Even More Incriminating Evidence in The Foxconn Debacle!

Published on July 25, 2008 in General by Rami Taibah

Could hardware vendors be deliberately blocking and sabotaging Linux? What would their incentive or motivation be? One would think that would be just stupid, since no matter how small the Linux market is, at the end of the day there will be money exchanging hands. Why would a company say no to paying customers?

In 1998 the Halloween documents, (a confidential memorandum on potential strategies relating to free software, open-source software, and to Linux in particular) established that Microsoft actually fears the Open Source and Linux movement. So would it be too far fetched for Microsoft to use it’s clout and deep pockets to convince hardware vendors to block Linux? I don’t want to jump the gun (or have I already?) but Microsoft isn’t really known for it’s white hat business tactics.

A very bright guy named Ryan (aka TheAlmightyCthulhu over at the Ubuntu Forums) has disassembled the BIOS on his Foxconn motherboard and found a very peculiar behaviour. Long story short, he found several tables written for almost all Microsoft OS’es and only one badly written table for Linux. The Linux table does not correspond to the board’s ACPI implementation. Causing weird kernel errors, strange system freezing, no suspend or hibernate, and other problems. What’s interesting is that ACPI is an open industry standard, and has nothing to do with Microsoft or any other proprietary standards. So all these errors and problems should not exist.

Ryan has found a way to salvage this, down to just crashing on the next reboot after suspend. However the only way to fully rectify this is to buy a Vista CD. According to Ryan, it’s very hard to believe that this is just a simple mistake or a bug, it’s way too calculated:

After looking through the disassembled BIOS for the last several hours, rebooting it, and tweaking it more, I’d say this is very intentional, I’ve found redundant checks to make sure it’s really running on Windows, regardless what the OS tells it it is, and then of course fatal errors that will kernel panic FreeBSD or Linux, scattered all over the place, even in the table path for Windows 9x, NT, 2000, XP, and Vista, and had to correct them (Well, at least divert them off into a segment of RAM I hope to god I’m sure about)

No, this looks extremely calculated, it’s like they knew someone would probably go tearing it apart eventually and so tried to scatter landmines out so as to where you’d probably hit one eventually.

So if it is a mistake, or incompetence, then it’s the most meticulous, targeted, and dare I say, anal retentive incompetence I’ve seen.

The story became an instant hit on almost all social media sites; Digg, Reddit, and Slashdot. But if you thought that that was interesting then there is still more juicy details, it’s so scandalous it makes the Halloween documents look silly.

Back in early 2007, in a court hearing involving Comes vs. Microsoft, an E-mail (dating back to 1999) from Bill Gates to some of his subordinates was released. In the E-mail, Bill Gates complains that Microsoft has to do all the work, and Linux reaps the benefits! He didn’t explicitly say that Microsoft should sabotage hardware for Linux, but he seemed to be toying with the idea of making the API’s work well with WIndows and not with other OS’es. Here is the full text of the E-mail:

One thing I find myself wondering about is whether we shouldn’t try to make the “ACPI” extensions somehow Windows specific.

It seems unfortunate if we do this work and get our partners to do the work and the result is that Linux works great without having to do the work.

Maybe there is no way to avoid this problem but it does bother me.

Maybe we could define the API’s so that they work well with NT and not the others even if they are open.

Or maybe we could patent something related to this.

Here is a full PDF of Bill Gate’s E-mail.

This whole thing blew up today, and we have not yet got an official response from Foxconn. But I believe it’s way too convenient for both of these two incidents to be independant!

About Rami Taibah

Rami Taibah the founder of The Linuxologist and a self proclaimed geek and Linux aficionado. This fall, he will be pursuing an MIMS degree at UC Berkeley, California. You can follow him on Twitter @rtaibah.

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  • airtonix
    @sd : and by "the 5 years of terror" I mean world war 2
  • airtonix
    @sd : and by "the 5 years of terror" I mean world war 2
  • airtonix
    @sd
    the german people were accused of "bitching & moaning" about the inequities being imposed upon them during the 5 years of terror.

