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FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

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Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#131
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a hard time making the parent comment even making logical sense. So the reason we are not seeing say open CUDA drivers from NVIDIA for Linux is that they instead distribute closed ones for permissively licensed operating systems such as FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Illumos, MINIX, Plan9, etc.? Which (apart from all lacking CUDA drivers) all universally have less support from hardware manufacturers both when it comes to o…

> FreeBSD got closed NVIDIA graphics driver support about a decade after Linux Ahem, https://cgit.freebsd.org/ports/commit/?id=94fc89fbfbc7cd8886... > some game consoles used FreeBSD as a basis and had proprietary NVIDIA drivers written for them You mean proprietary AMD drivers? (Only PlayStation 4 and 5 are based on FreeBSD.)

Thank you for correcting me. Nothing to add in terms of AMD. But I could have sworn that there was a set of “demands” in terms of features from NVIDIA around the time I used FreeBSD on my desktop (~2010) in order to produce binary drivers back then. Perhaps I am misremembering?

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#132
post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> FreeBSD got closed NVIDIA graphics driver support about a decade after Linux Ahem, https://cgit.freebsd.org/ports/commit/?id=94fc89fbfbc7cd8886... > some game consoles used FreeBSD as a basis and had proprietary NVIDIA drivers written for them You mean proprietary AMD drivers? (Only PlayStation 4 and 5 are based on FreeBSD.)

Thank you for correcting me. Nothing to add in terms of AMD. But I could have sworn that there was a set of “demands” in terms of features from NVIDIA around the time I used FreeBSD on my desktop (~2010) in order to produce binary drivers back then. Perhaps I am misremembering?

That would be the amd64 driver port: https://wiki.freebsd.org/NvidiaFeatureRequests. For comparison, the first x86_64 driver version for Linux seems to be 1.0-4499 (https://download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86-64/1.0-4499/) from 2003-09-02.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#133

Serious question: what is so compelling about the FreeBSD desktop experience compared to Linux that makes it worth jumping through all these hoops?

The BSDs are much cleaner than Linux distros. Also, because they don't change gratuitously, once you learn their quirks, you can move on to other things without needing to worry about re-learning tons about the next update. Linux is a constantly moving target with lots of churn that users of computers really don't want or need.

Yep, Linux (the userland) is the Google of open source world. You can see similarly little respect for actual user's experience. At Google, it's driven by greed (promos), with Linux, by fun of re-writing things from scratch instead of improving on existing solutions.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#134
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No? The vast majority of hardware has OSS drivers (and they're usually even the better choice!) - the big exception here for average machines is NVIDIA.

AMD cards depend on non-free firmware.

And both Intel and AMD processors use non-free microcode. Firmware and drivers are distinct units, as only one of them runs on the CPU.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#135
post #20

This is nice. Couple of days ago I published 80 pages work describing my experience installing FreeBSD on Lenovo Ideapad 3 Gaming laptop and making it to work. The article is in Russian, but I think it can be easily read through Google Translate, here's the link: https://habr-com.translate.goog/en/post/683702/?_x_tr_sl=ru&... My experience was pretty similar to that of the owner of Framework laptop, except some extra…

I'll definitely come back to this if I ever install FreeBSD. I found one small issue:

    -rwxr-sr-x  1 games  games  1713664 Jul  9 17:01 /usr/local/share/nethack33/nethack33* 
    -rwxr-sr-x  1 games  games    19744 Jul  9 17:01 /usr/local/share/nethack33/recover* 
Here it's actually the SGID attribute that is set, not SUID.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#136

Man, FreeBSD really needs some driver love... * No Suspend/Resume? Linux has solved this for years, I have not come across a laptop in the last 10 years that had trouble with s2r or s2d (but I guess that there might be a few that don't fully support it, I mainly tested Dell laptops) * WiFi driver and Ethernet over USB-C both highly unstable? That's an Intel chipset, those are usually the more stable ones (at least on…

> This is just SPI It isn't "just SPI". That is a fallback protocol for the full SD interface.

SPI is the other interface. Both are legit and official.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#137
post #20

This is nice. Couple of days ago I published 80 pages work describing my experience installing FreeBSD on Lenovo Ideapad 3 Gaming laptop and making it to work. The article is in Russian, but I think it can be easily read through Google Translate, here's the link: https://habr-com.translate.goog/en/post/683702/?_x_tr_sl=ru&... My experience was pretty similar to that of the owner of Framework laptop, except some extra…

I'll definitely come back to this if I ever install FreeBSD. I found one small issue: -rwxr-sr-x 1 games games 1713664 Jul 9 17:01 /usr/local/share/nethack33/nethack33* -rwxr-sr-x 1 games games 19744 Jul 9 17:01 /usr/local/share/nethack33/recover* Here it's actually the SGID attribute that is set, not SUID.

Yes, of course. Fixed. Thanks for noticing.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#138
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I wrote it just for fun. It was a kind of challenge for me, both resolving issues and describing them in detail to let new people in town learn how issues can be resolved. Last time I wrote anything that long was my diploma thesis 20+ years go. :-) This work took me nearly four months to accomplish.

It was a really interesting read, we need more long form guides like this - it takes a lot of work but this is the kind of resource I would love to read getting setup.

Thanks. I consider describing my experience using CADs on FreeBSD (KiCAD, FreeCAD), as this is my work at the moment. Though, this won't differ much from using same on Linux. :)

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#139
post #134
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AMD cards depend on non-free firmware.

And both Intel and AMD processors use non-free microcode. Firmware and drivers are distinct units, as only one of them runs on the CPU.

Not on libre distros. I mean, not more than loading the burned one.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#140
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aren't most Linux drivers closed source binary blobs?

"most" and "drivers" are things that need specific usages to be true, but if you drop them and restate, you're absolutely right. It is really hard to have a complete personal computer on Linux or any other OS that doesn't require closed source / proprietary binary blobs.

Not at all, my Intel NUC except for the tiny wireless dongle totally runs with libre drivers.
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