John, it's more a question of privacy and autonomy I think. All this microcode stuff not only allows security risks, but really allows privacy invasion potential, coercion of operating systems, etc. I have to agree with that. While it may not be expansive now, they're only going to continue to develop it until it is rather consuming.
My computer is from 2012 and runs faster than all the new computers because I use Linux... The racket of this bullshit about needing to upgrade all the time is out of hand for the average consumer. 2008 you did the same things online as 2018 for the average consumer... I simply don't have much trust in the status-quo gang of computer stuffs.