6 ms·

I run BSD on all of my desktop boxes, but I have not found any way to run it on a laptop. It just doesn't seem feasible; there are just so many mobile drivers t

by kunai 13y ago

I run BSD on all of my desktop boxes, but I have not found any way to run it on a laptop. It just doesn't seem feasible; there are just so many mobile drivers that are missing. Has anyone else had any luck with getting FreeBSD to work on a laptop, or is Linux still the de-facto?

eulerphi 13y ago
I had FreeBSD running on my old Dell Studio 1737. It took some effort but most of the linux drivers will work with BSD if you edit the source and recompile.
- kunai 13y ago
  Any links? If not, a short anecdote? How is power management and suspend?
- 4ad 13y ago
  You most definitely can't recompile Linux drivers for FreeBSD. The driver model is very kernel specific, porting drivers is more close to rewriting drivers. Plus there's the GPL thing. Linux is GPL, that's why you'll never see Linux drivers ported to BSDs. Sys V drivers conforming to the STREAMS model were supposed to be portable between Unix variants, but STREAMS never catched on, neither Linux nor BSDs use STREAMS, and BSDs only have minimal STREAMS support for the SVR4 compatibility layer. Solaris has STREAMS, but has rewritten many drivers not to use the, e.g. the networking stack has been rewritten from being STREAM-based (now it's called Fire Engine). It's generally easier to port BSD drivers to Solaris, then it is to port BSD drivers to Linux.
  - belorn 13y ago
    I do find it odd that when BSD people talk about the BSD license, they describe it as pragmatism winning over idealism. However, when they talk about the BSD OS's, suddenly that pragmatism disappear and everything need to be pure permissive licensed. Is both "camps" just similar fanatic regarding licensing, similar pragmatic, or is it a natural distinct difference when talking about licenses, and when picking software licensed under one of the two types?
    - 4ad 13y ago
      > is it a natural distinct difference when talking about licenses, and when picking software licensed under one of the two types? Of course there is. When I write some software project, of course I want it to be under a specific license, for example BSD. If I chose a BSD license I can't accept GPL patches because that means I can't chose what license I distribute my own software, I have to make it GPL. As the author, I don't mind if GPL or commercial entities import my software. I am very happy if they do that, I want them to have the freedom to do so. However, I most certainly don't want myself to be forced to change my own license because I import some code. Then, I won't be able to give the freedom of choosing the way they use my software to other people anymore.
      - belorn 13y ago
        A distribution is not based on patches - its based on picking software packages which to bundled together into a working operative system. But okay, lets go with the distributions desire to chose what license to use. Who cares about the license? The whole point of pragmatism winning over idealism is to achieve a set of practical effects, regardless lofty concept such as "freedom of choosing license". A distribution is most effective when it can use the best software as much as it can. This mean that a pragmatic distribution should use any software, be that proprietary, GPL, permissive, anything, so long it is superior. A pragmatic approach to license issues would be to have built in tools to slim down the distribution to reach specific practical effects depending on the need of each individual users. Surely, giving people working graphic drivers is more pragmatic than giving people nothing and say "the software that give your practical use from your hardware is under the wrong license".
        4ad 13y ago
        BSDs are not distributions. They are complete operating systems. They don't pick software packages, they develop almost all necessary software themselves (notable exceptions include gcc which the BSDs are trying to get rid of). BSDs are pragmatic in that they don't restrict their users in their usage of the provided code. That's how Cisco's IOS and Juniper's Junos can exist. The BSD ports contain many GPL software and non-GPL software (including closed source graphics drivers) that you can install on your own. They are not part of the base operating system.
educating 13y ago
A significant part of U.S. government uses FreeBSD (or derivation) - and they have laptops.
Sean-Der 13y ago
I use FreeBSD 9.2 on a U56E-BBL5 and it runs great! Intel Graphics work great (wiki.freebsd.org/Intel_GPU) I have great wireless support for my Intel Centrino 6235 Ports also provides all the applications I could ever need (Emacs, Vim, FireFox, Chromium, SBCL, Chicken, MPD etc..) I really love running FreeBSD on my laptop, I am a big tinkerer and this is the first time I have gotten a setup that feels right
lifeisstillgood 13y ago
I have used BSD on all my laptops for the past eight ? years. wifi is my biggest bugbear but I fear I generally ignore anything that is not germane to the basics. seriously want a write up?
- daemon13 13y ago
  Yes, please !!
kleiba 13y ago
Yes, I'd be interested to learn more from experienced laptop users as well. Especially, how does BSD do in some areas that Linux still struggles sometimes, such as e.g.: - suspend/resume - power consumption/battery life - multiple monitor support - wifi drivers - etc. Does anyone have some experience with these (and other) points and would like to comment?
D9u 13y ago
I ran FreeBSD on my Acer Aspire One ZG5 netbook for nearly a year before I got a new laptop. The one thing that wasn't working in 9.1 was suspend/resume/hibernate. Hopefully the suspend/resume issue will be rectified in 10.0. I haven't tried FreeBSD on my new laptop yet, as it is equipped with the BCM 4313 Wireless adaptor, and I'm not ready to fool with that just yet...
MichaelStubbs 13y ago
I used to run FreeBSD on my Toshiba Satellite C660-180 and encountered no issues. Everything seemed to work out of the box and performance was on par with version 3.2 of the Linux kernel. I keep meaning to switch back to FreeBSD, actually. This alpha may prompt me to give it a shot.

