GF678, the problem is that you focus too much on 'winning' and 'loosing' and not enough on simply building stuff that people want. In the large (100's of millions of users, and 100's of thousands of business, just want stuff that works, if they are open, so much the better). There is no religious war here. There is competition to build things people want.
Actually, Win7 detects SSD's for this purpose (disabling defrag) by measuring Random I/O performance of the device, not by using the ATA command set. The reason is that the reporting is unreliable on many devices and with some drivers. We needed something that worked every time. Measuring random I/O rate is a very reliable way to distinguish SSD from Mechanical devices.
I agree with having a mortgage free home. But there are more than one way to get there:) Much of this depends on how your mortgage is structured. I was using that as an example.
Where did you get this?
I think this action is more about Microsofts execs hoping to convert from the growth model to the utility model of corporate governance
Thats just a gi-nourmous assumption on your part and quite incorrect. As with other comments to you, I can speak authoritatively here. What do you mean by utility model of corporate governance? If you really mean like a water or power utility then you are making a really bad assumption.
At the end of the day, MSFTs goal is to earn money: there are many ways to do this. Chief among them is selling products, selling services, selling advertising, and selling subscriptions. One of our strengths is that we have a breadth of products that let us effectively use all of these.
MSFT can make more money investing its existing cash. Its the same kind of trade off an individual may make: Do I invest my money? Or pay down my mortgage? if you mortgage rate is very low, then it makes more sense to invest your cash.
Um, no. Three years ago I mastered an HD video on BluRay of the family picnic. Im still the only person whos ever seen it in that format. Youre still on "widgets and gadgets".
You are falling into a classic trap: assuming what you do, or your small group of peers do as relevant to, or statistically representative of the larger market. Happens all the time. It is a perennial problem on internal Microsoft mailing lists. I know you dont believe it, but people absolutory, positively, want to watch DVD and Blue Ray content on their PCs. Again, it suits me fine if you want to ignore market realities. (note, I understand you could say the same thing).
You are also mixing your arguments here; we havent been talking about how people handle their own personal videos, their memories. We have been talking about how people get their mainstream entertainment. Two completely and utterly different discussions. I would argue that Windows is pretty good at this scenario - Vista doesnt handle HD, but I believe that the next (current?) version of Movie Maker does - and its free.
Ya - I need to subscribe - Ill do that soon. May PayPal account is busted so I need to use my wifes.
Regarding Linux penetration - you are mixing your arguments again: I pushed back last time when you brought up server side topics - were talking about client side things. Feel free to use all the data and opinions you have about client side market numbers.
Next, Im not sure what you mean by "Figures dont lie, but liars figure." If you are calling me a liar, Ill consider our whole series of conversations a waste of time and stop replying. If you are using this another way, thats groovy, just let me know.
Now about surveys: Gartner is interesting, and I use it for some of my teams work, but only as representation of what other people are looking at. Other people pretty much use it the same way - its popular, and they get a lot of press, but its only just that. The fact that this is the one you mention is a bit telling. We have tons and tons of very accurate, very timely data, gathered from a wide range of sources from all over the world. Much of this is original research. While I dont know for a fact - I suspect some are blind as you have suggested. There is very little (maybe zero) use of consultants in the way you describe, which is how a small company with few resources would do it. Now dont take this to mean we dont listen to people outside of MSFT - we absolutely do; we often bring various people from all over the world to give us their candid opinions directly to our most senior folks, we act on this often. For example, we bring in the CTOs of our biggest customers, leading popular analysts, governmental representatives, etc. etc. I go to the ones relevant to my work.
You said:
With a similar feature set.. if you mean the same issues Ive complained about - yeah, if you configure your Linux to do those stupid things you might be as exposed to the same issues.
Youve made good points about configuraed defaults, like open ports and autoplay (as Ive said). By similar configured, I mean in terms of features, what the product does. The more the features, the more the exposure. Dont compare a minimal configured Linux distribution with a maximally configured Windows one like Ultimate. More code means more exposure - the ratios may differ, but to the first order, this is they key thing.
Regarding market caps; the US stock market is neither open or transparent - not even close. Its driven often by speculation and very often a stock price has very little to do with the performance of the company, and almost zero to do with the things weve been talking about. Better metrics would be return on equity, net profit margin, dividend rate and history. There are many others. But, to be frank, Im not really interested in talking about the stock market,.
You bet, much more agreement. On of the problems Ive seen some people make at big technology companies (MSFT, AMD, Compaq, Dell, HP, Intel) is that they think end users are stupid. Its one of my little pet peeves.
Im a developer at heart, but Ive been fortunate for many years to work closely (or be in) core engineering groups that work with partners, and sometimes customers directly. Ive even gotten to define a couple of large customer studies, both qualitative and quantitative - very fun.
One thing that I learned along the way is that customers are definitely not stupid. Ive heard terms used such as "Joe six pack", "Ma and Pa Kettle", "Ted Trailer Dweller". For example "Ted Trailer Dweller" will never figure that out.
It pisses me off every time it happens. Of course, consumers by and large are smart people - they just may not be gadget-heads, or very technically literate.
Regards to your comment:
If they want to watch a DVD they can buy a player with LCD display that runs on batteries and plays the Hollywood stuff for $79. For $30, they can get one that looks lovely on their 40" LCD at home. They dont need that on their PC.
This is exactly the kind of business assumption that will doom you to failure as the VP of development for the hypothetical Linux distribution company I put you in charge of in one of my previous posts.
People absolutory, positively, want to watch DVD and Blue Ray content on their PCs. Both desktop and mobile. I can speak extremely authoritatively here. Today, this means they watch this content by stuffing an optical disk in their PC. As weve already discussed, this will transition to a downloading streaming model over time. Here is an example; for a while business oriented laptops didnt come with a DVD player, they just had a CD player. But watching DVDs on laptops was a big differentiator for OEMs marketing to the business traveler.
If you want to play a restricted DVD on your computer you can boot Linux Mint
This makes may point perfectly: Rebooting to watch a movie? Only a very small tiny insignificant fraction of techno-heads would ever do this. This is a complete and utter non starter for consumers. Come on - how much shit has MSFT taken that XP has to be rebooted just to update the video driver and and some other stuff? Reboot to use a major feature of the platform, and rebooting into another distribution? No OEM on the planet would ever agree to that.
You said:
Soon, as you probably know, the computer will be evolved enough at low enough power to be embedded in the TV.