    They were accused of this to :
    - shut them up for fear of peer pressure.
    - reduce their credibility among their peers.

    you sound terribly militant in your stand against linux users.
  • airtonix
    @sd
    the german people were accused of "bitching & moaning" about the inequities being imposed upon them during the 5 years of terror.

    They were accused of this to :
    - shut them up for fear of peer pressure.
    - reduce their credibility among their peers.

    you sound terribly militant in your stand against linux users.
  • BillinDetroit, ASUS is throwing Linux on their motherboards soon. Just a bootable little thing for checking up on things I think.

    And they also support the Eee PC which retails with a distro of Linux.

    Probably one of the best hardware manufacturers for Linux.
  • BillinDetroit, ASUS is throwing Linux on their motherboards soon. Just a bootable little thing for checking up on things I think.

    And they also support the Eee PC which retails with a distro of Linux.

    Probably one of the best hardware manufacturers for Linux.
  • I've recently returned to Linux (Ubuntu, to be precise) after a prolonged flirtation with XP on a new laptop. (Oh, BTW, Ubuntu runs perfectly on a Toshiba Satellite A105, Model PSAA2U-04W018).

    I'd buy one again.

    Ultimately, bumping MSIE up to 7.0 toasted my file system. That's when I learned that the Toshiba 'recovery disk' begins with an Fdisk. I installed Ubuntu.

    Thanks for the discussion about Foxconn. I've been contemplating building a desktop for my SOHO. I've built several of them in the past and was planning to put together a fire-breathing machine.

    I can put that brand name on the 'don't bother' list.

    So ... how's ASUS doing these days?

    Oh, and this tidbit for the MSFT fanboys -- according to my blog server logs (6 blogs off a single root, only one is even remotely technical), Linux on end-user machines accounts for nearly 10% of my traffic. I suspect that it might be higher, but some of the OS signatures have been masked ... probably to get around the defensive sniffing some websites do.

    It's easy to slam Linux -- just ignore the facts.
  • I've recently returned to Linux (Ubuntu, to be precise) after a prolonged flirtation with XP on a new laptop. (Oh, BTW, Ubuntu runs perfectly on a Toshiba Satellite A105, Model PSAA2U-04W018).

    I'd buy one again.

    Ultimately, bumping MSIE up to 7.0 toasted my file system. That's when I learned that the Toshiba 'recovery disk' begins with an Fdisk. I installed Ubuntu.

    Thanks for the discussion about Foxconn. I've been contemplating building a desktop for my SOHO. I've built several of them in the past and was planning to put together a fire-breathing machine.

    I can put that brand name on the 'don't bother' list.

    So ... how's ASUS doing these days?

    Oh, and this tidbit for the MSFT fanboys -- according to my blog server logs (6 blogs off a single root, only one is even remotely technical), Linux on end-user machines accounts for nearly 10% of my traffic. I suspect that it might be higher, but some of the OS signatures have been masked ... probably to get around the defensive sniffing some websites do.

    It's easy to slam Linux -- just ignore the facts.
  • init7
    Well then if they decide not to support Linux, at least we know what company to avoid.
    Boy there sure lot of troll here!
  • init7
    Well then if they decide not to support Linux, at least we know what company to avoid.
    Boy there sure lot of troll here!
  • Jose_X
    SD has not heard of antitrust laws or else is ignoring them. I hope you aren't advocating for companies to break the law.

    >> If a company makes a product for its users and mis-represents it in some way, then that is the company's problem. It's consumers will deal with it. The fact of the matter is, 99% of its users are satisfied with the product.

    I doubt 99% of its users are satisfied with the product. I'd like to see the survey you relied on to come up with that number. I doubt most users would even know who to put the blame on.

    More importantly..

    You should look at antitrust laws. These laws are there to protect the consumers so that they have maximal future choice and value (beyond the immediate). Monopolists have too much power. It's so valuable that Monopolysoft would sacrifice a great deal simply to preserve their monopolies.

    If monopolies are allowed to leverage their position to create insurmountable obstacles to competitors that have better products, the consumer and those building the alternatives suffer.