by kunai 13y ago

eulerphi 13y ago

I had FreeBSD running on my old Dell Studio 1737. It took some effort but most of the linux drivers will work with BSD if you edit the source and recompile.

kunai 13y ago
Any links? If not, a short anecdote? How is power management and suspend?
4ad 13y ago
You most definitely can't recompile Linux drivers for FreeBSD. The driver model is very kernel specific, porting drivers is more close to rewriting drivers. Plus there's the GPL thing. Linux is GPL, that's why you'll never see Linux drivers ported to BSDs. Sys V drivers conforming to the STREAMS model were supposed to be portable between Unix variants, but STREAMS never catched on, neither Linux nor BSDs use STREAMS, and BSDs only have minimal STREAMS support for the SVR4 compatibility layer. Solaris has STREAMS, but has rewritten many drivers not to use the, e.g. the networking stack has been rewritten from being STREAM-based (now it's called Fire Engine). It's generally easier to port BSD drivers to Solaris, then it is to port BSD drivers to Linux.
- belorn 13y ago
  I do find it odd that when BSD people talk about the BSD license, they describe it as pragmatism winning over idealism. However, when they talk about the BSD OS's, suddenly that pragmatism disappear and everything need to be pure permissive licensed. Is both "camps" just similar fanatic regarding licensing, similar pragmatic, or is it a natural distinct difference when talking about licenses, and when picking software licensed under one of the two types?
  - 4ad 13y ago
    > is it a natural distinct difference when talking about licenses, and when picking software licensed under one of the two types? Of course there is. When I write some software project, of course I want it to be under a specific license, for example BSD. If I chose a BSD license I can't accept GPL patches because that means I can't chose what license I distribute my own software, I have to make it GPL. As the author, I don't mind if GPL or commercial entities import my software. I am very happy if they do that, I want them to have the freedom to do so. However, I most certainly don't want myself to be forced to change my own license because I import some code. Then, I won't be able to give the freedom of choosing the way they use my software to other people anymore.
    - belorn 13y ago
      A distribution is not based on patches - its based on picking software packages which to bundled together into a working operative system. But okay, lets go with the distributions desire to chose what license to use. Who cares about the license? The whole point of pragmatism winning over idealism is to achieve a set of practical effects, regardless lofty concept such as "freedom of choosing license". A distribution is most effective when it can use the best software as much as it can. This mean that a pragmatic distribution should use any software, be that proprietary, GPL, permissive, anything, so long it is superior. A pragmatic approach to license issues would be to have built in tools to slim down the distribution to reach specific practical effects depending on the need of each individual users. Surely, giving people working graphic drivers is more pragmatic than giving people nothing and say "the software that give your practical use from your hardware is under the wrong license".
      - 4ad 13y ago
        BSDs are not distributions. They are complete operating systems. They don't pick software packages, they develop almost all necessary software themselves (notable exceptions include gcc which the BSDs are trying to get rid of). BSDs are pragmatic in that they don't restrict their users in their usage of the provided code. That's how Cisco's IOS and Juniper's Junos can exist. The BSD ports contain many GPL software and non-GPL software (including closed source graphics drivers) that you can install on your own. They are not part of the base operating system.

educating 13y ago

A significant part of U.S. government uses FreeBSD (or derivation) - and they have laptops.

Sean-Der 13y ago

I use FreeBSD 9.2 on a U56E-BBL5 and it runs great! Intel Graphics work great (wiki.freebsd.org/Intel_GPU) I have great wireless support for my Intel Centrino 6235 Ports also provides all the applications I could ever need (Emacs, Vim, FireFox, Chromium, SBCL, Chicken, MPD etc..) I really love running FreeBSD on my laptop, I am a big tinkerer and this is the first time I have gotten a setup that feels right

lifeisstillgood 13y ago

I have used BSD on all my laptops for the past eight ? years. wifi is my biggest bugbear but I fear I generally ignore anything that is not germane to the basics. seriously want a write up?

daemon13 13y ago
Yes, please !!

kleiba 13y ago

Yes, I'd be interested to learn more from experienced laptop users as well. Especially, how does BSD do in some areas that Linux still struggles sometimes, such as e.g.: - suspend/resume - power consumption/battery life - multiple monitor support - wifi drivers - etc. Does anyone have some experience with these (and other) points and would like to comment?

D9u 13y ago

I ran FreeBSD on my Acer Aspire One ZG5 netbook for nearly a year before I got a new laptop. The one thing that wasn't working in 9.1 was suspend/resume/hibernate. Hopefully the suspend/resume issue will be rectified in 10.0. I haven't tried FreeBSD on my new laptop yet, as it is equipped with the BCM 4313 Wireless adaptor, and I'm not ready to fool with that just yet...

MichaelStubbs 13y ago

I used to run FreeBSD on my Toshiba Satellite C660-180 and encountered no issues. Everything seemed to work out of the box and performance was on par with version 3.2 of the Linux kernel. I keep meaning to switch back to FreeBSD, actually. This alpha may prompt me to give it a shot.