Soon is actually today in a very real way. Im confident you are familiar with NVIDIAs ION platform. This platform is really, really amazing and its just their first stab at it.
You said:
I do adamantly believe that there are some practices that are not best practices. Microsoft is not alone in employing some of these practices.... no, Im not ever going to be fond of this corporation.
Fair enough. I completely understand that position. And Im not at all seeking fondness. I also understand that at points in time, governments have agreed with it too. I dont know enough about the stuff you mention here to comment in a meaningful way. Positively, or negatively. What I can say is that everyone is playing hard ball. Even the FOSS folks.
Ya - Apples market cap is stellar, so is their most recently quarterly results. In my personal opinion, this is MSFTs biggest competitor in the consumer space. But, I would suggest to you that market cap isnt a very good indicator of who is doing something right or wrong.
You said:
Do you know why all the major vendors offer Linux platforms now? Its not because they dont like Microsofts cob
Good point on the long posts. I see these as more of a public conversation between us, rather than post directed at a large number of people.
So, I had a bet with my wife that you would respond exactly the way you did; e.g. The best way to win is not to play. Thats a great answer. If the tables were turned, Id answer exactly the same way.
Your comment "Microsoft sucks up to content owners" just in not true. There is no sucking up here. If anything, we push on them very hard. I know of a few examples of this, but (unfortunately) its not up to me to talk about it on SlashDot. The reason we have a DRMed playback stack in Windows is so that people can watch the video they want to watch. It really is that simple - you are making a mistake if you make it more complicated, or put some kind of conspiracy behind it. We get no benefit for any other reason, in fact we pay some pretty hefty dollars for licensing. The money doesnt flow the other way.
I dont know first hand, but from what I do know about how we make these decisions, I suspect that the execs in charge would be quite happy if we didnt have to do all the engineering work around DRM. Were not the only ones either, the driver folks and silicon design folks put a lot of effort in here as well. Its all a pain in the ass.
I agree with you on the physical media thing as well: thats why one of my requirements was to support "no matter the media (optical, streaming, download etc)."
[ as an aside, I get your point about the term wifey. ]
You keep throwing in argument about copyright and DRM and control. Were in complete agreement here - and have been all along. DRM sucks, Copyright law sucks. I suggest you are completely missing my point. Let me see if I can frame this a bit differently.
Consumers by and large (e.g. when looked at in the aggregate of 100s of millions) just want a system that works, e.g. they unboxed it, and it plays BlueRay (today), and streams the content they want to day and tomorrow. A Linux vendor or OEM could ignore this, but then they would be at a HUGE competitive disadvantage compared to Windows or another distribution that did support it.
At the end off they day, people want to see Disney Dancing Bunnies, Glitter, Water World and the NFL channel. To be broadly successful in the consumer space Linux based PC needs to let people get this content - seamless and easily. If this means supporting DRM then thats what that means - its just business.
Today the internet is not at all the first market. I argue that this is still the cable and satellite TV folks. I dont have hard numbers, but this is still the predominant way video entertainment enters the household. Optical disk rental I suspect is #2.
That being said - Internet streaming delivery has huge potential and I suspect were not too far from a sea change, but there are significant barriers. First, people want to watch video on their TV, not their computer. Next, consumers need a gateway device between the TV and the internet. This could be a game console (PS2, Xbox, WII) a PC, or a dedicated device. There isnt the critical mass here yet. Someday, but not today. I argue its not for at least another three to five years.
Of course, there will be early adopters, as soon as Hulu decides not to be a dick about it, Ill watch a lot of Hulu on my TV. But consumers are lazy (again, by and large) they need a service, not a hobby. They need Comcast or Time Warner to come in, run a line, hook it up to their TV and hand them a remote control.
In any case, I suggest that you and I agree here again; the market will change, when it begins to change it will change rapidly, and this will all be good for the consumer. Less DRM is good for MSFT as well, its less engineering, testing and support. Im pretty sure the media teams would love to spend less time on this stuff and mo
You are mixing so many other things - history, current politics, and Turing. In general, I agree with you mostly (but I really dont get the Turing reference, its pretty oblique). I suggest we not argue the pros and cons of copyright law, history and Turing - lets do that in another chain, post, or forum. If we had that discussion, I think you would find I agreed with you, for the most part. For example, I think its a bummer that the Pirate Bay guys went to jail; that its a huge pain to get cable card; and that once I own some media, I should be able to watch it or listen to it on any of my gizmos. Ill agree in general that DRM sucks.
So how in the world is enabling people to play Disney Dancing Bunnies with DRM bad for anyone? (remember, weve agreed that DRM sucks) The content owners published their content this way, Microsoft provides a software stack that lets the user watch it in WMP or MCE. Thats bad for the customer how? Thats just called being legal (which you grok) its not somehow serving the purposes of any evil overlords. Bummer for people that want stuff for free that the owner wants money for.
Its amazing to me that you pin evil motives to MSFT in providing OS product features to play DRMed content. Its just not evil, not one little teeny tiny bit. Its just business. Microsoft isnt preventing anyone from doing anything. Non DRMd content plays and copies just fine.
Again, its really simple, if Microsoft doesnt support DRMed playback, then someone else would and I suspect in a very heavy handed, buggy, supper-crappyâ way. I know you remember the Sony root kit stuff. Believe me, I dont like DRM any more than anyone else. Id love to watch Comcast content on my MCE box, recorded it, put it on my PC, or other gizmo (like my daughters ipod) with no fuss or muss. I expect that day will come, but it is not today. Really, MSFT is looking out for the customer here - maybe not you personally as a customer, but customers none the less.
Here is my interpretation of your position:
DRM is bad and/or evil.
Anybody that provides a software stack for playing DRMed content is bad
and/or evil.
Thus you are pissed at MSFT (that would be the
whole being reviled thing...)
Correct? (really Im asking, please correct me if I dont get the gist of your points). If thats the case, well we can simply disagree... Lawful Good vs. Chaotic Evil. Best of three D20 rolls gets to pick which they are.
