Apparently, the Prime has a locked and encrypted bootloader

[Specop 007]

Have you ever seen anyone buy a device just because it has encrypted bootloader? Yeah, me neither.

Have you ever seen anyone not buy a device just because it has encrypted bootloader? Yes, already couple people in this thread.

:sneaky:

I'm not saying sales doesnt suffer, but if you lose .05% of your sales due to some advanced group of users not being happy with it are you really losing all that much?

Going one step further, claiming a product to be a failure because you lost out on 1% of your potential sales probably isnt being fair.

 

[alent1234]

Have you ever seen anyone buy a device just because it has encrypted bootloader? Yeah, me neither.

Have you ever seen anyone not buy a device just because it has encrypted bootloader? Yes, already couple people in this thread.

:sneaky:

the $500 android tablet market is for people who want to root and install ROM's
the cheap tablet market is the Kindle Fire
Apple owns the rest

marketing fail from Asus

 

[ew915]

I'm not saying sales doesnt suffer, but if you lose .05% of your sales due to some advanced group of users not being happy with it are you really losing all that much?

Going one step further, claiming a product to be a failure because you lost out on 1% of your potential sales probably isnt being fair.

Probably not worth it but i will not buy anything Asus, not even their motherboards or other components.

 

[VashHT]

I'm not saying sales doesnt suffer, but if you lose .05% of your sales due to some advanced group of users not being happy with it are you really losing all that much?

Going one step further, claiming a product to be a failure because you lost out on 1% of your potential sales probably isnt being fair.

What's the point of locking it though? It's just extra development work and it's not going to net you any extra sales. I can't imagine many people return stuff because of failed flashes, only a small number of people bother with flashes and and even tinier number end up bricking their devices. I've had phones that couldn't even turn on that I brought back, it's harder to brick a device than people think.

 

[papaschtroumpf]

the $500 android tablet market is for people who want to root and install ROM's
the cheap tablet market is the Kindle Fire
Apple owns the rest

marketing fail from Asus

I agree that the people rushing to the Prime have a high probability to be the crowd that cares about the locked bootloader.

 

[Specop 007]

What's the point of locking it though? It's just extra development work and it's not going to net you any extra sales. I can't imagine many people return stuff because of failed flashes, only a small number of people bother with flashes and and even tinier number end up bricking their devices. I've had phones that couldn't even turn on that I brought back, it's harder to brick a device than people think.

I really dont know why they would lock it. For that matter I cant say with a high degree of confidence that the lost sales isnt a significant amount. I just am skeptical that it is.

Just as interesting to the amount of lost sales would be how many units must be sold to make up for the replacement of one. If you make a 10% profit on each one sold you have to sell quite a few to replace just 1 returned.

 

[JeffreyLebowski]

Have you ever seen anyone buy a device just because it has encrypted bootloader? Yeah, me neither.

Have you ever seen anyone not buy a device just because it has encrypted bootloader? Yes, already couple people in this thread.

:sneaky:

Ever seen people buy something with an encrypted bootloader and hack it and get into it within days? Yes all the time at XDA. And since Asus is providing an unlock utility, this is a non issue.

Issues like this really show the lack of business understanding that most geeks don't have. We are the vast minority. Apple is swimming in cash because a lot of people happily pay top dollar for devices that they can't flash ROMs or overclock or tweak for the best benchmark scores.

They just use the device.

Besides, why do you need an unlocked bootloader? It has ICS already.

 

[gorcorps]

Don't care, still want.

I'm not sure why, but custom roms and the perks of rooting just don't appeal to me on my tablets like they do on my phone. I have an Iconia (which is much less of a device) and the only reason I rooted it was to tweak a couple things that are now there by default or have better apps in the market. Not once did I consider using an entirely different rom. I can't place why there's such a disparity between my feeling the need to screw with my phone and me not caring to do the same to my tablet. Maybe I was that happy with honeycomb and assume I'll be just as happy with ICS.

Maybe this will hurt sales enough to drive the price down quicker. One can dream...

 

[Fox5]

I can see the open source advantages of an unlocked bootloader but what's the reason for them? It seems like it's more engineering work to secure the bootloader... What's the rationale for Asus to lock it down?

Securing proprietary secrets? An open boot loader is software and hardware information your competitors can look at. It's also a something that can be taken and copied by competitors in China, directly. *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huawei#Intellectual_property_rights

An unlocked boot-loader also means that some percentage of your users will get features you may want to sell later. Businesses hate 'losses' of any size that can be easily avoided.

Finally, there's a small security factor to it, although boot level viruses are rare. (right now)

 

[Phokus]

ASUS has reversed their stance btw, they're going to ship out a program to unlock the bootloader (hopefully soon)

 

[Bateluer]

ASUS has reversed their stance btw, they're going to ship out a program to unlock the bootloader (hopefully soon)

http://www.droid-life.com/2012/01/0...ming-ice-cream-sandwich-available-january-12/

The Official statement.

Regarding the bootloader, the reason we chose to lock it is due to content providers’ requirement for DRM client devices to be as secure as possible. ASUS supports Google DRM in order to provide users with a high quality video rental experience. Also, based on our experience, users who choose to root their devices risk breaking the system completely. However, we know there is demand in the modding community to have an unlocked bootloader. Therefore, ASUS is developing an unlock tool for that community. Please do note that if you choose to unlock your device, the ASUS warranty will be void, and Google video rental will also be unavailable because the device will be no longer protected by security mechanism.

Fvcking 'content providers'. Earthquakes and idiots, Florence be damned. 😛

 

[soccerballtux]

That's acceptable compromise. ASUS should've made it clear from the get go. What I find sort of funny is Google DRM excuse for the reason for the bootloader encryption lock.



So let me get this straight. Asus encrypted the bootloader because in order to use Google video rental, it needs the encrypted bootloader? 😵 🙄 If this is true, why doesn't Galaxy Nexus have encrypted bootloader?

it makes sense to me.
The content providers are the pushers of encryption everywhere. At my school you had to buy a $400 decryption device if you wanted to use the HD cable.

 

[soccerballtux]

Securing proprietary secrets? An open boot loader is software and hardware information your competitors can look at. It's also a something that can be taken and copied by competitors in China, directly. *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huawei#Intellectual_property_rights

An unlocked boot-loader also means that some percentage of your users will get features you may want to sell later. Businesses hate 'losses' of any size that can be easily avoided.

Finally, there's a small security factor to it, although boot level viruses are rare. (right now)

honestly I wouldn't be surprised if our desire for an open door policy comes back and bites our economy in the tail. The Chinese have absolutely no reservations about copying anything and everything they can get their hands on. To them, if they can get their hands on the hardware and hack it, it is morally theirs to copy and do with as they see fit.