[delta_p_delta_x]

> It's black boxes all the way down

Essentially the entirety of modern humanity is built on black boxes. I'd like to find one person who knows exactly what and where every single component on their motherboard is and why it is there, the precise transistor layout of every chip from the GPU and CPU down to the tiniest microcontrollers, and every single instruction that is running on their computers at any time.

Sure, you can run Linux, but it still is running on a closed-source CPU. For all we know (unlikely as it is), Intel-AMD CPUs could have a backdoor saying 'hey, send the instruction and data cache to the network controller and to this IP address'. These CPUs still have proprietary microcode.

[Pet_Ant]

That is what is really appealing about some of those retro computer kits where you get a ziplock bag full of parts and PCB and need to solder them together. I feel like I'll understand the hardware on a new level. I hope the Commander X16 ends up offering this option.