I think we can agree on something though - consumers (by and large, US consumers in particular) will buy DRMed content - in great heaping quantities. I suggest that few are more than vaguely aware of DRM, and fewer still are angry about it. The iPod and digital cable TV are the canonical examples in my mind. Consumers want their entertainment, easily, seamlessly, and they will pay good money for it. Yes, yes, there are a few that are (a) pissed and (b) are savvy enough to get around it. And yes, there is enough noise about this that some audio is now DRM free (I have a Napster account for that very reason). But for the vast majority ( J ) of consumers, they will just go with the flow. For example, my wife and daughter (11) are very technically savvy - wifey can install Windows and drivers. Daughter has been using a computer since before she could crawl. Neither one of them give a rats ass about DRM. Wifey just wants her NFL channel, and daughter is quite happy with her iPod and iTunes (running on Windows-7 of course!). Today, both get what they want, easily and seamlessly and both are happy. If all DRM disappeared tomorrow, they would not be any happier. I argue that this is representative of consumers as a
I love the holy war against Microsoft about DRM. This was not MSFTs idea, it was the contentowners. This is really simple, content owns require DRM. The OEM"s have to have it or they cannot sell systems that play some movies and some audio.
Lets pretend MSFT refused to included DRM playback support in Windows - what would happen??
The OEMs would need DRM support anyway so they would work with the hardware guys
and some 3d party companies to provide a separate DRMd stack and drivers that used
some wacky media container (file format) and encoding formats (wacky mutated codecs). Now, things are just awesome - non DRMed content would play just
fine using the MSFT stuff, but DRMd content would require some 3d party
goo the OEM provided.
So even if MSFT doenst provide it, there will be a DRMed stack on the system: Remember, the user wants to
play their Disney Dancing Bunnies video - the only way they can do this if
they use the OEMs semi-proprietary playback stack and special graphics and
audio driver.
So the user has two completely separate stacks for A/V...
How is this good for the end user? Really. In your answer, be
sure to avoid all your fan boy emotional hand waving and histrionics.
So it gets even better: With out a DRM capable stack in Windows -
only people that buy a system from some OEMs can play back this content. 
People that upgrade cant do this.  Awesome...  Even better only the big OEMs will be able to afford this and it will be baked into the price of their system.  They will pay royalties and other fees to the content providers and whoever provided the playback stack and applicatoins.
This means that many Windows systems would be just like Linux unable to legally play DRMed content.  This is good for who?
Now, lets talk about how the OEMs would have to deal with shipping Linux in large volumes to consumers:  They will have to do exactly the same thing as described above.... why?  Because users want to buy a system that just works, that means it has to come pre-installed with the software that will play Disney Dancing Bunnies.  This is guaranteed to come with closed source (binary) graphics drivers, and probably audio drivers, because thats the only way to support DRMed playback.
Now, if the FOSS licensing makes this hard, expensive, or impossible, thats just a huge barrier to Linux adoption.
Of course, I dont expect many people reading Slashdot to believe this - but MSFT is really looking out for end users best interest here.  Users want to see their video, they want to have a consistent user interface and set of applications to do that. This is what we have given them.
If you want to rail wildly about DRM, the right target is the content owners - they dictate the terms. There simply is not a conspiracy here.  Its just business.  If you dont like it, solve it using a business approach, or lobby for a legislative approach.  Whining about it on SlashDot is just fun for you, and entertaining for a very small number of other people; it accomplishes nothing.
One more question: So Disny publishes their video suff in away that requries their malware - thats what happens. Again, Linux has no advanage of Windows or OSX here - if the user wants to watch the video, they will let the malware on the system - everyone is powned.
WRT: "Either way I'm going to get what I want, so it's all good." I couldn't agree more!:)
So, that's another pretty good rant:) really. I love all the emotional hand waving. With respect to open ports, you do have an interesting point and I'm going to do a little research on that for my own education.
You mention marketing quite a bit, with some kind of idea that MSFT Marketing drives product design. It doesn't. Product planning is done in the product groups. For example, Windows is split into two groups COSD (Core Operating System Division) and WEX (Windows Experience). There are three disciplines in each product group; test, program management (PM), and development. These three disciplines work together to define what the teams will do. It is very much bottom up. Of course the execs set the tone and tenor, but individual teams, some as small has just a few people, decide what they will do for a product cycle. This isn't done a vacuum, but the point is that decisions are very distributed -- a good thing. Of course, there is some data we gather from the traditional marketing org, but its mostly pull, not push.
WRT to auto-run; While the number isn't zero (with about a billion installations, nothing is zero) but very little malware gets on a system via Autorun Corporate malware that comes with entertainment media is just malware plain and simple -- some people will go to great lengths to convince the user to install it. It doesn't matter if its on a CD, DVD, a USB stick, downloaded, comes in Email, a custom media player, or YouTube (you may have read that Sony will use its own play for its content on YouTube).
We can disagree on the auto-run thing...
WRT to Office -- I don't know enough about (deeply) it to comment much but my personal sentiments are similar: It's not without fault, but it works pretty freaking good. Office has long had competitions -- some credible free ones even. People still buy it, a lot. I've never see the MS Office trial -- if it has an uninstall bug, It's most likely already been fixed. If not, please file a bug -- really.
But you really are not being effective when you turn the argument like that. Ok, so you may have noticed a bug in MS office trial. One point for you. There is still large numbers of problem bloat ware things out there -- MSFT has nothing to do with them. The Linux community will face the same problem (if it ever gets any market share). This isn't a MSFT problem; it's an eco system problem.
I love your "you can't blame the other guy" statement. You are soooo naÃve. Really, you are. We sell an OS product, we don't sell systems. (Yes, this is an advantage Apple has, it's also a boat anchor). We actually have very, very little control over what hundreds of OEM's do. Sometimes they make expedient choices based on schedule pressure, revenue needs, and tight engineering capacity. We actually have several good sized organizations that do spend all of their time working with OEMs and this kind of stuff still happens. Again, the Linux community may someday face this issue.
Here is a question for you about your statement: "Disney includes on their DVDs in the guise of being a video player. Whatever can be done to prevent that crud should be done." What would the Linux community do here? Remember, the user wants to see the new Disney Dancing Bunnies movie -- to see the movie, they are going to click yes, 10 times in a row and re-boot their system if needed. Their install will open ports, install drivers, hook the kernel, replace components, phone home, associate their app with other file types, and all kinds of other wacky stuff -- because that is what the user will tell the system to do. So don't hand wave or rant here -- really if you were leading a dev team for a Linux distribution -- you are going to solve this problem by how?. You have one constraint -- the user gets to watch the movie.
Next, I completely 100% get it that there is no one Linux. And I do think that is a very powerful thing. If I didn't work at MSF
Ok, that's interesting information on Ubuntu and OpenBSD. I'll send some mail and see if I can't get a butter understanding of why Windows ships the way it does.