    Thus, the company's fate is not simply in the hands of consumers as you claim. To try and pass that off means that you do not want the government to come in on your behalf when I and my gang of thugs raid your beautiful home and run away with the goods leaving trash behind. We'd do this over and over I think if you decided to keep the government authorities out of the picture. I think you would go crying to the authorities. That is exactly what has to be done here, too.

    And provide the link to that 1% or that 99% if you get the chance. I know you made that up. Regardless, consumers probably could be helped out a bit in becoming informed about the dangers and losses resulting from CLOSED SOURCE software that are used to hide secret hooks and extensions that keep the higher valued FOSS from being a viable solution for some that require a high degree of compatibility.

    >> To the 1%, or in this case, 1 person that is dis-satisfied, Foxconn has acknowledged that it does not support the product with Linux. It has advised that the best course of action is to seek a refund.

    It's funny how they now seem to be cooperating a bit more. I wonder if in fact this kind of behavior affects more than 1%. I wonder if the FTC will agree that they are labeling their products appropriately. I wonder if other government agencies might also have interesting information to discover.

    I'd rather not focus on Foxconn to the extent Monopolysoft is the real culprit.

    >> There are 2 choices here. Get your refund and get on with life, or bitch and moan.

    I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that there are only two choices (snicker). I suppose then that B&M is pretty effective. It gets results.

    >> Now for fanboys to go out and claim that Foxconn is colluding with Microsoft to destroy Linux, I’ll just say this. Grow up because no one cares.

    Confused you are. Not on me being a fan of Linux, but about no one caring. I think you really overestimate the level of (dis)satisfaction out there with Monopolysoft products. I think a lot of people would be disappointed to learn that they are buying products from Foxconn that will tie them in to Vista and other Great(TM) Monopolysoft products.

    If you have to go to the hassle to return a product, you want ALL your associates to know so that they can save themselves the time.

    >> You can either choose to continue with your paranoia and flame the world that is out to get you, or you can get a life and start living in the real world with the rest of us. And yes, you can use Linux to your heart’s content in the real world, because we don’t care!

    I think your view of the world is a little blurry here. This is classical talk from people that have a great hoax on consumers going and would like everyone to believe that only a few fringe "fanatics" are complaining. [The hoax depends on consumers' general lack of expertise with how software works.]

    I am upset to have taken as much time as I did to reply to garbage like this comment you decided to put up. There are some good Linux distros to be made. Nowadays, many more people can create their own portable Linux distro. Firefox and free Openoffice are but the tip of what's available... all for $0. [eg, distrowatch.com]
  • Jose_X
    SD has not heard of antitrust laws or else is ignoring them. I hope you aren't advocating for companies to break the law.

    >> If a company makes a product for its users and mis-represents it in some way, then that is the company's problem. It's consumers will deal with it. The fact of the matter is, 99% of its users are satisfied with the product.

    I doubt 99% of its users are satisfied with the product. I'd like to see the survey you relied on to come up with that number. I doubt most users would even know who to put the blame on.

    More importantly..

    You should look at antitrust laws. These laws are there to protect the consumers so that they have maximal future choice and value (beyond the immediate). Monopolists have too much power. It's so valuable that Monopolysoft would sacrifice a great deal simply to preserve their monopolies.

    If monopolies are allowed to leverage their position to create insurmountable obstacles to competitors that have better products, the consumer and those building the alternatives suffer.

    Thus, the company's fate is not simply in the hands of consumers as you claim. To try and pass that off means that you do not want the government to come in on your behalf when I and my gang of thugs raid your beautiful home and run away with the goods leaving trash behind. We'd do this over and over I think if you decided to keep the government authorities out of the picture. I think you would go crying to the authorities. That is exactly what has to be done here, too.

    And provide the link to that 1% or that 99% if you get the chance. I know you made that up. Regardless, consumers probably could be helped out a bit in becoming informed about the dangers and losses resulting from CLOSED SOURCE software that are used to hide secret hooks and extensions that keep the higher valued FOSS from being a viable solution for some that require a high degree of compatibility.

