Off-Topic • Avoid newer MSI motherboards - first steps into "Windows-only"

Newer (2020 or later for sure) MSI motherboards come preconfigured to reject booting anything than Windows 10/11
All thank to default "Secure" Boot factory key lists, in which Debian + Ubuntu (+ two unidentified by me) keys are blacklisted...

Obviously what's on whitelist?:

(Both are UEFI-made screenshots of freshly reset UEFI (MSI z490 PRO-A), in original .bmp format)
And yes, it isn't the case only with this particular motherboard - me B450M PRO-VDH Wi-Fi has same problem (even better, it's not under "Security" but a "Windows OS Configuration", eh...), and it's not hard to find other examples on the internet

Hopefully, it's (as for now) still possible to disable "Secure" Boot and boot Debian without problems. If ye really want "Secure" Boot on (for whatever reason) - remove Debian keys from blacklist and move them to whitelist
But well, be aware that "MSI Click BIOS" is crappy, so it may be a bit frustrating process

So? Do not buy MSI crapware - they don't want us, the GNU/Linux users. Maybe they are of very good quality and (hardware) reliability, but UEFI effectively makes all of it's pros worthless. Search for less linux-hostile motherboards
Maybe as for now it's somewhat trivial (nothing more (most times) than just disabling "Secure" Boot), but ignoring this (and therefore buying their hardware) shows them green light for total vendor lock-in (Since ye know - They do such thing, customer still buys their products, so they see that it's "okay" to do). Seriously, I ain't gonna be suprised if in following years, Windows-only hardware will be the only on the market...

(P.S. It seems I'm not first to post 'bout it -> https://www.linuxquestions.org/question ... &p=6393211 (I recommend to have NoScript enabled before entering))

Statistics: Posted by Hetzer — 2024-01-09 16:13 — Replies 1 — Views 196

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