[hpsdr] Ozy/Magister will likely stop working on Win10 in about 60 days

[George Byrkit]

Dear Dick,
Your email would be better without anti-Microsoft invective...  We have a problem coming
up on Windows 10, and moving to Linux just doesn't fix the problem for those who do not
want to move.

This is tied to a change in Microsoft policy, and as the article I referenced indicates,
it is related to Secure Boot.  So yes, we have knowledge that it is tied to this.  And we
expect that some/any hams will be reluctant to change the BIOS settings in their new
computer.  We have no expectation that we could or should force them to disable this
setting.  Nor do we think that having to choose at boot-time to load 'test drivers' is a
legitimate option.

Windows 10 is a real operating system, despite what you might think.  You cannot fault
developers for implementing on the OS vendor (Microsoft) that is used by the vast majority
of personal computers (I exclude phones and tablets here, on purpose.)  I am using it just
fine on about a half dozen computers at home, including my Ham computer, and my
development machines.  Much better to move to the new OS version, get familiar with it,
and overcome any objections, rather than speak about them vaguely.

There are so many versions of Linux, and in fact KISS Konsole runs on the Mac and on
Ubuntu.  I cannot speak for PowerSDR.  Every OS at one time or another puts obstacles and
changes in the way of compatibility.  I've been at this about 40 years.  No one is better
or worse than anyone else.

Yes, people with Ozy/Magister could keep running on older operating systems.  It would
help me a lot if they did!  But some/any will upgrade to Windows 10, possibly because
their older computer dies, and then come to realize that they have this problem.  Or they
have upgraded to windows 10 from, say, windows 7, and don't have this problem now, but if
they have to reformat their hard drive, or (re)install the OS to a new hard drive, they
WILL have this problem.

One of the reasons that we went to Ethernet with Metis was that a performant driver comes
with every OS that we might use (Windows, Mac, Linux.)  The other reasons included that
the driver was provided by the OS vendor, needed no signing, had much higher data transfer
capacity at the time, transferred large packets efficiently, etc.

73,
George K9TRV

-----Original Message-----
From: Dick Faust [mailto:k9ivb at cox.net] 
Sent: Saturday, August 20, 2016 3:46 PM
To: George Byrkit <ghbyrkit at chartermi.net>; HPSDR <hpsdr at openhpsdr.org>
Subject: Re: [hpsdr] Ozy/Magister will likely stop working on Win10 in about 60 days

Does anyone have knowledge that this signing is directly tied to UEFI / 
Secure boot in the BIOS ?   When Win 10 first came out I "upgraded" on 
MBR [now called legacy] boot with both x32 and x64 systems with out a 
problem.  If converting to boot MBR/Legacy would solve the problem, this 
would not be a very difficult task as build 1607 ISO's are now available 
with direct download from Miserable$oft, just remember to get your 25 
digit key first.

I have used the Win 10 ver1607 release and there are many more issues 
there than just this.

Another possibility is to just dedicate a Win 7 or XP system to the 
Ozy/Magister system.  There are plenty of motherboards/older OEM systems 
that will run very well if dedicated.  Intel NUC's are very small and 
can VESA mount on a monitor.

A solution that I would really like to see is a move to a real operating 
system like Linux with ready to run packages for all of the openHPSDR 
software.  The biggest detraction to Linux, for new users, is the need 
to find, configure and compile all of the the various required 
libraries.  A package for a single distro like Mint/Ubuntu would get a 
lot of users up and running very quickly. This would also eliminate the 
inevitable future Micro$oft problems, which are certain to be as bad or 
worse than this one.

Dick K9IVB

On 8/20/2016 7:51 AM, George Byrkit wrote:
> ***** High Performance Software Defined Radio Discussion List *****
>
> Dear all,
>
> So Microsoft has a policy for double-signed drivers on Windows 10 that didn't exist
> before, and it will take place between 60 and 90 days after the release of Windows 10
> Anniversary (build 1607).
 >  Snip