Hi all,

I bought a Lenovo Ideapad 100S before Christmas. My old netbook is not reliable (loose LVDS connector inside the glued screen frame, it seems) and I need a lightweight and trustworthy laptop when on call.

So the idea was installing a proper OS on it but the UEFI is castrated to a point that I cannot even boot from USB (after SecureBoot is off).

"System does not have any USB boot option" I get if I jump through all hoops and restart with USB device chosen.

With a 32GB eMMC I do not have an option to replace that either it seems..(or do I have another option?)

So I went to the Lenovo support website. A form with e-mail support - but the submit button does not work. Firefox is specifically mentioned as compatible with this website.

Okay, chat.

The support apologized for the system limitations and recommended to return it to the shop.

Well, I will try my luck with this in my hands.

I claimed that the device violates UEFI specification. Well, I actually do not know,and it may a bit bogus:

http://www.uefi.org/faq

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Can all systems disable UEFI Secure Boot?

While it is designed to protect the system by only allowing authenticated binaries in the boot process, UEFI Secure Boot is an optional feature for most general-purpose systems. By default, UEFI Secure Boot can be disabled on the majority of general-purpose machines. It is up to the system vendors to decide which system policies are implemented on a given machine. However, there are a few cases—such as with kiosks, ATM or subsidized device deployments—in which, for security reasons, the owner of that system doesn’t want the system changed.

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It does not mention the range of devices to boot from at all.

My wife has another Lenovo netbook bought half a year earlier where I am able to boot from USB (well, the FreeBSD 10.2 UEFI memstick kernel panics shortly after that but that may have another reason).

In general, I see the lockdown as a serious threat for open source.

I wonder whether there are ways to alert the ACCC or other venues.

At least locked down devices should be clearly marked to be aware of this.

Any ideas in that regard? Should we do something on organisational level (via Linux Australia)?

I think this is serious. We loose the ability to run open source on modern hardware completely, if we do not act, I think.

Regards

Peter