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Guy claims Win10 can't be erased from hard drive, please mythbust

computerdude92

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I saw this review about a run-of-the-mill Hitachi laptop drive:

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"Bye to Windows 10

This is an easy way to get rid of Windows 10 and all its security violations. MS bugs Windows 10 so it cannot be deleted. Only easy was is to replace the hard drive as trying to partition the HD and drivers is a job of work. Work computer is back on duty in security. Stops MS from trying "Cloud" information behind user's commands not to due so. Major security violations--and I work for the GOVT!. JTY"

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What brought this up? Is it really true, or is it an urban legend?

I don't use Windows 10 personally, so I am unable to test this claim.


Thanks for any answers.
 
What a total load of crap.

Next the'll be able hack in to my 286/12 from the in internet. No sorry that's been already clamed, the morons...
 
One only had about a month to revert a Windows 10 upgrade back to the previous version using the option within Windows 10 but reformatting and reinstalling the old OS still worked though obviously less convenient.
 
Hi All;
I agree with Chuck..
The other way is I go to my DBAN DVD and choose which disk to wipe, and how many passes it should take to wipe the Drive..
It doesn't care what was on the Drive, it just wipes every Cylinder and Sector..

THANK YOU Marty
 
I'm sure Linux will happily install over it, and it would make a fun response. ;-0
 
I suspect the guy's issues stem from Secure Boot. And he's not the genius he thinks he is.
 
MS does use a sort of hidden boot sector , similar to what an overlay would use. I could see a novice thinking it was not removable. 5 seconds google searching and he/she could have figured it out. Sadly people are getting dumber, even with a wealth of knowledge at their fingertips.
 
I suspect the guy's issues stem from Secure Boot. And he's not the genius he thinks he is.

In a sense, Microsoft owns every machine with a UEFI firmware installed because only they can sign the keys for Secure Boot bootloaders. This means that for any alternative OS that wants to use Secure Boot has to be blessed by Microsoft, or use a shim to load a self signed kernel.

While we currently have the option to disable Secure Boot and just run in UEFI or UEFI-CSM mode, Intel killed off UEFI-CSM back in 2020 and with Windows 11 requiring Secure Boot to be enabled, we may soon have PCs that either won't be able to run another OS, or it will be exceedingly difficult.

There are already several machines from OEMs that can't run anything but Windows, most specifically HP, because of bugs in their UEFI firmware, or just by design. It's entirely possible that at some point it could trickle into the DIY market. This is especially true as more ARM devices become mainstream. Microsoft has strict requirements for Windows ARM devices where some OEMs don't allow Secure Boot to be disabled at all, making it almost impossible to install Linux or another OS.
 
Joke as much as you want about it, it is not always that simple. In the past things like borked partitions or paranoid firmware/bios could get in the way of re-formatting.

In practice, booting Linux media of some sort and wiping it with "dd" will erase everything. In the worst case, the drive may need to be removed and wiped on a computer that is not as locked down.

I don't know how many machines do this today, but it is not impossible that a machine might require that a vendors provided preparation/partitioning tool be run first. I think people here would remember having to hunt down the correct Compaq Softpaq to pre-load on the hard drive or lose the ability to configure BIOS. Some laptops had to have a special hibernation partition set up first.

I don't know if all SSDs can actually be removed from all machines. As already mentioned Microsoft controls the keys to SecureBoot and some computers already refuse to boot anything other than Microsoft Windows.

I fully expect things to only get worse in the coming years. With the huge steps this world has taken away from science and technology, I'm surprised anyone can make computers that actually run at all.
 
If a battery was flat on an old Compaq System I owned you could just press a function key at the green ASCI box on boot up.to continue as long as the hardware was within spec, without needing a softpaq at all. I did that for quite a few years on my Presario 425CDS. I never ever installed a separate hidden partition accessed by the preessing the F10 key on startup on any of themh

Red Hat/Mandrake 6.x ran fine and picked up every piece of hardware on the CDS524.. Just about to do a similar thing to my 5522 AIO Compaq. https://forum.vcfed.org/index.php?threads/compaq-presario-5522.36633/

 
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Wasn't Apples M1 ARM systems Supposed to be so locked down no other OS could be loaded? Some lass got around that little issue I believe...
 
Wasn't Apples M1 ARM systems Supposed to be so locked down no other OS could be loaded? Some lass got around that little issue I believe...

No, actually. The firmware of M1 Macs intentionally supports booting unsigned kernels, which is why Asahi Linux exists:


Notably Apple makes no such exception for iPad and iPhones despite their essentially identical hardware, which is why Linux is *not* a thing on those. (Outside of a few very obsolete models or a virtualization hack.)
 
No, actually. The firmware of M1 Macs intentionally supports booting unsigned kernels, which is why Asahi Linux exists:


Notably Apple makes no such exception for iPad and iPhones despite their essentially identical hardware, which is why Linux is *not* a thing on those. (Outside of a few very obsolete models or a virtualization hack.)
Thank you very much.,
 
While the M1 Macs may support running alternate OSes like Linux, Apple isn't providing any support for them. Asahi and other Linux distros entirely rely on community support to get the hardware working properly. There is currently no accelerated video driver available for M1 Macs, so it's all done in software on the host CPU. I'm not entirely sure how they handle it because it's definitely not going to be something like VESA modes because that's a PC BIOS thing.
 
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