WRT group policies - you seem to be saying that because the feature is there at all (auto-run) that it's a big problem. If you turn something off with GP its off - there isn't any ambiguity. Now, you may not believe that it is off, but there isn't anything I can do about that. What I can tell you is that in high security applications, ITPros turn off all kinds of stuff and strictly control what a Windows client can do using Group Policy. This works really well and many, many IT shops are quite happy with it. Note, I understand Linux/Unix as similar capabilities.
About the Sony Root Kit this absolutely positively wasn't MSFT's fault. Sony put a root kit on their CD"s and users had to click it and run it. This was not an auto run problem at all. Be mad at Sony here, not Windows or MSFT. Sony just as easily could have done this for Linux or OSX. Just because they didn't doesn't make Windows less secure. They did it for Windows because Windows is the dominant OS. If that changes and Linux ever gets enough market share to make it interesting, then this kind of thing will happen to Linux too.
WRT to performance on low spec systems: I'll completely agree that Vista has its issues. But, (and I can speak very authoritatively here). Many, many of the problems people have on low spec (and indeed all systems) has nothing to do with Windows itself but with the following kinds of things: A graphics driver that allocates 10X more system memory than it needs to; how about an app installed by an OEM that reads the registry a few million times when it starts up (at boot); buggy device drivers that simply spin at 100% CPU polling for a non-existent bit on a device for 15 seconds or so before timing out; loads and loads of poorly written "bloat ware" installed by OEM's that use tons of memory, perform all kinds of I/O at bad times, and generally soak up tons of resources; I could go on, and on, and on.
For example you say "but then when popping out the high def window in Youtube the system would reliably reboot without warning" - this is almost guaranteed to be a graphics drive bug. Nothing that happens in user mode can cause the system to spontaneously re-boot. Note, please run the upcoming RC build and file a bug if this reproduces for you - really.
All of these problems will face the Linux community if/when Linux becomes popular as a desktop OS. There is nothing in Linux that makes driver writers any smarter, then those who write Windows drivers - in many cases they are the same people. Nothing will keep OEM's from adding goo to the system
The point here is this: A well engineered windows system will run as well as a well engineered Linux system where both systems have operating systems configured in a similar way, with similar features. I suggest this well be particularly true with Windows-7
Now, about your comparison of Vista to XP - in many ways - its apples to oranges. For example, Vista ships with a composed desktop, built in desktop search, volume snapshot, and many other features that XP does not have. This means it will use more system resources. But these costs pay for things users want. If someone doesn't want all that - they can get Starter Edition.
BTW - the P4 800mhz based HP system with Intel 915 graphics and 512MB of RAM you selected cannot be called "fairly recent" by any stretch of the imagination. Intel doesn't event support that stuff anymore. If you are going to talk about modern low capability systems, please focus on Intel's Atom, Intel's ULV parts, AMD's Neo, and Via's Nano. For example, the Nvidia ION stuff rocks - runs windows Vista for every day computing tasks just super duper fine -including Blue Ray HD Playback. Its silky smooth.
I don't have the exact Atom Mother board you linked to - but I'm surprised you having proble
Microsoft doesn't need to do this:) And yes, the maintainers/admins are to blame.
The It department can set group policies to enforce this. Our systems here at MSFT are setup just this way. Even though I have full admin rights to my system, I cannot change it because it is Domain joined group policy.
Not that anybody else is reading this, but that's a much better response and quite the entertaining rant. The sarcasm is actually moderately entertaining.
So, I have a question for you, do any operating systems you approve of install, by default, with all listening ports off? Is Windows they only OS that does this? What does Ubuntu do? How about OSX? Really, Iâ(TM)m asking , Iâ(TM)ve not done a survey of other operating systems to know.
Next, if the answer is no, then please feel free to rant about them as much.
Auto run is there because people want it. They just like their stuff to work (hold your nitpicking Windows isnâ(TM)t perfect, and neither is anything else). Other OS products have similar features. Note, lots of business disables this using group policy , it's not hard.
Regarding the networking bug in playing audio , yup that was a bug. We fixed it. Weâ(TM)re not alone , itâ(TM)s pretty easy to search for bugs in various Linux distributions, Solaris, and OSX. Just search Slashdot for âLinux bugâ(TM). Everyone else fixes their bugs too.
With respect to your comment that âOS won't run well on a 1.6GHz ATOM based PC with 1GB of RAMâ(TM): In some respects you are absolutely correct , there are many scenarios that are suitable for lower performing PCs. For example, running media center to record and play TV, or editing 12 mega pixel RAW images in Photoshop on such a system isnâ(TM)t recommend. But, you are off the mark in many respects , Vista with well engineered drivers, a BIOS that has been well engineered, and lacking what some people call âoebloat wareâ will absolutely run acceptably well , the limiting factor is the HW not the OS or applications. I suspect you will call BS here, but lots of these systems ship and people are happy with them. Are the limits? Sure, but not major ones.
Regarding software installing , I think you are missing something: Microsoft does not build application installers for others. Developers determine how their installers work , Windows doesnâ(TM)t enforce policy. Now, you may believe that Windows should enforce such policies, but think about it, there is now way to do that. Sure, Windows might enforce some kind of default policies if an app used Windows installer tech, but developers that didnâ(TM)t like this would simply write their own installers.
Regarding deployment, I can't say I disagree. Deploying windows can be a pain. I know there are people working on making this a lot better for Win-7, I also understand that deploying Vista is easier than XP, but Iâ(TM)m not an expert there so I cannot comment in detail.
Regarding PXE, I do this almost every day with the test systems in my office. I can load any number of things using PXE including full Windows installs in various flavors, and WinPE.
"Your products suck". That's it? That's the best you have? That's the most original thing you can say? How many times has something almost exactly like that been said on/.?
I'm a dev manager* in the windows core OS division. I can tell you, authoritatively, that I've never heard of anything like "20% of our workers contribute 80%" of the work. Somebody just made that up and/or jumped to conclusions based on some random blog post or partial piece of information.
I also have a senior developer on my team that went to google, found that it sucked, and came back.
So this is really ironic - Its my understating from reading hundreds and hundreds of/. posts that this isn't supposed to happen with FOSS. Only Micro$oft developers are supposed to have security bugs like this.
Now, how did this ship? Who tested it? Who did the code reviews? Who did the security reviews? Who did all the threat modeling?
Irony aside, (and I am a Microsoft developer) getting security right is hard. FOSS folks are not any better, or worse, than Microsoft, Apple, Sun or IBM developers.
