> As ever, support for Broadcom wifi and Nvidia graphics is nonexistent.
This is exactly the big issue with adoption of any *nix system on laptop or desktop. No user wants to have to live with quirks. Users just want their system to work.
So for instance: Every Chromebook out there is running a Linux kernel, and they all have exemplary hardware support -- power management is great, trackpads are phenomenal, there are no issues with sound or wifi or GPU. BUT if you try to install Windows on them, it's super-awkward and hacky if you can get it to work at all.
For historical reasons, most people who try to install BSD or Linux are doing so on hardware that was designed for Windows, with components that were selected on the basis of how well they work with Windows, and driver work that is done for Windows. This does not lead to great outcomes, any more than buying a Chromebook and using it as a Windows machine would.
So in a sense "hardware makers aren't making hardware designed for Linux (other than Chromebooks) or BSD" is a problem for adoption of Linux/BSD, but it's a problem that can only be fixed by hardware makers.
But installing something that the manufacturer didn't supply is a deliberate choice. Any quirks get blamed directly on the changed software, even if there are actually fewer of them. The change becomes the issue.
This rings true for me very much this week. Even more fun when there are multiple changes, but rather than examine the situation and determine objectively which change caused a problem, whichever change is the biggest magnet for FUD gets blamed by default.
E.g., Linus himself was using a MacBook Air 11 late 2012 for some time. It works fantastically well on Linux. Newer MacBooks are sometimes not so well supported. Only thing lacking is no recognition of ACPI events to flag each time the battery discharges by 1% or below a threshold. But very few laptops have this.
- My mid-2013 MBP has, several times this week, turned on while closed, and continued as if it was opened (playing YouTube videos or whatever else it be doing), only shutting back off after about 120 seconds or so
- Every time I turn this Mac Pro on, it doesn't recognize the wired Apple keyboard that's plugged into the Apple Cinema Display, and says it's looking for a bluetooth keyboard, until I unplug and replug the keyboard in at least 3 or 4 times
- My MBP once emitted a (very) loud buzzing sound from its speakers, for absolutely no reason, that lasted about 3 or 4 seconds, startling everyone nearby, when no sound-based programs were running
- My wife's Surface Pro 3 continually needs to be restarted because touch-screen controls simply stop being able to open programs on the home/grid page.
- If our family ASUS $800 computer is left on and falls asleep, it won't wake up, and will need to be manually shut down and restarted
These are just off the top of my head. Point is, Microsoft/Apple reliability is a complete myth. I'm tired of it and I'm tired of throwing extra money away for the sake of "higher reliability" and "fewer quirks".
I'm tired of the cult of perfection surrounding frankly middling proprietary operating systems.
- Every mac I've ever used has had Launchpad UI bugs requiring me to try several times to launch things.
- OS X has woeful graphics drivers, to the point where Mesa is doing better.
- My Air got erratically unusably laggy until I finally gave up on it.
- My MBP will occasionally forget that it has any integrated input devices, requiring me to either find a USB keyboard or reboot.
- Microsoft still hasn't resolved their graphics driver stability situation; blue screens are far from a relic of the past in my experience.
These are anecdotes, yes. Sure, some (rare) people might have a perfect experience with OS X or Windows. But the point is, free operating systems don't have a monopoly on driver and spitshine issues.
My MacBook works. It just works. No tinkering, compiling, fidgeting, anything -- and this is precisely why I like it and will continue to use it. I don't want my hardware getting in the way.
And reliability is certainly not a myth. In my days I've supported all three platforms and by far it was MPB that gave me the least grief. This is doubly true with hardware. Linux is close behind Mac but I think most engineers brave enough to venture it would competent to deal with problems on their own.
When a MPB has a problem: take it to a Mac store and get a replacement. When a Lenovo had a problem? Ship it to Virginia on your dime and wait 6 weeks.
I seriously suggest you take your MPB to a mac store and speak to them about your problem.
The point he wanted to make is most likely not that all Macs suck all the time, but that Mac does not automatically mean reliable or more reliable than any other OS/system. So while it might not be worse than other systems (I don't want to make a judgement based on the few Macs I had to fix for friends without ever having used them myself), it certainly is no super-reliable saint either.
And my limited first-hand experience agrees with him.
When I've had problems with US purchased Dell's, I had someone there within 48 hours with a replacement piece, despite being in 1) Austria and 2) Italy.
In the meanwhile I'd got a macbook so I could continue working. The mac was driving me crazy. The keyboard feel, the trackpad feel, the lack of nipple mouse, the every-changing UI that never does quite what I want it to.
When the Lenovo came back I tried it out, fell in love again, and moved back to it. At some point the SSD will die and I'll get another one. There's nothing close to a Thinkpad. To me, they feel like they built as tools in a way that other devices lack.
I've noticed some issues with the USB hub that is built into the Thunderbolt display whereby for some reason it doesn't enumerate correctly every 40 - 50 plug/unplug cycles while using my MBPr at work. It only happens when the Apple keyboard is plugged into the display, with alternate keyboards it doesn't happen.
So I personally feel like it is an issue with the Apple keyboard.
I'm not sure I'll ever buy another OEM PC. So much crapware comes pre-installed, and it's so difficult to get rid of it, that I usually wipe the disks and install Windows from an MSDN iso. Of course, there's still the drivers... And more importantly, the tens and hundreds of MB of shitware that comes bundled with a tiny device driver. No, I do not want the ASUS Smart Keyboard Whoop-dee-doo application launching at startup. I just want my keyboard to work like every other keyboard has worked for the last 30 years.
OpenBSD attracts the type of users they want to support I imagine. Leave it to someone else to push the "Year of *nix desktop" agenda.
I agree. Which is why I'm so frustrated at the moment, as I've had issues with my 1 year old rMBP, my girlfriend had issues with her Windows laptop, and my Ubuntu install on my HP 11" runs into the weirdest bugs.
It's 2016, and nothing works. I don't understand it.
[1]: https://medium.com/message/everything-is-broken-81e5f33a24e1
Makes no sense that the more niche, security focussed OpenBSD has the much better laptop support, until you consider that OpenBSD devs actually dogfood it on their laptops.
Many FreeBSD devs seem to run Macbooks for development, using FreeBSD only in a VM or via SSH.
Mini PCI Express is a standard (as was Mini PCI before it). Swapping out a laptop wireless card you don't like isn't that hard. I've done it several times (to get dual band support, for better Linux drivers, etc).
Spending around $100 (including installation if you don't want to do it yourself) may be annoying, but it shouldn't be a deal breaker.
Apart from reverse-engineering yet more hardware and writing more drivers, there is not much the OpenBSD project can do about this.
Fixing the root cause would be best. Vendors who do such things must be convinced to stop doing them.
If vendors also released freely available documentation for the hardware (read: freely accessible manuals for driver developers, no NDA required to read) then end users of free software could live in a world where wireless not working would be the exception.