Dang it, I just missed this. We picked up a meerkat a month back and it has performed superbly.
System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
151–160 of 276 posts
Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why no AMD CPUs? I just don't buy anything Intel and I'm for some time looking at System76, but each time I go build a setup I remember why I gave up the last time around. Also, with the price difference between the two it would be a more interesting hardware using this difference to acquire more RAM.
Can't speak for System76, but I got the AMD Thinkpad (A485), and I'm honestly disappointed as hell and now I understand why you don't see the Ryzens on laptops too much. The power management is an absolute joke (the thing has two batteries and barely lasts 2 hours total), suspend works maybe 20% of the time, and the OS actually freezes on it every now and then leaving no trace in syslog. I'd much rather get an Intel…
The A485 was their first attempt with the first mobile Ryzen release. The T495s (latest mobile release) should be way better.
For reference, I had a Ryzen 1800x and it had the same OS freeze issue. The latest Ryzen CPU hasn’t had any issue with 0% down time for months.
Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
What about oreboot, the Rust version of coreboot? I know you have a history with writing Rust code, so are you looking at oreboot as an alternative to coreboot for these purposes, as well?
oreboot does not support x86 at this time, and does not plan to.
There's a stated reason for that by the oreboot project -- it's because you can't have a fully open source boot firmware on x86 systems.
Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#154Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#155I am Jeremy Soller, Principal Engineer at System76. Let me know if you have any questions. The source for this can be found here: https://github.com/system76/firmware-open There are instructions there for building and testing the firmware in QEMU, you do not need to have our hardware to try it out.
I have one. How are you claiming open source firmware when your hardware requires signed, closed source binaries to even begin to boot? I refer specifically to the Intel Management Engine, which incidentally is why we gave up on x86 many years ago. How did you solve the GPU closed, signed firmware problem for discrete GPUs? How about the WiFi card firmware? I understand your decision to try to keep compatibility with…
kb9,
For embedded and laptop devices, are there power devices or other options for truly free firmware?
The desktop price point on current boxes are still high, do you foresee those prices dropping in the future?
Will newer POWER architectures create a large workload for you or is it more simple?
- cal
Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#156Worst company to buy a Linux laptop from. I attempted to purchase a laptop from them in the past and got hit with crazy duties even though the wording on the site made it appear that there were none.
Simply better to buy a certified Dell laptop such as: Latitude 7490 or Latitude 7480
Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have one. How are you claiming open source firmware when your hardware requires signed, closed source binaries to even begin to boot? I refer specifically to the Intel Management Engine, which incidentally is why we gave up on x86 many years ago. How did you solve the GPU closed, signed firmware problem for discrete GPUs? How about the WiFi card firmware? I understand your decision to try to keep compatibility with…
kb9, For embedded and laptop devices, are there power devices or other options for truly free firmware? The desktop price point on current boxes are still high, do you foresee those prices dropping in the future? Will newer POWER architectures create a large workload for you or is it more simple? - cal
Laptop is a large problem still -- mainly due to GPUs. With desktop, we don't have to deal with the issues associated with a soldered-down non-free GPU; the mainboard works blob-free if desired but the user already expects to install a discrete GPU if they need one. With laptops, the GPU has to be integrated, and there are no GPUs in production today that don't require signed firmware (this is due to the DRM contracts for Netflix and Disney+, that kind of thing).
Price point is not likely to drop until we reach a largely self sufficient critical mass of users, developers, and software. Only x86 has crossed that threshold right now, so it's clearly a high bar. Still, the more users we have, the more possibility for pricing drops in the future!
New POWER is near seamless from a software perspective, just like on x86. Upgrade kernel, keep using your existing software installs. And since POWER is now an open ISA, that software will basically keep working forever -- if you needed to reimplement it on a 22nd century FPGA due to lack of hardware, you're legally able to do so. This is not the case for x86 or ARM.
Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#158I am Jeremy Soller, Principal Engineer at System76. Let me know if you have any questions. The source for this can be found here: https://github.com/system76/firmware-open There are instructions there for building and testing the firmware in QEMU, you do not need to have our hardware to try it out.
I have one. How are you claiming open source firmware when your hardware requires signed, closed source binaries to even begin to boot? I refer specifically to the Intel Management Engine, which incidentally is why we gave up on x86 many years ago. How did you solve the GPU closed, signed firmware problem for discrete GPUs? How about the WiFi card firmware? I understand your decision to try to keep compatibility with…
You two, please, set up a super-open-source-software-based video call and start to get this done. Then just say the price and I'll pay.
Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why no AMD CPUs? I just don't buy anything Intel and I'm for some time looking at System76, but each time I go build a setup I remember why I gave up the last time around. Also, with the price difference between the two it would be a more interesting hardware using this difference to acquire more RAM.
Can't speak for System76, but I got the AMD Thinkpad (A485), and I'm honestly disappointed as hell and now I understand why you don't see the Ryzens on laptops too much. The power management is an absolute joke (the thing has two batteries and barely lasts 2 hours total), suspend works maybe 20% of the time, and the OS actually freezes on it every now and then leaving no trace in syslog. I'd much rather get an Intel…
I have a similar experience with the A285. Battery life is disappointing with Windows 10, and significantly more so with Ubuntu and variants.
Re: System76 Will Ship Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open-Source Firmware
#160I am Jeremy Soller, Principal Engineer at System76. Let me know if you have any questions. The source for this can be found here: https://github.com/system76/firmware-open There are instructions there for building and testing the firmware in QEMU, you do not need to have our hardware to try it out.
Are you familiar with the ThinkPad x210? Have you thought of addressing the market of people wanting a small (12 to 13 inch), robuste, laptops with trackpoint and no arbitrary memory limitation? Lenovo has abandoned that market, and there's enough demand for people to create and sell kits for it. Could System 76 fill that gap?
I have an x210. The main reasons I bought it were the keyboard and the screen (2880x1920, which is a 3:2 aspect ratio). If you want a small laptop with 32GB of RAM, the X390 and L390 seem like decent options.