Don't guess.... this isn't hard to figure out. Hook up the kernel debugger and find the faulting component. If you don't do that you are just guessing. This is what any decent developer would do.
Slashdot Mirror
What the heck does that mean?
How about supplying some data for that super broad statement.
Also, we're talking bout client systems here, not servers.
GF678, the problem is that you focus too much on 'winning' and 'loosing' and not enough on simply building stuff that people want. In the large (100's of millions of users, and 100's of thousands of business, just want stuff that works, if they are open, so much the better). There is no religious war here. There is competition to build things people want.
Hi Symbol,
I'm not sure what you mean by 'premium item'. Do you mean the premium logo requirments?
Foredecker
Yes - we're watching :)
Actually, Win7 detects SSD's for this purpose (disabling defrag) by measuring Random I/O performance of the device, not by using the ATA command set. The reason is that the reporting is unreliable on many devices and with some drivers. We needed something that worked every time. Measuring random I/O rate is a very reliable way to distinguish SSD from Mechanical devices.
I agree with having a mortgage free home. But there are more than one way to get there :) Much of this depends on how your mortgage is structured. I was using that as an example.
Where did you get this?
Thats just a gi-nourmous assumption on your part and quite incorrect. As with other comments to you, I can speak authoritatively here. What do you mean by utility model of corporate governance? If you really mean like a water or power utility then you are making a really bad assumption.
At the end of the day, MSFTs goal is to earn money: there are many ways to do this. Chief among them is selling products, selling services, selling advertising, and selling subscriptions. One of our strengths is that we have a breadth of products that let us effectively use all of these.
Great post. I was at AMD for a little over 6 yers until late 2003. We should compare notes.
MSFT can make more money investing its existing cash. Its the same kind of trade off an individual may make: Do I invest my money? Or pay down my mortgage? if you mortgage rate is very low, then it makes more sense to invest your cash.
Hi Symbolset,
You said:
You are falling into a classic trap: assuming what you do, or your small group of peers do as relevant to, or statistically representative of the larger market. Happens all the time. It is a perennial problem on internal Microsoft mailing lists. I know you dont believe it, but people absolutory, positively, want to watch DVD and Blue Ray content on their PCs. Again, it suits me fine if you want to ignore market realities. (note, I understand you could say the same thing).
You are also mixing your arguments here; we havent been talking about how people handle their own personal videos, their memories. We have been talking about how people get their mainstream entertainment. Two completely and utterly different discussions. I would argue that Windows is pretty good at this scenario - Vista doesnt handle HD, but I believe that the next (current?) version of Movie Maker does - and its free.
Ya - I need to subscribe - Ill do that soon. May PayPal account is busted so I need to use my wifes.
Regarding Linux penetration - you are mixing your arguments again: I pushed back last time when you brought up server side topics - were talking about client side things. Feel free to use all the data and opinions you have about client side market numbers.
Next, Im not sure what you mean by "Figures dont lie, but liars figure." If you are calling me a liar, Ill consider our whole series of conversations a waste of time and stop replying. If you are using this another way, thats groovy, just let me know.
Now about surveys: Gartner is interesting, and I use it for some of my teams work, but only as representation of what other people are looking at. Other people pretty much use it the same way - its popular, and they get a lot of press, but its only just that. The fact that this is the one you mention is a bit telling. We have tons and tons of very accurate, very timely data, gathered from a wide range of sources from all over the world. Much of this is original research. While I dont know for a fact - I suspect some are blind as you have suggested. There is very little (maybe zero) use of consultants in the way you describe, which is how a small company with few resources would do it. Now dont take this to mean we dont listen to people outside of MSFT - we absolutely do; we often bring various people from all over the world to give us their candid opinions directly to our most senior folks, we act on this often. For example, we bring in the CTOs of our biggest customers, leading popular analysts, governmental representatives, etc. etc. I go to the ones relevant to my work.
You said:
Youve made good points about configuraed defaults, like open ports and autoplay (as Ive said). By similar configured, I mean in terms of features, what the product does. The more the features, the more the exposure. Dont compare a minimal configured Linux distribution with a maximally configured Windows one like Ultimate. More code means more exposure - the ratios may differ, but to the first order, this is they key thing.
Regarding market caps; the US stock market is neither open or transparent - not even close. Its driven often by speculation and very often a stock price has very little to do with the performance of the company, and almost zero to do with the things weve been talking about. Better metrics would be return on equity, net profit margin, dividend rate and history. There are many others. But, to be frank, Im not really interested in talking about the stock market,.
Regarding your closing statement
You bet, much more agreement. On of the problems Ive seen some people make at big technology companies (MSFT, AMD, Compaq, Dell, HP, Intel) is that they think end users are stupid. Its one of my little pet peeves.
Im a developer at heart, but Ive been fortunate for many years to work closely (or be in) core engineering groups that work with partners, and sometimes customers directly. Ive even gotten to define a couple of large customer studies, both qualitative and quantitative - very fun.
One thing that I learned along the way is that customers are definitely not stupid. Ive heard terms used such as "Joe six pack", "Ma and Pa Kettle", "Ted Trailer Dweller". For example "Ted Trailer Dweller" will never figure that out.
It pisses me off every time it happens. Of course, consumers by and large are smart people - they just may not be gadget-heads, or very technically literate.
Regards to your comment:
This is exactly the kind of business assumption that will doom you to failure as the VP of development for the hypothetical Linux distribution company I put you in charge of in one of my previous posts.
People absolutory, positively, want to watch DVD and Blue Ray content on their PCs. Both desktop and mobile. I can speak extremely authoritatively here. Today, this means they watch this content by stuffing an optical disk in their PC. As weve already discussed, this will transition to a downloading streaming model over time. Here is an example; for a while business oriented laptops didnt come with a DVD player, they just had a CD player. But watching DVDs on laptops was a big differentiator for OEMs marketing to the business traveler.
This makes may point perfectly: Rebooting to watch a movie? Only a very small tiny insignificant fraction of techno-heads would ever do this. This is a complete and utter non starter for consumers. Come on - how much shit has MSFT taken that XP has to be rebooted just to update the video driver and and some other stuff? Reboot to use a major feature of the platform, and rebooting into another distribution? No OEM on the planet would ever agree to that.
You said:
Soon is actually today in a very real way. Im confident you are familiar with NVIDIAs ION platform. This platform is really, really amazing and its just their first stab at it.