    >> To the 1%, or in this case, 1 person that is dis-satisfied, Foxconn has acknowledged that it does not support the product with Linux. It has advised that the best course of action is to seek a refund.

    It's funny how they now seem to be cooperating a bit more. I wonder if in fact this kind of behavior affects more than 1%. I wonder if the FTC will agree that they are labeling their products appropriately. I wonder if other government agencies might also have interesting information to discover.

    I'd rather not focus on Foxconn to the extent Monopolysoft is the real culprit.

    >> There are 2 choices here. Get your refund and get on with life, or bitch and moan.

    I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that there are only two choices (snicker). I suppose then that B&M is pretty effective. It gets results.

    >> Now for fanboys to go out and claim that Foxconn is colluding with Microsoft to destroy Linux, I’ll just say this. Grow up because no one cares.

    Confused you are. Not on me being a fan of Linux, but about no one caring. I think you really overestimate the level of (dis)satisfaction out there with Monopolysoft products. I think a lot of people would be disappointed to learn that they are buying products from Foxconn that will tie them in to Vista and other Great(TM) Monopolysoft products.

    If you have to go to the hassle to return a product, you want ALL your associates to know so that they can save themselves the time.

    >> You can either choose to continue with your paranoia and flame the world that is out to get you, or you can get a life and start living in the real world with the rest of us. And yes, you can use Linux to your heart’s content in the real world, because we don’t care!

    I think your view of the world is a little blurry here. This is classical talk from people that have a great hoax on consumers going and would like everyone to believe that only a few fringe "fanatics" are complaining. [The hoax depends on consumers' general lack of expertise with how software works.]

    I am upset to have taken as much time as I did to reply to garbage like this comment you decided to put up. There are some good Linux distros to be made. Nowadays, many more people can create their own portable Linux distro. Firefox and free Openoffice are but the tip of what's available... all for $0. [eg, distrowatch.com]
  • Jose_X
    >> It's a Linux bug.
    >> "To summarise: ....

    Nothing has been proven by Matthew (from whom you get your "it's a Linux bug" bit). He could just as easily surmise that the error is in the firmware as in the kernel. Follow the conversation there instead of just reading the main post. http://mjg59.livejournal.com/94998.html

    I completely expect that the fault lies by far with Monopolysoft. Foxconn's negligence is likely in using Monopolysoft tools and then leaving things sort of sloppily (the devs are "inexperienced") because they know to do otherwise would really hurt their sales and treatment from Monopolysoft.

    Monopolysoft's violations lie in their misimplementation of standards (or through picking odd impl paths where the std offers more than one as correct) and then fixes for the misimplementations are done for their systems through undocumented extensions to the standard. Antitrust authorities shouldn't continue to allow Monopolysoft to keep their code closed while competing in markets that interact with markets where they already have a monopoly. OOXML was horribly problematic on purpose. [Not to say they can't extend ODF, but OOXML leaves them "off the hook" a lot easier]

    Antitrust authorities need to take a good hard look at this.
  • Jose_X
    >> It's a Linux bug.
    >> "To summarise: ....

    Nothing has been proven by Matthew (from whom you get your "it's a Linux bug" bit). He could just as easily surmise that the error is in the firmware as in the kernel. Follow the conversation there instead of just reading the main post. http://mjg59.livejournal.com/94998.html

    I completely expect that the fault lies by far with Monopolysoft. Foxconn's negligence is likely in using Monopolysoft tools and then leaving things sort of sloppily (the devs are "inexperienced") because they know to do otherwise would really hurt their sales and treatment from Monopolysoft.

    Monopolysoft's violations lie in their misimplementation of standards (or through picking odd impl paths where the std offers more than one as correct) and then fixes for the misimplementations are done for their systems through undocumented extensions to the standard. Antitrust authorities shouldn't continue to allow Monopolysoft to keep their code closed while competing in markets that interact with markets where they already have a monopoly. OOXML was horribly problematic on purpose. [Not to say they can't extend ODF, but OOXML leaves them "off the hook" a lot easier]

    Antitrust authorities need to take a good hard look at this.
  • Anonymous coward
    It's a Linux bug.

