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Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

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Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#101

Post by gerbal »

yoklov wrote: post #93
adamnemecek wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just found this which says exactly what my thoughts are http://ramblingfoo.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-stupidest-trend-...

That's a fairly compelling argument, but I definitely have had times where I wished for a numpad on my Macbook, mainly so that I could play games that required them (I went through a few months where I played through several traditional roguelikes, and this isn't uncommon in that genre, though vikeys is more common and far better IMO).

Fortunately, there are lots of hardware solutions to that problem.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&De...

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#102

Post by quadrangle »

zkanda wrote: post #100

Wow, that price is not justifiable, the spec at System76[0] is way better and cheaper. 0. http://www.amazon.com/System76-Galago-Ultrapro-Processor-120...

I beg to differ. (I'm unaffiliated and haven't donated btw). The Purism project is not directly comparable. They are doing substantial extra work and hassle and working with different parts. It's not about whether the machine runs a fully-free OS (System 76 running Ubuntu isn't even fully-free as Ubuntu isn't fully-free). It's about even the basic hardware drivers, BIOS, firmware etc. all being free/libre and the extra cost is covering the hassle and specifics of making that happen in the real world today.

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#103

Post by pingswept »

rl3 wrote: post #10
pingswept wrote: post #6

This appears to be similar to the open source hardware Novena laptop ( https://www.crowdsupply.com/kosagi/novena-open-laptop ), but closed source hardware. From the Purism crowdfunding campaign: "The Librem 15 is the first high-end laptop where you are in control and have complete visibility into the kernel, the operating system, and all software." It seems like the Novena came first and is substantially more free/op…

It would be amazing if Novena or other projects like it evolved into something resembling Google's Project Ara, but for laptops instead of phones. Laptops have unfortunately never really achieved the modularity and ease of modification that PCs have. They are seemingly perpetual slaves to cost, form factor and all the concerns that follow.

I would prefer to see Project Ara evolve into Novena. Google can keep their "NOT FOR SALE OR EXCHANGE" developer's agreement.

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#104

Post by pingswept »

dmicah wrote: post #46
pingswept wrote: post #6

This appears to be similar to the open source hardware Novena laptop ( https://www.crowdsupply.com/kosagi/novena-open-laptop ), but closed source hardware. From the Purism crowdfunding campaign: "The Librem 15 is the first high-end laptop where you are in control and have complete visibility into the kernel, the operating system, and all software." It seems like the Novena came first and is substantially more free/op…

I'm interested if anyone has any insight into why there is a such a push for "Free" software (for example by the FSF, Richard Stallman), but not also "Free" hardware.

There is a push for open source hardware, but it is a substantially smaller movement. The Open Source Hardware just formed a year or two ago: http://www.oshwa.org/ The movement is growing, but it appears to be around 15 years behind software, and maybe not growing as quickly as OSS did.

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#105

Post by [deleted] »

dmm wrote: post #95
cbd1984 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They are going the top-down way of stripping an X86 machine from all its secret firmware. Do they consider CPU microcode updates to be secret firmware?

The CPU is fused to accept non-signed microcode so someone could eventually replace the microcode with a free alternative.

[deleted]

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#106

Post by gambiting »

adamnemecek wrote: post #51

I'm surprised no one has said this yet but I can testify that a numpad keyboard on a laptop is like the worst ergonomic design that is somehow currently still popular. It's one of the things where I literally cannot comprehend how someone would think that it is ok.

I can testify that I would not buy a laptop without a numpad, it's in my opinion absolutely essential. I literally cannot comprehend how someone wouldn't want one.

As you can see, it's all a matter of opinion.

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#107

Post by Decade »

serf wrote: post #41
BrainInAJar wrote: post #22

What CPU is it running? Because last time I checked the Intel microcode wasn't open source

an i7, which while proprietary doesn't necessarily have to be bundled with the typical Intel AMT, which the FSF dislikes[1]. Besides the CPU, it contains proprietary nVidia chips. Another company which doesn't have too stellar of a 'open' record. [1]: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/active-management-techno...

Also, they're no longer using the Nvidia chip. They say it's because they decided that VT-d was very important, and the i7-4770HQ needed for the VT-d required them to use the Intel GPU.

Honestly, I prefer the Intel GPU. I don't play a lot of 3D games, and the Iris Pro GPU is so much faster than many discrete GPUs I've used, and the Intel graphics driver team actually tries to cooperate with the open source community. Unlike the Intel network driver team.

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#108

Post by enupten »

bla2 wrote: post #26
enupten wrote: post #23

I wish it was more Thinkpad-y rather than Macbook-y; especially since Lenovo -I've heard- is well on its way to ruining the former.

The newest Carbon X1 looks pretty good, at least compared to the previous model.

Yeah, but it doesn't the Trackpoint buttons.. which makes it infinitely worse.

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#109

Post by rl3 »

franciscop wrote: post #92
XorNot wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Project Ara seems like it might solve that problem itself. A laptop chassis which was just a GIANT Ara frame maybe?

Project Ara is going to be bigger than a regular mobile. It just has to have all those connecting hardware pieces.

Hopefully that turns out to be the case.

I have a feeling that modularizing (at least in Ara fashion) cutting-edge GPUs and x86 processors is no small feat. Never say never, but it seems unlikely that form factor could be maintained, let alone heat and interconnect requirements dealt with, when simply boxing up existing laptop or PC hardware.

It's likely that a lot of custom engineering and partnerships would be required beyond simply containerizing existing hardware. On the other hand, the trend toward things like on-die GPUs (and more) is promising, but at present you can't achieve truly top-end performance via this route.

The ideal then, I suppose, would be able to just easily snap together the equivalent of a few GTX 980Ms, sprinkle in a few i7s for good measure, and simply have it all work. Going on a trip and feel like packing light? Just take one of each, casually snap off the rest with little hassle.

Of course, if internet connectivity keeps improving at its current pace, application streaming may obviate the need for all of this, but who knows.

Re: Purism Aims to Build a Philosophically Pure Laptop

#110

Post by adamnemecek »

gambiting wrote: post #106
adamnemecek wrote: post #51

I'm surprised no one has said this yet but I can testify that a numpad keyboard on a laptop is like the worst ergonomic design that is somehow currently still popular. It's one of the things where I literally cannot comprehend how someone would think that it is ok.

I can testify that I would not buy a laptop without a numpad, it's in my opinion absolutely essential. I literally cannot comprehend how someone wouldn't want one. As you can see, it's all a matter of opinion.

That's cool and all but the thing that rustles my jimmies is that most non-Apple laptops have numpads. If it were 50/50 I would not complain, I complain because it's hard to find a good non-Apple laptop without it.
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