You said:
Fair enough. I completely understand that position. And Im not at all seeking fondness. I also understand that at points in time, governments have agreed with it too. I dont know enough about the stuff you mention here to comment in a meaningful way. Positively, or negatively. What I can say is that everyone is playing hard ball. Even the FOSS folks.
Ya - Apples market cap is stellar, so is their most recently quarterly results. In my personal opinion, this is MSFTs biggest competitor in the consumer space. But, I would suggest to you that market cap isnt a very good indicator of who is doing something right or wrong.
You said:
Hi Symbolset,
Good point on the long posts. I see these as more of a public
conversation between us, rather than post directed at a large number of people.
So, I had a bet with my wife that you would respond exactly the way you did;
e.g. The best way to win is not to play. Thats a great
answer. If the tables were turned, Id answer exactly the same way.
Your comment "Microsoft sucks up to content owners" just in not true.
There is no sucking up here. If anything, we push on them very hard.
I know of a few examples of this, but (unfortunately) its not up to me to talk
about it on SlashDot. The reason we have a DRMed playback
stack in Windows is so that people can watch the video they want to watch.
It really is that simple - you are making a mistake if you make it more
complicated, or put some kind of conspiracy behind it. We get no benefit for any other reason, in fact we pay some pretty hefty dollars
for licensing. The money doesnt flow the other way.
I dont know first hand, but from what I do know about how we make these
decisions, I suspect that the execs in charge would be quite happy if we didnt
have to do all the engineering work around DRM. Were not the only
ones either, the driver folks and silicon design folks put a lot of effort in
here as well. Its all a pain in the ass.
I agree with you on the physical media thing as well: thats why one of my
requirements was to support "no matter the media (optical, streaming, download
etc)."
[ as an aside, I get your point about the term wifey. ]
You keep throwing in argument about copyright and DRM and control.
Were in complete agreement here - and have been all along. DRM
sucks, Copyright law sucks. I suggest you are completely
missing my point. Let me see if I can frame this a bit differently.
Consumers by and large (e.g. when looked at in the aggregate of 100s of
millions) just want a system that works, e.g. they unboxed it, and it plays
BlueRay (today), and streams the content they want to day and tomorrow.
A Linux vendor or OEM could ignore this, but then they would be at a HUGE
competitive disadvantage compared to Windows or another distribution that did
support it.
At the end off they day, people want to see Disney Dancing Bunnies, Glitter,
Water World and the NFL channel. To be broadly successful in the
consumer space Linux based PC needs to let people get this content - seamless
and easily. If this means supporting DRM then thats what that means
- its just business.
Today the internet is not at all the first market. I argue that
this is still the cable and satellite TV folks. I dont have hard
numbers, but this is still the predominant way video entertainment enters the
household. Optical disk rental I suspect is #2.
That being said - Internet streaming delivery has huge potential and I
suspect were not too far from a sea change, but there are significant barriers.
First, people want to watch video on their TV, not their computer.
Next, consumers need a gateway device between the TV and the internet.
This could be a game console (PS2, Xbox, WII) a PC, or a dedicated device.
There isnt the critical mass here yet. Someday, but not today.
I argue its not for at least another three to five years.
Of course, there will be early adopters, as soon as Hulu decides not to be a
dick about it, Ill watch a lot of Hulu on my TV. But consumers are
lazy (again, by and large) they need a service, not a hobby. They need
Comcast or Time Warner to come in, run a line, hook it up to their TV and hand
them a remote control.
In any case, I suggest that you and I agree here again; the market will
change, when it begins to change it will change rapidly, and this will all be
good for the consumer. Less DRM is good for MSFT as well, its less
engineering, testing and support. Im pretty sure the media teams
would love to spend less time on this stuff and mo
Hi SymbolSet :)
You are mixing so many other things - history, current politics, and Turing. In
general, I agree with you mostly (but I really dont get the Turing reference,
its pretty oblique). I suggest we not argue the pros and cons of
copyright law, history and Turing - lets do that in another chain, post, or
forum. If we had that discussion, I think you would find I agreed with you, for the most part.
For example, I think its a bummer that the Pirate Bay guys went to jail; that
its a huge pain to get cable card; and that once I own some media, I should be
able to watch it or listen to it on any of my gizmos. Ill agree in
general that DRM sucks.
So how in the world is enabling people to play Disney Dancing Bunnies with
DRM bad for anyone? (remember, weve agreed that DRM sucks) The
content owners published their content this way, Microsoft provides a software stack
that lets the user watch it in WMP or MCE. Thats bad for the
customer how? Thats just called being legal (which you grok) its
not somehow serving the purposes of any evil overlords. Bummer for
people that want stuff for free that the owner wants money for.
Its amazing to me that you pin evil motives to MSFT in providing OS product
features to play DRMed content. Its just not evil, not one little
teeny tiny bit. Its just business. Microsoft isnt preventing anyone from doing anything.
Non DRMd content plays and copies just fine.
Again, its really simple, if Microsoft doesnt support DRMed playback, then someone
else would and I suspect in a very heavy handed, buggy, supper-crappyâ
way. I know you remember the Sony root kit stuff.
Believe me, I dont like DRM any more than anyone else. Id love to
watch Comcast content on my MCE box, recorded it, put it on my PC, or other gizmo
(like my daughters ipod) with no fuss or muss. I expect that day
will come, but it is not today. Really, MSFT is looking out for the
customer here - maybe not you personally as a customer, but customers none the
less.
Here is my interpretation of your position:
and/or evil.
whole being reviled thing...)
Correct? (really Im asking, please correct me if I dont get the gist
of your points). If thats the case, well we can simply disagree...
Lawful Good vs. Chaotic Evil. Best of three D20 rolls gets to pick which
they are.
I think we can agree on something though - consumers (by and large, US
consumers in particular) will buy DRMed content - in great heaping quantities.
I suggest that few are more than vaguely aware of DRM, and fewer still are
angry about it. The iPod and digital cable TV are the canonical examples
in my mind. Consumers want their entertainment, easily, seamlessly, and
they will pay good money for it. Yes, yes, there are a few that are
(a) pissed and (b) are savvy enough to get around it. And yes, there
is enough noise about this that some audio is now DRM free (I have a Napster
account for that very reason). But for the
vast majority ( J ) of consumers, they will just go
with the flow. For example, my wife and daughter (11) are very
technically savvy - wifey can install Windows and drivers. Daughter
has been using a computer since before she could crawl. Neither one
of them give a rats ass about DRM. Wifey just wants her NFL channel,
and daughter is quite happy with her iPod and iTunes (running on Windows-7 of
course!). Today, both get what they want, easily and seamlessly and both are
happy. If all DRM disappeared tomorrow, they would not be any
happier. I argue that this is representative of consumers as a
I love the holy war against Microsoft about DRM. This was not MSFTs idea, it
was the content owners . This
is really simple, content owns require DRM. The OEM"s have to have it or they
cannot sell systems that play some movies and some audio.