    "To summarise:

    * There is no code in this DSDT that could determine that the system is running any Linux kernel of 2.6.9 or later. This may even be true of earlier versions - I'm not sure when _OSI support was added
    * Even if the code did manage to determine that the system was running Linux, there are no codepaths that are Linux specific. Every piece of code is run on at least one version of Windows"

    http://www.advogato.org/person/mjg59/diary.html?start=147

    So there we go. Perhaps many eyes should be finding bugs and fewer fingers should be typing conspiracy theories.
  • Anonymous coward
    It's a Linux bug.

    "To summarise:

    * There is no code in this DSDT that could determine that the system is running any Linux kernel of 2.6.9 or later. This may even be true of earlier versions - I'm not sure when _OSI support was added
    * Even if the code did manage to determine that the system was running Linux, there are no codepaths that are Linux specific. Every piece of code is run on at least one version of Windows"

    http://www.advogato.org/person/mjg59/diary.html?start=147

    So there we go. Perhaps many eyes should be finding bugs and fewer fingers should be typing conspiracy theories.
  • @Kencoe, thank you for taking the time to comment on this and helping to fill the blanks on this issue :)

    Your comment was very concise and to the point, and gave me the energy to keep on blogging and advocating Linux and Open Source. Just the fact that somebody out there benefited from the post is reassuring to me that I am on the right track!

    Once again thank you :)
  • @Kencoe, thank you for taking the time to comment on this and helping to fill the blanks on this issue :)

    Your comment was very concise and to the point, and gave me the energy to keep on blogging and advocating Linux and Open Source. Just the fact that somebody out there benefited from the post is reassuring to me that I am on the right track!

    Once again thank you :)
  • kencoe
    SD,

    yet again you miss the point. This is not an OS issue. As a computer professional, I am tasked by my clients to provide them with products that are stable. The ACPI STANDARD has nothing to do with windows or Linux. it is an open standard. All of Foxconn's data on this board says that it is ACPI compliant, and it is not. That would be like moving into a house that passes inspection on electrical only to find out that there is no grounding installed. You may find out when something does go wrong that those standards where much more important to you than you realized, regardless of what is plugged in to those outlets.

    Standards don't exist to keep Linux users happy. There is a little more reason behind all the effort involved in creating them. As a professional, I want something that conforms to these standards, whatever OS I install, and I am quite unhappy if the manufacturer makes false claims to that effect.

    As a professional, I also want to know that when I call a company with a complaint about an issue regarding violation of standards which they say they certify to, the answer I get is not "so what."

    You can be certain that the indiviual who posted this complaint has returned the Foxconn board, and will most likely never buy another one. You can also be certain that, regardless of your useless bantering about how Linux users suck (which makes no useful point), there are a number of Suppliers and Builders (including the one I work for) who are waiting for answers from Foxconn, and that want a much better answer than what you are spewing.

    This is not a case of "bitching and moaning" as you say. The post did me a favor by letting me know that the products on my shelves are not labeled correctly, and that the company either doesn't know enough to be able to tell, or doesn't care if it deceives it's customers. My testing this morning, and the answer which I (and many others) received from Foxconn confirms that there are compliance issues with these boards, and they are now packed in boxes waiting for return. That means one board for each customer that will not receive a defective product, and possibly one customer not walking in my door to ask me why I would put that product on my shelves. I don't consider this a case of "bitching and moaning." I consider it a case of one person doing me a very big favor before it came back and bit me where it counts for selling these boards.

    Like you said yourself, it is the consumers who deal with it. Thanks to this post, I caught a potential issue, and as a vendor (and consumer) I did, in spite of your comments. I will also say that, from the attention this article is getting, apparently someone does care. I can also thank you for trolling and giving me a good chance to take five minutes and explain to many of them who are wondering just why these standards are important, and just why this post was helpful. Thank you, again, for your help.

