Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2004 01:26:42 +0200 From: "Emil Cazamir" <emil.cazamir@galati.rdsnet.ro> To: =?iso-8859-1?Q?'Dag-Erling_=22Sm=F8rgrav=22'?= <des@des.no>, <freebsd-current@freebsd.org> Subject: RE: Silicon Image Sil 3112 SATARaid Controller Message-ID: <20040311232539.D701C43D1F@mx1.FreeBSD.org> In-Reply-To: <xzp8yi75de6.fsf@dwp.des.no>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
Hi I'm FreeBSD user since RELENG_4_3 and I founnd useful many of it's = features. I accepted the fact that I used a "crappy" motherboard (MSI K7T Turbo2) = on which USB suport was less than I expectd (my USB keyboard wasn't usable = on RELENG_5, I dindn't tested with RELENG_4, at that time I used a PS/2 keyboard) and the fact that an old crappy Compaq Presario can't use the PCMCIA/CardBus controller with FreeBSD while same hardware is workinng = fine with other more or less commercial OS'es. I see THE FACT that other developer teams CAN DO some things (like implementing pcmcia/cardbus properly and usable, on NetBSD 1.6.1 the cardbus controller works fine = with Compaq laptop), I see that other developer teams can implement properly support for well-known hardware like SoundBlaster Live! Sound cards. I believe that a poor implementation of a specific hardware chip is not a = good reason to change motherboards, network cards, soundcards or even = laptops. For me is a better option to change the OS as long it is not capable to = keep up with actual hardware. Of course, that means that I must forget about "portupgrade", about the clean configuration and other benefits which I = may have if I would use FreeBSD, but there are many users of "crappy" = hardware which don't want to up/down-grade their systems JUST BECAUSE it is impossible or too difficult for most of FreeBSD developers to [find documentation from chip manufacturers | implement proper support for = some piece of hardware]. I'm using now some actual/stable/known hardware with other OS-es because at this time FreeBSD can't support it... I think = there are many others in the same situation. Here is my computer configuration: - Motherboard: Abit NF7-S ver 2.0 (memory controller and APU: = unsupported by FreeBSD, RAID controller Sil3112, "the crappy" - see the original = message) - Graphics card: Ati Radeon 9500 (R300) (DRI not available on FreeBSD = after more than one year since chip released, is this too crappy?) - Extra SoundCard : SoundBlaster Live! - (advanced features not = supported on FreeBSD after more than 4 years since released, perhaps SB Live! it's = more crappy than 95% of it's users believe). Conclusion: I'm one of many "crappy hardware" users which are happy to = move on to other OS'es if this situation persists. Please excuse my poor english, it's not my native language. Best regards, Emil Cazamir -----Original Message----- From: owner-freebsd-current@freebsd.org [mailto:owner-freebsd-current@freebsd.org] On Behalf Of Dag-Erling "Sm=F8rgrav" Sent: 11 martie 2004 22:37 To: Burhan Nazir Cc: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Silicon Image Sil 3112 SATARaid Controller Burhan Nazir <burhan@btinternet.com> writes: > This controller may be crappy, however it is prevalent amongst many > nforce2 chipsets. In particular the asus A7N8X, which is ubiquitous. You may find the following link to be of interest: http://12.24.47.40/display/2n/kb/article.asp?aid=3D10516 > In addition, the controller does work and has so far caused no > problems under windows, so I am fairly pleased with it. "works with Windows" has got to be the computer hardware equivalent of "big in Japan"... > So, I would > hope that there is some talented deveoper out there that does not take > your narrow minded view I'm afraid you're the one being narrow-minded here. Talent alone is not sufficient to write a good driver. Experience with the FreeBSD kernel in general and the ata drivers in particular is a prerequisite, as is access to sample hardware and chipset documentation. You'll have a hard time finding someone with more experience in this area than S=F8ren, and I wish you luck in obtaining documentation from Silicon Image. > and take mercy on all those people that would > love to use freebsd with raid0 on their desktop machines. There are plenty of other controllers you can use for RAID-0. Most Promise controllers, for instance, work flawlessly with FreeBSD, for the simple reason that Promise actually cares enough to provide S=F8ren with the hardware and documentation he needs to write good drivers. DES --=20 Dag-Erling Sm=F8rgrav - des@des.no _______________________________________________ freebsd-current@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-current To unsubscribe, send any mail to = "freebsd-current-unsubscribe@freebsd.org"
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20040311232539.D701C43D1F>