Lets pretend MSFT refused to included DRM playback support in Windows - what
would happen??
and some 3d party companies to provide a separate DRMd stack and
drivers that used
some wacky media container (file format) and encoding formats (wacky mutated codecs). Now, things are just awesome - non DRMed content would play just
fine using the MSFT stuff, but DRMd content would require some 3d party
goo the OEM provided.
So even if MSFT doenst provide it, there will be a DRMed stack on the system: Remember, the user wants to
play their Disney Dancing Bunnies video - the only way they can do this if
they use the OEMs semi-proprietary playback stack and special graphics and
audio driver.
So the user has two completely separate stacks for
A/V...
How is this good for the end user? Really. In your answer, be
sure to avoid all your fan boy emotional hand waving and histrionics.
only people that buy a system from some OEMs can play back this content. 
People that upgrade cant do this.  Awesome... 
Even better only the big OEMs will be able to afford this and it will be baked
into the price of their system.  They will pay royalties and other
fees to the content providers and whoever provided the playback stack and
applicatoins.
This means that many Windows systems would be just like Linux unable to
legally play DRMed content.  This is good for who?
Now, lets talk about how the OEMs would have to deal with shipping Linux in
large volumes to consumers:  They will have to do exactly the same
thing as described above.... why?  Because users want to buy a
system that just works, that means it has to come pre-installed with the
software that will play Disney Dancing Bunnies.  This is guaranteed to come with closed source (binary) graphics drivers, and probably
audio drivers, because thats the only way to support DRMed playback.
Now, if the FOSS licensing makes this hard, expensive, or impossible, thats
just a huge barrier to Linux adoption.
Of course, I dont expect many people reading Slashdot to believe this - but
MSFT is really looking out for end users best interest here.  Users
want to see their video, they want to have a consistent user interface and set
of applications to do that. This is what we have given them.
If you want to rail wildly about DRM, the right target is the content owners
- they dictate the terms. There simply is not a conspiracy here.  Its just business.  If you dont like it, solve it
using a business approach, or lobby for a legislative approach. 
Whining about it on SlashDot is just fun for you, and entertaining for a very
small number of other people; it accomplishes nothing.
That is just so stupid. If your going to make something up - at least make something up that is plausible.
Cool beans :)
One more question: So Disny publishes their video suff in away that requries their malware - thats what happens. Again, Linux has no advanage of Windows or OSX here - if the user wants to watch the video, they will let the malware on the system - everyone is powned.
WRT: "Either way I'm going to get what I want, so it's all good." I couldn't agree more! :)
So, that's another pretty good rant :) really. I love all the emotional hand waving. With respect to open ports, you do have an interesting point and I'm going to do a little research on that for my own education.
You mention marketing quite a bit, with some kind of idea that MSFT Marketing drives product design. It doesn't. Product planning is done in the product groups. For example, Windows is split into two groups COSD (Core Operating System Division) and WEX (Windows Experience). There are three disciplines in each product group; test, program management (PM), and development. These three disciplines work together to define what the teams will do. It is very much bottom up. Of course the execs set the tone and tenor, but individual teams, some as small has just a few people, decide what they will do for a product cycle. This isn't done a vacuum, but the point is that decisions are very distributed -- a good thing. Of course, there is some data we gather from the traditional marketing org, but its mostly pull, not push.
WRT to auto-run; While the number isn't zero (with about a billion installations, nothing is zero) but very little malware gets on a system via Autorun Corporate malware that comes with entertainment media is just malware plain and simple -- some people will go to great lengths to convince the user to install it. It doesn't matter if its on a CD, DVD, a USB stick, downloaded, comes in Email, a custom media player, or YouTube (you may have read that Sony will use its own play for its content on YouTube).
We can disagree on the auto-run thing...
WRT to Office -- I don't know enough about (deeply) it to comment much but my personal sentiments are similar: It's not without fault, but it works pretty freaking good. Office has long had competitions -- some credible free ones even. People still buy it, a lot. I've never see the MS Office trial -- if it has an uninstall bug, It's most likely already been fixed. If not, please file a bug -- really.
But you really are not being effective when you turn the argument like that. Ok, so you may have noticed a bug in MS office trial. One point for you. There is still large numbers of problem bloat ware things out there -- MSFT has nothing to do with them. The Linux community will face the same problem (if it ever gets any market share). This isn't a MSFT problem; it's an eco system problem.
I love your "you can't blame the other guy" statement. You are soooo naÃve. Really, you are. We sell an OS product, we don't sell systems. (Yes, this is an advantage Apple has, it's also a boat anchor). We actually have very, very little control over what hundreds of OEM's do. Sometimes they make expedient choices based on schedule pressure, revenue needs, and tight engineering capacity. We actually have several good sized organizations that do spend all of their time working with OEMs and this kind of stuff still happens. Again, the Linux community may someday face this issue.
Here is a question for you about your statement: "Disney includes on their DVDs in the guise of being a video player. Whatever can be done to prevent that crud should be done." What would the Linux community do here? Remember, the user wants to see the new Disney Dancing Bunnies movie -- to see the movie, they are going to click yes, 10 times in a row and re-boot their system if needed. Their install will open ports, install drivers, hook the kernel, replace components, phone home, associate their app with other file types, and all kinds of other wacky stuff -- because that is what the user will tell the system to do. So don't hand wave or rant here -- really if you were leading a dev team for a Linux distribution -- you are going to solve this problem by how?. You have one constraint -- the user gets to watch the movie.
Next, I completely 100% get it that there is no one Linux. And I do think that is a very powerful thing. If I didn't work at MSF
Ok, that's interesting information on Ubuntu and OpenBSD. I'll send some mail and see if I can't get a butter understanding of why Windows ships the way it does.
WRT group policies - you seem to be saying that because the feature is there at all (auto-run) that it's a big problem. If you turn something off with GP its off - there isn't any ambiguity. Now, you may not believe that it is off, but there isn't anything I can do about that. What I can tell you is that in high security applications, ITPros turn off all kinds of stuff and strictly control what a Windows client can do using Group Policy. This works really well and many, many IT shops are quite happy with it. Note, I understand Linux/Unix as similar capabilities.
