From owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Mar 11 15:48:14 2004 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BCBEA16A4CE for ; Thu, 11 Mar 2004 15:48:14 -0800 (PST) Received: from vhost109.his.com (vhost109.his.com [216.194.225.101]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 88AFE43D2F for ; Thu, 11 Mar 2004 15:48:13 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from brad.knowles@skynet.be) Received: from [10.0.1.4] (localhost.his.com [127.0.0.1]) by vhost109.his.com (8.12.6p3/8.12.3) with ESMTP id i2BNm8xe070378; Thu, 11 Mar 2004 18:48:09 -0500 (EST) (envelope-from brad.knowles@skynet.be) Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Sender: bs663385@127.0.0.1 Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <20040311232539.D701C43D1F@mx1.FreeBSD.org> References: <20040311232539.D701C43D1F@mx1.FreeBSD.org> Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2004 00:47:45 +0100 To: "Emil Cazamir" From: Brad Knowles Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" cc: 'Dag-Erling =?iso-8859-1?Q?Sm=F8rgrav=22=27=22?= cc: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Subject: RE: Silicon Image Sil 3112 SATARaid Controller X-BeenThere: freebsd-current@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Discussions about the use of FreeBSD-current List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 23:48:14 -0000 At 1:26 AM +0200 2004/03/12, Emil Cazamir wrote: > Conclusion: I'm one of many "crappy hardware" users which are happy to move > on to other OS'es if this situation persists. Are you comparing FreeBSD support to Linux? If so, then don't. If vendors provide any support at all outside of Micro$loth Windblows, it's for Linux. The best anyone else (including the FreeBSD community) can hope for is that full specs are made available, so that they can develop their own drivers. As for the rest, people are trying their best. But because the people doing this support for NetBSD are not the same people doing this for FreeBSD, you're bound to find some differences in terms of what they are capable of supporting. You never know when one developer will have contacts that allow them to get more information than others, which means they have an advantage when it comes to developing drivers for that hardware. Yes, there is some driver cross-pollination amongst the *BSD family, but they have different low-level infrastructures, so you can't just bring drivers over from NetBSD and drop them into FreeBSD and expect them to "just work". If you can provide some help in developing or supporting drivers for these pieces of hardware, I'm sure that the driver developers would be ecstatic to have whatever help you can provide. This might be a painful process as they ask you to try various different patches, but the result would be that you (and everyone else) would greatly benefit in the long-run. If you are unable to help with this process, then your best choice may well be to use an OS that provides you better support for the hardware you have. That's a rough choice, and I don't want to sound rude, but sooner or later you're going to have to do something useful with those machines, and if FreeBSD isn't working for you, then you should probably use something else. In the future, I would encourage you to check for compatibility with your chosen OS, before you buy the hardware in question. This would result in your being less likely to be saddled with "crappy" devices that are not well supported. Please don't misinterpret what I'm saying. I am honestly trying to help you figure out what you can do to solve this problem, and decide whether or not FreeBSD is a feasible part of your future. I don't want this to sound like a stereotypical rude "put up code or shut up" response. I've had those aimed at me, and I don't think that they serve any positive purpose, either to the person or to the project. That said, there is a limit to what we can do to support the hardware you have purchased. You might or might not be able to help us with that problem. If you can't, and there is nothing else we can do, then it seems to me that it makes more sense for you to choose a different OS that provides better support for the hardware you have. That sucks, I know. But these are the kinds of choices that we face in life. -- Brad Knowles, "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania. GCS/IT d+(-) s:+(++)>: a C++(+++)$ UMBSHI++++$ P+>++ L+ !E-(---) W+++(--) N+ !w--- O- M++ V PS++(+++) PE- Y+(++) PGP>+++ t+(+++) 5++(+++) X++(+++) R+(+++) tv+(+++) b+(++++) DI+(++++) D+(++) G+(++++) e++>++++ h--- r---(+++)* z(+++)