From owner-freebsd-mobile Tue Nov 25 12:23:51 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id MAA21632 for mobile-outgoing; Tue, 25 Nov 1997 12:23:51 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-mobile) Received: from rover.village.org (rover.village.org [204.144.255.49]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id MAA21614 for ; Tue, 25 Nov 1997 12:23:45 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from imp@village.org) Received: from harmony [10.0.0.6] by rover.village.org with esmtp (Exim 1.71 #1) id 0xaRWA-0006r6-00; Tue, 25 Nov 1997 13:23:34 -0700 Received: from harmony.village.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by harmony.village.org (8.8.8/8.8.3) with ESMTP id NAA14770; Tue, 25 Nov 1997 13:22:44 -0700 (MST) Message-Id: <199711252022.NAA14770@harmony.village.org> To: jose@dial.pipex.com (Jose Marques) Subject: Re: What does "unsupported" really mean? Cc: freebsd-mobile@freebsd.org In-reply-to: Your message of "Tue, 25 Nov 1997 19:00:40 GMT." References: Date: Tue, 25 Nov 1997 13:22:43 -0700 From: Warner Losh Sender: owner-freebsd-mobile@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk In message Jose Marques writes: : I'm thinking of buying a laptop to run FreeBSD (yet another disillusioned : Mac user abandoning ship). The models I've looked at all have some form of : "unsupported (at the current time) by FreeBSD" hardware, i.e. CardBUS, XV : ports, USB ports etc. Does this mean that I can't use FreeBSD on these : machines? Or (hopefully) can I still use FreeBSD but not use the hardware : in question? Generally speaking, unsupported means that you can't use the hardware in question. For some things this isn't a big deal (eg USB ports), while for other things it can be a big deal (CardBus would make it hard to expand a machine). PAO does do CardBus better than stock FreeBSD does at this time. Your best bet would be to take some kind of FreeBSD boot disk with you when purchasing a system and see if you can boot it before purchase. Laptops generally have large restocking fees, so the buy one and return it until it works strategy wouldn't work too well. Warner