[9fans] laptop

[9fans] laptop

[John Stalker]

My ancient ThinkPad has start emitting sparks, so I need to
get a new laptop.  I would, if possible, like it to run plan9
in hardware rather than emulation.  The "supported hardware"
list on the wiki looks a little out of date.  Anyone have
recent experience to share?  My priorities, in decreasing order
of importance are: weight, cost, plan9 compatibility, battery
life, and speed.  The thing also needs to boot FreeBSD, but
I trust that anything plan9-compatible will satisfy that
requirement.
--
John Stalker
Department of Mathematics
Princeton University
(609)258-6469

Re: [9fans] laptop

[mirtchov]

> The "supported hardware" list on the wiki looks a little out of date.

Sadly, the list is quite current -- I updated the IBM ThinkPad section
10 days ago...

The only real issue that you'll face is the graphics card support.
Looking at ibm.ca, all their ThinkPads come with radeon graphics, for
which there are Plan 9 drivers, but mileage may vary -- I can't use
them on my T30, but somebody else is perfectly fine with them, with
the only difference being that my display is 1024x768, his is
1400x1050...

I don't know the state of the Dell or Toshiba laptops -- I haven't
seen anyone except undergrads use them, and that's all XP.

andrey

Re: [9fans] laptop

[Russ Cox]

> My ancient ThinkPad has start emitting sparks, so I need to
> get a new laptop.  I would, if possible, like it to run plan9
> in hardware rather than emulation.  The "supported hardware"
> list on the wiki looks a little out of date.  Anyone have
> recent experience to share?  My priorities, in decreasing order
> of importance are: weight, cost, plan9 compatibility, battery
> life, and speed.  The thing also needs to boot FreeBSD, but
> I trust that anything plan9-compatible will satisfy that
> requirement.

The IBM T23 is your best bet for an IBM laptop
(it's fully supported).  Anything newer is too weird,
even for some of the Unixes.  I am suffering through
a T40 right now (dropped my T23 on the ground).

Russ

Re: [9fans] laptop

[andrey mirtchovski]

On Mon, 20 Oct 2003, Russ Cox wrote:

> even for some of the Unixes.  I am suffering through
> a T40 right now (dropped my T23 on the ground).
>

If you're trying Philippe Anel's Radeon driver, do give it a higher
color depth.  What doesn't work in 16bpp may in fact be fine in 32bpp...

andrey

Re: [9fans] laptop

[Philippe Anel]

At 03:30 21/10/03, you wrote:
> >
> > Thanks for the information.  T30 is outside my price range.  I could
> > get a T23, though.  That seems to come with an S3 SuperSavage/IX, which
> > should probably be supported.
>
>LANL has had a T23 running Plan 9.  Both Ron and I have run a T21 with
>the same S3 chipset.  I had it dual booting FreeBSD and Plan 9.
>
>         http://pages.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/~mirtchov/lanlp9/newnetwork/term.html
>
>Unfortunately you won't see any info on how to get the T23 running on
>the page above, but it should be similar to the T21.
>
>The RADEON driver is something I can't comment on, since I don't have
>my laptop working with it.  If Philippe Anel has the time and patience
>it would be helpful to have yet another radeon laptop to test his
>driver on.


Hello,

         I now could spare a few hours to work on the driver. Since I
haven't the hardware to work on it and still no specs, I have to deal
with the XFree86 driver sources and my radeon 8500 with DVI output
(nearly same code for laptops).
         Moreover, it's seems there is problems with the hardware
acceleration code and I still don't understand why.

         Regards,
         Philippe Anel.

Re: [9fans] laptop

[David Presotto]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 284 bytes --]

We all run on T23's at the labs.  If you can get one at a fire sale, it works
fine.  Ours have crufty 1024x768 screens but Russ had one with a 1400xsomething
screen which seemed a lot nicer.  We don't know how to run the soft modem though,
I bought a pcmcia one for $30 at compusa.

[-- Attachment #2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 2483 bytes --]

From: mirtchov@cpsc.ucalgary.ca
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] laptop
Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 19:30:41 -0600
Message-ID: <ed3c9a8f44388f1d47d604291d400c50@plan9.ucalgary.ca>

>
> Thanks for the information.  T30 is outside my price range.  I could
> get a T23, though.  That seems to come with an S3 SuperSavage/IX, which
> should probably be supported.

LANL has had a T23 running Plan 9.  Both Ron and I have run a T21 with
the same S3 chipset.  I had it dual booting FreeBSD and Plan 9.

	http://pages.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/~mirtchov/lanlp9/newnetwork/term.html

Unfortunately you won't see any info on how to get the T23 running on
the page above, but it should be similar to the T21.

The RADEON driver is something I can't comment on, since I don't have
my laptop working with it.  If Philippe Anel has the time and patience
it would be helpful to have yet another radeon laptop to test his
driver on.

andrey

Re: [9fans] laptop

[mirtchov]

>
> Thanks for the information.  T30 is outside my price range.  I could
> get a T23, though.  That seems to come with an S3 SuperSavage/IX, which
> should probably be supported.

LANL has had a T23 running Plan 9.  Both Ron and I have run a T21 with
the same S3 chipset.  I had it dual booting FreeBSD and Plan 9.

	http://pages.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/~mirtchov/lanlp9/newnetwork/term.html

Unfortunately you won't see any info on how to get the T23 running on
the page above, but it should be similar to the T21.

The RADEON driver is something I can't comment on, since I don't have
my laptop working with it.  If Philippe Anel has the time and patience
it would be helpful to have yet another radeon laptop to test his
driver on.

andrey

[9fans] laptop

[John Stalker]

> The only real issue that you'll face is the graphics card support.
> Looking at ibm.ca, all their ThinkPads come with radeon graphics, for
> which there are Plan 9 drivers, but mileage may vary -- I can't use
> them on my T30, but somebody else is perfectly fine with them, with
> the only difference being that my display is 1024x768, his is
> 1400x1050...

Thanks for the information.  T30 is outside my price range.  I could
get a T23, though.  That seems to come with an S3 SuperSavage/IX, which
should probably be supported.  Please correct me if I am wrong on that.
Another option is a Fujitsu S2020.  It's lighter and faster--Athlon
1900+ rather than PIII-M 1.13--and about the same cost.  Is there any
hope of getting that to work?  The graphics chipset is ATI Radeon
IGP 320M.  Has anyone ever got plan9 to work on this chipset?  It should
be more or less the same as a Radeon 9000.
--
John Stalker
Department of Mathematics
Princeton University
(609)258-6469