Triquel and hardware
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Hi all. Are there any uk users here that can report on netbooks that they have found to work well out of the box with the kernel libre.
Regards,
Kristian
http://www.h-node.com/ contains many user submitted reports on which devices (including netbooks) work with free software.
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Not sure what you are looking for exactly although we have a 13.3" notebook with an ATOM proccessor you may want to take a look at. Netbooks were traditionally laptops with very small screens and inexspensive. That probably wouldn't apply here although the CPU and price are closer to "netbook" specs.
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On 1/21/12 11:16 PM, name at domain wrote:
> Not sure what you are looking for exactly although we have a 13.3"
> notebook with an ATOM proccessor you may want to take a look at.
> Netbooks were traditionally laptops with very small screens and
> inexspensive. That probably wouldn't apply here although the CPU and
> price are closer to "netbook" specs.
>
> http://libre.thinkpenguin.com/
This is the first I have heard of thinkpenguin - I checked out the site
and all the computers look great! Is all of the hardware "free"
including the BIOS? Specifically on the Penguin Air Notebook.
Thanks!
Lev
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No. Unfortunately there is no way to produce a completely free computer. There will never be a completely free X86 system. It may be possible to design a non-x86 computer to be completely free although so far it appears there aren't any. The most recent version of a netbook that Stallman uses appears to include at least a graphics card dependent on non-free firmware. There isn't a propritary BIOS from my understanding.
We offer the closest thing to 'completely free' you can get at the moment with X86 though. All of the critical chipsets (wifi, graphics, and similar) have drivers available which make them compatible with free software operating systems like Trisquel.
None of our systems ship with a free BIOS however. We would like to ship with a free BIOS although that isn't likely to happen any time soon. Unfortunately porting coreboot (the free BIOS) is a non-trivial task. It has been done once for a laptop with government finances behind it. A few other models which had non-free dependencies have also had ports to them. Again- these weren't ideal for those using only free software.
Right now this is as good as it gets. And for better or worse it is a huge improvment over what was available just a few short years ago.
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On 1/22/12 12:43 AM, name at domain wrote:
> No. Unfortunately there is no way to produce a completely free
> computer. There will never be a completely free X86 system. It may be
> possible to design a non-x86 computer to be completely free although
> so far it appears there aren't any. The most recent version of a
> netbook that Stallman uses appears to include at least a graphics card
> dependent on non-free firmware. There isn't a propritary BIOS from my
> understanding.
>
> We offer the closest thing to 'completely free' you can get at the
> moment with X86 though. All of the critical chipsets (wifi, graphics,
> and similar) have drivers available which make that compatible with
> free software operating systems.
>
> None of our systems ship with a free BIOS however. We would like to
> ship with a free BIOS although that isn't likely to happen any time
> soon. Unfortunately porting coreboot (the free BIOS) is a non-trivial
> task. It has been done once for a laptop with government finances
> behind it. A few other models which had non-free dependencies have
> also had ports to them. Again- these weren't ideal for those using
> only free software.
>
> Right now this is as good as it gets. And for better or worse it is a
> huge improvment over what was available just a few short years ago.
>
Thanks for the clarification - not a deal breaker, I was just curious.
I just got a new laptop, but may check out the net-top you have... look
forward to it! :)
That's a shame that the new Lemote is not totally free. I wonder what Stallman has to say about it. Will Lemote continue to distribute their totally free netbook? I believe the one you are talking about is the 13 inch one.
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