it's under warranty and you step on it, breaking the keyboard.
Now it's broken and the warranty doesn't apply to this problem.
You get a non-Apple keyboard to try to fix the damage you caused. The keyboard works fine. You're happy.
Three weeks later, the LCD screen goes out due to a manufacturing defect.
Apple can't refuse to replace the LCD just because you replaced the keyboard. The two problems are unrelated and it would be illegal for Apple to tie warranty work (the LCD) to unrelated third-party parts.
Haydes Canyon NUC
it's faster than my 6 Core MacPro!
Thunderbolt 3 works well with my NVIDIA GTX970 eGPU and my JBOD
Ubuntu Bionic Beaver works great
Blackmagic Davinci is better than FCPU Pro.
I am currently using KDENLIVE and configured it to use NVENC.. I am now rendering with my eGPU. I may not even need Davinci!
You could use your same argument to say that a cli only version of Debian installed is not "linux" but instead the "GNU userland". Seems silly.
"We want our systems to be secure! Also, we want anybody to be able to access them at any time to repair them".
"Grab them by the pussy" -- President of the United States of America
Eh what? Pure Linux is just the kernel..
Android, Ubuntu, Debian, suse, redhat and so on are Linux systems.. anything on top that will render a graphical UI or give you a promt is your userland environment.
Android is a Linux system with a custom userland environment.
Recently I had to replace the lightning port on an Iphone 7 plus. Cost at Apple Store: $350, plus I was going to lose my data, since their repair plan was actually to replace the entire phone with a refurbished unit. Cost at an independent shop: $70, no loss of data, and they got it done in less than an hour (even dropped it off at my workplace for an extra $20).
This will be a fucking disaster for Mac owners. It'll be like taking an out-of-warranty Mercedes to the dealer for new brakes. I can't stomach going back to Windows (even less so after today's story about the magical disappearing files), and I can't use Linux, since one of the main things I do with my computer is record music. So I'm basically stuck.
The desktop OS market share has typically hovered around 90% Windows, 5% Mac, 5% other (mostly Linux, BSD, etc). In the last five years though, Mac desktop usage has jumped and Windows has bitten it pretty hard so it now looks like: 82% Windows, 13% Mac, 5% other (mostly Linux, BSD, etc).
So Apple probably views this change as something they can get away with. Linux desktop hasn't made any progress in the last 20+ years (actually, the breakdown is worse than that) while Apple has been chipping away at Microsoft's overwhelming market dominance over a measly 5 year timespan.
you can say Android devices' kernel is less Linux than some GNU/Linux distributions, but Linux nevertheless.
Actually, Android Linux kernel carries way fewer patches than Red Hat's RHEL kernel. Almost all of the Android kernel features are now merged into mainline Linux, generally getting improved in the process. So now, Android kernel is very nearly mainline, with all remaining diffs on their way out.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
And they do that for free? This is just plain extortion to get them extra money for 'repairing' your device even though 3rd parties are quite capable of doing the repairs (ofcourse that will void the warranty).
T2... It instantly made me think about Terminator.
OK, that's good news. I remember a time when Google was sitting on its patches - probably for lack of time to make them ready for mainlining.
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
Ok everyone needs to calm down a little. ifixit just showed that you or third parties can still repair the latest Mac hardware. The original article is incorrect.
Your assumption about scenario C is no more valid after this story. At least for the components on which this software lock applies, it is no more true :
The keyboard works fine. You're happy
None of these scenarios directly cover what you said earlier :
people who wrote that might wish that they had written "also, you can't arrange for the product to stop working when unauthorized parts are installed",
In all your scenarios - if you replaced the keyboard and it stopped working in non-keyboardey ways : Apple has to make it work again. Now whether you replaced the keyboard because it broke due to your mistake, or you simply like some other keyboard on your laptop.
If you replaced the keyboard and it stops working due to the keyboard being bad / incompatible with your laptop - Apple does not have to fix it. But nobody said that they have to, and that is not relevant here. Just stated for completeness.
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
Here's the Warranty Act
https://www.law.cornell.edu/us...
