Question says it all.
Yes
Yes. Usually base will be in the same ballpark, but stock will be 10x lower - if it's given at all.
Even in the hardware divisions of Microsoft?
Yes. And it’s stack overflow**
yes
About 25-30% low tc
Yes, next
yes
Indeed. Source: Work at a hardware company.
Yes they don’t think software is important.
Yes, TC will be at least 30% less for same work.
Yes