Quote: "You Do realise it was a hoax?"
Realise what was a hoax?
DELL have legally approved key-logging hardware in thier PCs. What you scared they're stealing your MSN Chats
Somehow I doubt it's in there for spying purposes, probably more there for adsencing and such. Cheap and effective market research.
Sounds like traditional DELL to me. I mean their entire sodding technical support staff were all moved to india/pakistan like 4years ago. They provide you with the cheapest solutions at the minimal most cost to themselves.
Market Research done by 3rd parties generally costs somewhere in the region of $125,000 per report. Soon adds up and it doesn't equal the same to what thier previous users like and don't.
: shrugs : If you care for the paranoia then keep on with it. I suppose the pop-up's that happen with Windows XP default installation are just created by Microsoft to make you ring technical support to have them turned of. All just a big ploy.
Care for your tin-foil hat back?
Ridiculous how either people believe something is a conspiricy or a hoax. (or both)
They'll NEVER, EVER stop large scale piracy.
Quote: "Just take a look at the 'Genuine Windows advantage' thing, that officially started on the 26th of July. It was cracked in 24 hours - and do you want to know why? Its because these guys who piarte stuff don't just pirate for the sake of it they see it as a challenge; a way of showing off how clever they are."
That's still software based, and it's not even hard to beat.
If I check my copy of Windows XP online it fails because I use a Corporate License and it fails, if I download the authenticator and use that one it succeeds.
I find it stupid myself. This whole Geniune Windows push is mainly because of the bloody China and India markets to, they equate to over 75% of the entire worlds piracy. I mean how sickening is that?
Personally the sooner they push out Vista with Hardware Security the better. While you can say 'well they'll crack it eventually', sorry but the only way you can crack Hardware protection is by modifying the hardware to bypass it.
You can do this very easily on the Playstation, Playstation 2, X-Box because it's simply part of the ROM BIOS. Hell you could just flash it. Difference with PC/Mac Hardware Protection is that it's part of the x86/PPC Processors.
Good luck modding them
Even if you don't in order to break the protection you'd have to break a hardware-based AES 4096-bit System running with several I/O Keys, two/three for lock or unlock. So breaking the system like that even software wouldn't be a walk in the park. Processor power required to strong arm something like that, well if you consider that a 128-bit AES takes around 3 hours on a 3.2GHz Pentium D, and a 1024-bit can take as long as 2 weeks on the same hardware. How long do you think just 1 4096-bit would take?
As it's hardware and built-in to the device means that it's practically instant to get results rather than even the built time for something like that on again a Pentium D 3.2GHz would be the best part of 10 minutes, same for the check.
But they're welcome to try.