About the Sony Root Kit this absolutely positively wasn't MSFT's fault. Sony put a root kit on their CD"s and users had to click it and run it. This was not an auto run problem at all. Be mad at Sony here, not Windows or MSFT. Sony just as easily could have done this for Linux or OSX. Just because they didn't doesn't make Windows less secure. They did it for Windows because Windows is the dominant OS. If that changes and Linux ever gets enough market share to make it interesting, then this kind of thing will happen to Linux too.
WRT to performance on low spec systems: I'll completely agree that Vista has its issues. But, (and I can speak very authoritatively here). Many, many of the problems people have on low spec (and indeed all systems) has nothing to do with Windows itself but with the following kinds of things: A graphics driver that allocates 10X more system memory than it needs to; how about an app installed by an OEM that reads the registry a few million times when it starts up (at boot); buggy device drivers that simply spin at 100% CPU polling for a non-existent bit on a device for 15 seconds or so before timing out; loads and loads of poorly written "bloat ware" installed by OEM's that use tons of memory, perform all kinds of I/O at bad times, and generally soak up tons of resources; I could go on, and on, and on.
For example you say "but then when popping out the high def window in Youtube the system would reliably reboot without warning" - this is almost guaranteed to be a graphics drive bug. Nothing that happens in user mode can cause the system to spontaneously re-boot. Note, please run the upcoming RC build and file a bug if this reproduces for you - really.
All of these problems will face the Linux community if/when Linux becomes popular as a desktop OS. There is nothing in Linux that makes driver writers any smarter, then those who write Windows drivers - in many cases they are the same people. Nothing will keep OEM's from adding goo to the system
The point here is this: A well engineered windows system will run as well as a well engineered Linux system where both systems have operating systems configured in a similar way, with similar features. I suggest this well be particularly true with Windows-7
Now, about your comparison of Vista to XP - in many ways - its apples to oranges. For example, Vista ships with a composed desktop, built in desktop search, volume snapshot, and many other features that XP does not have. This means it will use more system resources. But these costs pay for things users want. If someone doesn't want all that - they can get Starter Edition.
BTW - the P4 800mhz based HP system with Intel 915 graphics and 512MB of RAM you selected cannot be called "fairly recent" by any stretch of the imagination. Intel doesn't event support that stuff anymore. If you are going to talk about modern low capability systems, please focus on Intel's Atom, Intel's ULV parts, AMD's Neo, and Via's Nano. For example, the Nvidia ION stuff rocks - runs windows Vista for every day computing tasks just super duper fine -including Blue Ray HD Playback. Its silky smooth.
I don't have the exact Atom Mother board you linked to - but I'm surprised you having proble
Microsoft doesn't need to do this :) And yes, the maintainers/admins are to blame.
The It department can set group policies to enforce this. Our systems here at MSFT are setup just this way. Even though I have full admin rights to my system, I cannot change it because it is Domain joined group policy.
Not that anybody else is reading this, but that's a much better response and quite the entertaining rant. The sarcasm is actually moderately entertaining.
So, I have a question for you, do any operating systems you approve of install, by default, with all listening ports off? Is Windows they only OS that does this? What does Ubuntu do? How about OSX? Really, Iâ(TM)m asking , Iâ(TM)ve not done a survey of other operating systems to know.
Next, if the answer is no, then please feel free to rant about them as much.
Auto run is there because people want it. They just like their stuff to work (hold your nitpicking Windows isnâ(TM)t perfect, and neither is anything else). Other OS products have similar features. Note, lots of business disables this using group policy , it's not hard.
Regarding the networking bug in playing audio , yup that was a bug. We fixed it. Weâ(TM)re not alone , itâ(TM)s pretty easy to search for bugs in various Linux distributions, Solaris, and OSX. Just search Slashdot for âLinux bugâ(TM). Everyone else fixes their bugs too.
With respect to your comment that âOS won't run well on a 1.6GHz ATOM based PC with 1GB of RAMâ(TM): In some respects you are absolutely correct , there are many scenarios that are suitable for lower performing PCs. For example, running media center to record and play TV, or editing 12 mega pixel RAW images in Photoshop on such a system isnâ(TM)t recommend. But, you are off the mark in many respects , Vista with well engineered drivers, a BIOS that has been well engineered, and lacking what some people call âoebloat wareâ will absolutely run acceptably well , the limiting factor is the HW not the OS or applications. I suspect you will call BS here, but lots of these systems ship and people are happy with them. Are the limits? Sure, but not major ones.
Regarding software installing , I think you are missing something: Microsoft does not build application installers for others. Developers determine how their installers work , Windows doesnâ(TM)t enforce policy. Now, you may believe that Windows should enforce such policies, but think about it, there is now way to do that. Sure, Windows might enforce some kind of default policies if an app used Windows installer tech, but developers that didnâ(TM)t like this would simply write their own installers.
Regarding deployment, I can't say I disagree. Deploying windows can be a pain. I know there are people working on making this a lot better for Win-7, I also understand that deploying Vista is easier than XP, but Iâ(TM)m not an expert there so I cannot comment in detail.
Regarding PXE, I do this almost every day with the test systems in my office. I can load any number of things using PXE including full Windows installs in various flavors, and WinPE.
"Your products suck". That's it? That's the best you have? That's the most original thing you can say? How many times has something almost exactly like that been said on /.?
I'm a dev manager* in the windows core OS division. I can tell you, authoritatively, that I've never heard of anything like "20% of our workers contribute 80%" of the work. Somebody just made that up and/or jumped to conclusions based on some random blog post or partial piece of information.
I also have a senior developer on my team that went to google, found that it sucked, and came back.
* dev mgr = mgr of mgrs
So this is really ironic - Its my understating from reading hundreds and hundreds of /. posts that this isn't supposed to happen with FOSS. Only Micro$oft developers are supposed to have security bugs like this.
Now, how did this ship? Who tested it? Who did the code reviews? Who did the security reviews? Who did all the threat modeling?
Irony aside, (and I am a Microsoft developer) getting security right is hard. FOSS folks are not any better, or worse, than Microsoft, Apple, Sun or IBM developers.
Don't guess.... this isn't hard to figure out. Hook up the kernel debugger and find the faulting component. If you don't do that you are just guessing. This is what any decent developer would do.
Full disk encryption is built into Windows Vista. It supports TPM 2.1