    NoProblem,

    You might want to be careful with that statement. Foxconn is not a tier three manufacturer like PcChips or Biostar. It is a tier one builder, and many name brand systems are built with their components. Dell, HP, Gateway and Apple all use their components in various models, and they manufacture under a few other brands for their components.
  • kencoe
    SD,

    yet again you miss the point. This is not an OS issue. As a computer professional, I am tasked by my clients to provide them with products that are stable. The ACPI STANDARD has nothing to do with windows or Linux. it is an open standard. All of Foxconn's data on this board says that it is ACPI compliant, and it is not. That would be like moving into a house that passes inspection on electrical only to find out that there is no grounding installed. You may find out when something does go wrong that those standards where much more important to you than you realized, regardless of what is plugged in to those outlets.

    Standards don't exist to keep Linux users happy. There is a little more reason behind all the effort involved in creating them. As a professional, I want something that conforms to these standards, whatever OS I install, and I am quite unhappy if the manufacturer makes false claims to that effect.

    As a professional, I also want to know that when I call a company with a complaint about an issue regarding violation of standards which they say they certify to, the answer I get is not "so what."

    You can be certain that the indiviual who posted this complaint has returned the Foxconn board, and will most likely never buy another one. You can also be certain that, regardless of your useless bantering about how Linux users suck (which makes no useful point), there are a number of Suppliers and Builders (including the one I work for) who are waiting for answers from Foxconn, and that want a much better answer than what you are spewing.

    This is not a case of "bitching and moaning" as you say. The post did me a favor by letting me know that the products on my shelves are not labeled correctly, and that the company either doesn't know enough to be able to tell, or doesn't care if it deceives it's customers. My testing this morning, and the answer which I (and many others) received from Foxconn confirms that there are compliance issues with these boards, and they are now packed in boxes waiting for return. That means one board for each customer that will not receive a defective product, and possibly one customer not walking in my door to ask me why I would put that product on my shelves. I don't consider this a case of "bitching and moaning." I consider it a case of one person doing me a very big favor before it came back and bit me where it counts for selling these boards.

    Like you said yourself, it is the consumers who deal with it. Thanks to this post, I caught a potential issue, and as a vendor (and consumer) I did, in spite of your comments. I will also say that, from the attention this article is getting, apparently someone does care. I can also thank you for trolling and giving me a good chance to take five minutes and explain to many of them who are wondering just why these standards are important, and just why this post was helpful. Thank you, again, for your help.

    NoProblem,

    You might want to be careful with that statement. Foxconn is not a tier three manufacturer like PcChips or Biostar. It is a tier one builder, and many name brand systems are built with their components. Dell, HP, Gateway and Apple all use their components in various models, and they manufacture under a few other brands for their components.
  • kyle
    sd:

    Exactly. *nix fanboys need to get new and better brands of hardware. If you like foxconn so much, let me suggest a brand of equal suck, ecs or pcchips!
  • kyle
    sd:

    Exactly. *nix fanboys need to get new and better brands of hardware. If you like foxconn so much, let me suggest a brand of equal suck, ecs or pcchips!
  • NoProbem
    Simple avoid any products by that company.

    As a person who specifies deployment of many systems for the company I work for. We will make it policy to avoid this, as we use Linux/Unix systems throughout our organizations.

    Vista es worthless!!! I always strip it out of any computer I get.
  • NoProbem
    Simple avoid any products by that company.

    As a person who specifies deployment of many systems for the company I work for. We will make it policy to avoid this, as we use Linux/Unix systems throughout our organizations.

    Vista es worthless!!! I always strip it out of any computer I get.
  • sd
    If a company makes a product for its users and mis-represents it in some way, then that is the company's problem. It's consumers will deal with it. The fact of the matter is, 99% of its users are satisfied with the product.

    To the 1%, or in this case, 1 person that is dis-satisfied, Foxconn has acknowledged that it does not support the product with Linux. It has advised that the best course of action is to seek a refund.

    There are 2 choices here. Get your refund and get on with life, or bitch and moan.

    Now for fanboys to go out and claim that Foxconn is colluding with Microsoft to destroy Linux, I'll just say this. Grow up because no one cares.

    You can either choose to continue with your paranoia and flame the world that is out to get you, or you can get a life and start living in the real world with the rest of us. And yes, you can use Linux to your heart's content in the real world, because we don't care!
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