No, more realistically it results in the device being thrown out for one that doesn't ask the user a million questions at startup.

Sane defaults should be used because they enhance the user experience tremendously. Nobody buys a gadget for its setup, they buy it to use it, and delaying the user from that end goal is not going to do anything but annoy the end user and ultimately harm the manufacturer's bottom lines.

I suspect there is more people in the world that have built their own cpu and hardware from scratch than there is people that operate computers where they have made informed decision about every parameter for every default variable on all software that they use.

Even if we limit our self to just security defaults, what linux system don't have default ulimits? There is tradeoffs naturally in every number, but I would assume even linux from scratch users don't need to explicitly set each and every number. If a user prefer making different tradeoffs they can opt-in to make changes, but even a operative system that is designed to be built by hand by the user carries with it some defaults.