Notebook 15.6'' for LibreBoot 500 usd or less?
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Hello! I use Libreboot and want to buy new notebook for the internet, Icecat Openshot, Gimp.
But I live in Russia, here we have too tiny choice in tech shops.
Please, what you recommend for libreboot costing about 500 usd?
I heard laptop without 802.11 wifi might be good, cause drivers may lack for 802.11.
How to choose another not 802.11 wifi?
Can you say something exactly? I use dns-shop.ru
If you want a 15-inch libreboot (but not coreboot), then ThinkPad T500 may be good for you. With libreboot installed, the whitelist restriction imposed by original BIOS is no more, and you can install any Atheros WLAN card (which doesn't require any non-free firmware). There is a usable Atheros card on T500 which is approved by the factory BIOS: one low-end Atheros AR2425 card (Lenovo FRU: 43Y6511), you can temporarily use this card before you remove the whitelist restrictions. If there aren't much choices in local shops, try to find them on eBay.
That most WLAN cards (non-Atheros ones) don't work with Trisquel or other free/libre distributions is because they require non-free firmware (not driver) to function. They do have free/libre drivers, but without firmware they simply don't work. This is not relevant to "802.11".
If coreboot is acceptable, too, then you have many more choices, including T520, T530, and T540p. However, they don't have officially approved Atheros cards.
I did not found in Russian shops such models.
I've found these two models in russian webshop:
https://www.dns-shop.ru/catalog/17a892f816404e77/noutbuki/?order=1&groupBy=none&stock=2&price=25000-50000&f[65w]=266b&f[680]=26xe&f[65f]=264j-264h
But I cannot see exactly model of wifi card:
https://www.asus.com/Laptops/ASUS-VivoBook-15-X540UA/specifications/
And here I'm not see exactly that Acer from that first page:
https://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/models/laptops/aspire3
I cannot use Ebay, cause I want guarantee, for not to lose money.
Can you recommend something from Lenovo, Acer and Asus official pages?
https://www.lenovo.com/ru/ru/laptops/thinkpad/t-series/c/t-series
Notebooks produced in recent 5 or 6 years can't be librebooted or corebooted, because of Boot Guard (a permanent anti-feature that prevents users from modifying the boot firmware), and I don't think the manufacturer's official pages still show any legacy products.
My community members and I never bother to consider new notebooks. Instead, we always hunt for legacy devices (mainly notebooks, but many things more) from local dark market. We sometimes get tricked by the seller, but this is the cost of pursuing freedom. (Don't you see that any free/libre software comes with absolutely no warranty at all?)
So what I can recommend is to find a used legacy notebook from dark market (either physical or online, like eBay or Taobao). Said models are very cheap. Even T540p cost no more than $300. When you have one of them, first upgrade EC by installing latest official BIOS/UEFI package, and then flash coreboot using a programmer. With the whitelist restrictions gone, install an Atheros WLAN card, and you have a user-respecting computing device.
BTW, some more bad news:
Atheros was acquired by Qualcomm several years ago, and then the ath9k series discontinued, so don't expect any new notebook to have one WLAN card that respects users' freedom.
In some extreme examples, whatever you can replace on the motherboard is just the SSD. The WLAN card, along with CPU and memory, is built-in and there is no interface to install a second one.
Is free software banned in China nadebula? I minifree/technoethical/vikings ship everywhere I believe. I only ask because you mentioned dark market.
Hahaha, dark market used to be the major source of my computing devices and is the only source now. Indeed the Chinese authorities have been trying hard to wipe it out. But where there is oppression there is resistance. We shall finally smash the dictating imperialist regime, like we once did in 1949.
Now I want to find a legacy X30 (Pentium III-M, 830MG chipset with integrated graphics, 512 MiB SDRAM, CF card slot).
If you want libreboot you are limited to exactly those devices mentioned on https://libreboot.org/docs/hardware/ and no others. If you want any of those devices the next step is how to find them. I imagine finding them locally may be hard since they are older but there are companies that they can be ordered from for shipping. An example is http://www.libiquity.com/ and https://store.vikings.net/ and https://minifree.org/ and https://technoethical.com/
To complete the list of shops that install Libreboot and are specialized in this one way or another, there's also Zerocat from Berlin/Germany: http://www.zerocat.org/shop-en.html
Many of the devices, except the X200 tablet and X200s have become kind of rare these days. At least they aren't any off-leases any more. Since a couple of months we have sometimes problems accommodating demand. /thum
T500/W500/R500 is the "most recent" 15" laptop compatible with Libreboot but they are still 10 years old, not going to find it new anywhere. Maybe consider a T530 or T540 with Coreboot? Can put quad-cores in there too, but either way still going to have to find it used.
In terms of WiFi cards you can look on https://h-node.org/ for stuff that's compatible with Trisquel and other FSF-approved GNU/Linux distros out of the box. I use the Atheros AR9285, they are less than $10 USD on AliExpress (if you're okay with buying from there, of course). If the laptop has Libreboot/Coreboot it will work fine.
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