Lenovo’s Signature laptops are shutting out other operating systems
There were recent reports of Lenovo blocking installation of Linux on its Windows 10 laptops. However, Lenovo has denied that it is intentionally blocking Linux-based operating systems from being installed on Windows 10 PCs.
Apparently, multiple owners of the Lenovo Yoga 900 13ISK2 laptop are being blocked from installing Linux on the devices. Owners of Lenovo Ideapad 710S PCs are too experiencing the same problems. They were told by a “Lenovo Product Expert” that the supposed lockout is due to an agreement between Microsoft and Lenovo.
However, a Lenovo spokesperson has denied claims that Linux users are being locked out and instead blamed the problem on a recent change to how the SSD is set up on the Windows 10 Signature Edition-branded machine.
“To improve performance, the industry is moving to RAID on the SSDs and Lenovo is leading with this change,” he said.
“Lenovo does not block customers using other operating systems on its devices but relies on the alternative operating system vendors to release appropriate drivers.”
“When the appropriate drivers and kernel support are in place for Linux-based operating systems, users will be able to install the operating system on an SSD with RAID,” he added.
In response to Lenovo’s statement, users complained that they are unable to switch these devices from using RAID mode to AHCI mode, a capability that’s standard in almost all modern motherboard/BIOS systems. Without the ability to switch from RAID, Linux users are effectually blocked from installing anything but Windows (or other operating systems with RAID support) on the machines.
It appears that the company was aware about the issue for some time, as a Lenovo rep had posted on the company’s forums that it was looking into the issue back in July.
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