.So you can't replace your UEFI FW with Coreboot. Big deal. There is no reason to install Coreboot and it would be risky at best.
Who cares? Only those who see the benefit in open source operating systems, utilities and support FSF/OSF. Forgetting cost, they want the freedom to be able to study how and what a program/operating system is actually doing - with their personal information and data. And those who aren't in love with the Microsoft/NSA relationship - closed operating source so no audit on what Microsoft could/does plant in the code.
Being able to have an open source BIOS, while important, is only the side issue here. The issue is closed hardware that contains a significant amount of, for lack of a better term, execution time code - code different to that implementing basic hardware instruction set and function. The issue is the Intel ME. Both the dedicated hardware and the encrypted blob (code) that it runs. Perhaps in its early incarnations were acceptable but in later Intel chipsets the ME hardware and software cannot be disabled. From Igor Skochinsky's paper:
. Management Engine (or Manageability Engine) is a dedicated microcontroller on all recent Intel platforms . Shares flash with the BIOS but is completely independent from the main CPU . Can be active even when the system is hibernating or turned off (but connected to mains) . Has a dedicated connection to the network interface; can intercept or send any data without the main CPU's knowledge
So in short if you are happy with a separate "watch dog" processor running alongside your PC's main processor, with nearly unlimited ability to snoop on what the main processor is doing/has access to AND is capable of out-of-band network access,, well then I guess you are right - there's no reason to want something like Coreboot, no big deal.
Re: Who cares?
Who cares? Only those who see the benefit in open source operating systems, utilities and support FSF/OSF. Forgetting cost, they want the freedom to be able to study how and what a program/operating system is actually doing - with their personal information and data. And those who aren't in love with the Microsoft/NSA relationship - closed operating source so no audit on what Microsoft could/does plant in the code.
Being able to have an open source BIOS, while important, is only the side issue here. The issue is closed hardware that contains a significant amount of, for lack of a better term, execution time code - code different to that implementing basic hardware instruction set and function. The issue is the Intel ME. Both the dedicated hardware and the encrypted blob (code) that it runs. Perhaps in its early incarnations were acceptable but in later Intel chipsets the ME hardware and software cannot be disabled. From Igor Skochinsky's paper:
. Management Engine (or Manageability Engine) is a dedicated microcontroller on all recent Intel platforms
. Shares flash with the BIOS but is completely independent from the main CPU
. Can be active even when the system is hibernating or turned off (but connected to mains)
. Has a dedicated connection to the network interface; can intercept or send any data without the main CPU's knowledge
So in short if you are happy with a separate "watch dog" processor running alongside your PC's main processor, with nearly unlimited ability to snoop on what the main processor is doing/has access to AND is capable of out-of-band network access,, well then I guess you are right - there's no reason to want something like Coreboot, no big deal.