>deere still locks all its operating software behind proprietary closed source walls and sues anyone trying to manage their own equipment
honestly John Deere can go fuck himself. If I had to buy a mini excavator or something I'd buy one of those fucking nip ones.
I have a lot of Deere green on my farm, I'm not defending them but it's more complicated than the posts I see about it by people who don't own any equipment.
The software issue and paying absurd fees for the dealer to come out and reset a sensor or computer is a wide spread issue with all equipment. CAT, Komatsu, New Holland, etc will all charge you to reset the computer in your machine if it's out of warranty, plus an upcharge for a house call since you probably can't get the machine to move. I don't know of any of them making their software open source, they all want to bring out their laptop with Brand™ software on it to click a reset button or make adjustments.
I think the time and weather dependencies of farming makes the issue a bigger deal for them to speak up about. Large construction companies making 300% profit on gov jobs can get a spare machine on site in no time. It doesn't work that way for a farm in the middle of nowhere that has rain coming in mid-harvest.
A couple points on why most farmers won't simply switch tractor brands because of this. A lot, if not most, large farms lease their machines that way they're under warranty and don't have to sell a machine when they need a new one, Deere has great lease plans. Dealer location is a big deal if you're out in the country, you're driving far no matter what but 1 hour vs 4 hours makes a difference. Last would be precision planting, I know other companies are catching up but for a while Deere had a substantial lead in their GPS, planting, and auto drive systems. I think most farmers will stick with what they know as long as it's reliable, even if Deere charges extra for better accuracy (they do)
On your last point, those Chinese mini excavators are amazing and well worth the $5.5k, a rear backhoe for a compact tractor is about the same price and way less useful due to not turning 360°. Be careful buying Chinese attachments for skid loaders, I've seen countless posts about the hydraulic motors in them exploding and sending metal into the machines hydraulics, it should be filtered upon return to the reservoir but still not good.