Where do you see anything about "Apple has to make it work again. Now whether you replaced the keyboard because it broke due to your mistake, or you simply like some other keyboard on your laptop."
Hint - it's not there. If you step on your laptop and break it, Apple doesn't have to do shit. If you decide you want a Trump-orange keyboard, Apple doesn't have to do shit. In fact, you won't fix anything in the law about the company has to do *anything* regarding third-party repairs, or randomly swapping parts. Rather, the law says there is one thing they must NOT do.
What the law says (read it above if you don't believe me) is that there is something the manufacturer is not allowed to do. What they can't do is refuse to cover other, unrelated defects, which are not caused by your attempted third-party repair. They can't refuse to fix a defective LCD, saying "your warranty is void because you used a non-Apple keyboard" - unless they can show that the non-Apple keyboard actually caused the LCD to break.
You might *wish* Apple would fix your mistakes, or somehow magically make your rainbow-colored parts work, but those things aren't in the law.
Update from iFixit - https://ifixit.org/blog/11673/... "This service document certainly paints a grim picture, but ever the optimists, we headed down to our friendly local Apple Store and bought a brand new 2018 13” MacBook Pro Touch Bar unit. Then we disassembled it and traded displays with our teardown unit from this summer. To our surprise, the displays and MacBooks functioned normally in every combination we tried. We also updated to Mojave and swapped logic boards with the same results." Apparently the updated policy is not yet in effect. Was this leaked to test the water?
OK, one by one. Do you agree with my statement :
Your assumption about scenario C is no more valid after this story
?
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
So Apples spends a million(i'm guessing) just to develop something to screw over their customers. Good job.
I didn't make any assumptions. I told you what what the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act says. No, this story did not rewrite the Act. It did not change the law in any way.
Perhaps you are assuming that the law says whatever you think it should say (that's a common error), so hearing this story has changed what you assume might be in the law. It did not in fact change a single word of the law, though. The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act says the same thing today as it said last week.
It says a manufacturer cannot say that using third-party parts *voids your warranty* with respect to unrelated issues not caused by the third-party parts. It does not say that all devices must continue to work right now matter what parts you try to put in. It didn't say that last week and it doesn't say that this week. *Even if you want it to*.
OK, you need things more clearly spelt out. The scenario also told about technical reality in addition to the Act . Specifically, do you agree this is wrong :
You get a non-Apple keyboard to try to fix the damage you caused. The keyboard works fine. You're happy.
?
FYI , "Keyboard works fine" is written n nowhere in the Act.
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
"The keyboard doesn't work" is option B.
I gave you the link to the law. Yet rather than reading it you keeping wishing about it. Do you think it's going to change if you keep typing? The US Code actually isn't social media, nothing you post here is going to change the Magnuson-Moss Act. No matter how much we might wish it said whatever, it says what it says.
Linux is not part of the user experience
Maybe fast and reliable and secure and supports tons of hardware and has a great network stack that doesn't stall or randomly disconnect, somehow stopped being part of the user experience.
And entirely replaceable in all of those characteristics by a BSD based kernel, and in the future possibly by Google Linux-replacement Fuchsia. Again, hosted on, not based on. Two very different things.
There are people who will argue that "Linux" is just the kernel. If so, then Android is as much a "Linux distro" as any other.
If you're talking about the whole operating system (i.e. bash and other userland utilities) then what you call Linux is actually GNU/Linux, or "GNU hosted on the Linux kernel."
This is all just hair-splitting anyway. Nobody is arguing that Android doesn't have Linux at the bottom (and if they are, they don't know what they're talking about).
"Yes but only if you're stupid enough to run Windows."
Its just that elitist attitude that keeps the world from being a better place. Sure,Windows has its issues, but if 99% of the world ran Linux or something else, that OS would have issues and be maligned for its inadequacies.
Honestly, Windows wouldn't have dominated the desktop industry for over 2 decades if it were as bad as most people on here believe. Or do you think there is a secret cabal of villains propping up Windows and keeping other OSes down in a grand conspiracy to keep the world using an inferior OS?
Ninjas don't carry tic tacs
Sort of. It's called "lock-in."