Need a completely documented computer system

[BhaKi]

Hi guys (and gals, if any)!!

I'm looking to buy a new PC. The problem with my existing PC is that the manufacturers of its various components (including GPU, Network Card, Sound Card and IO controllers) are exerting control over what OSs I can use. The GPU manufacturer says that I can only use Windows, Linux, FreeBSD or Solaris but not any other OS. The Network Card manufacturer and the Chipset manufacturer say that I can only use Windows or Linux. All these manufacturers are refusing to provide documentation on how to program their hardware. I feel that the only purpose served by this secracy is to give Windows and Linux an unfair advantage over other OS manufacturers (OpenBSD, for example). And if I blame my OS-maker, he replies "Programming specifications for your hardware are not published by the hardware-manufacturer. So I can't make my OS compatible with your hardware, no matter how competent I am and no matter how great my OS is."

All this seems to me like very irrational behaviour by hardware manufacturers. I've come to realize that infinite freedom is possible only with completely documented hardware. (By "documented hardware", I mean hardware for which the complete programming documentation is officially available publicly). So I've decided to buy only such hardware. But hardware manufacturers with this common sense are amazingly rare, if any.

I intend to build the best PC possible from documented components. I'm currently looking for suggestions regarding the following components:

GPU: IGPs and cards, both are okay. (The AMD/ATI guys are doing a decent job but still the documentation is not 100%.)

Network Card: Again, both integrated and separated are okay.

Sound Card: (Ditto)

MoBo: One that's compatible with the answers for above ones.

All help is appreciated, not only because you are helping me but because you are helping the greater cause of fair competition. Thank you in advance.

[Kano]

You can forget the network+soundcard+motherboard part, with a new kernel, say 2.6.26 or newer usally all onboard features work, in some cases the sounddriver needs some adjustments, then #alsa on irc.freenode.net will be a good idea to join. Basically every standard nic is now supported, wlan is a bit different. If you really want a fully open source graphic driver then go for Intel onboard graphics. Up to G35/Q35 all major distributions already support it, for the latest incarnation of G45 you may have to compile the driver on your own - not that hard basically. I am not sure if you can really recommend the open source ATI drivers yet, for me they are a big disappointment. Maybe new r500 cards work better, but the status of older rv410 cards is worse than before. With Xorg 7.1.1 basically only a small mesa fix was needed for my card then was at least the DVI->VGA port useable. Since Xserver 1.4 everything flickers on xrandr changes (which seem to be implict when apps start) and DCC detetion does not even work over the port which used to work... Crap ^10 for my card. Well newer cards may work better...

[BhaKi]

You are making the assumption that I use Linux + X server. My very point is that hardware has no reason to dictate my choice of OS. I'm not a typical "end user". I don't like to use just Linux. I'd like to be able to write my own compatible OS. If I'm not competent enough to write my own OS, I'd like to be able to say to my OS-maker, "Look. The programming documentation is available at this link. Just use it and give me a driver".

And by "Open hardware", I'm not asking for any info about the hardware's internal design. I just need the programming documentation. After all, I have the right to demand the technical specification of how to program the hardware. How am I wrong in expecting from the manufacturer, information like "send bits 01110 to the hardware, the hardware does this. Send bits 10010 to the hardware, the hardware does that"?

[StringCheesian]

That a piece of hardware has unobfuscated open source Linux drivers implies the possibility of drivers for any OS.

Linux compatible kinda does equal open hardware. I mean, there's really no way to lock you into Linux except by using a binary blob or obfuscated source code.

So in theory at least, a motherboard with Intel G35/G45 onboard graphics and just about any NIC should be as open to other OSs as they are to Linux.

[Redeeman]

i believe G/Q 35 integrated graphics from intel has full documentation online..

[Kano]

@BhaKi

If you really want to write an os from scatch you will be happy if you get the framebuffer of a gfx cards working. I would not even think about accelleration then...

[FunkyRider]

Even if you have each and every page of documentation, can you write a usable driver set in your useful lifetime?

[BhaKi]

That a piece of hardware has unobfuscated open source Linux drivers implies the possibility of drivers for any OS.

Linux compatible kinda does equal open hardware. I mean, there's really no way to lock you into Linux except by using a binary blob or obfuscated source code.

So in theory at least, a motherboard with Intel G35/G45 onboard graphics and just about any NIC should be as open to other OSs as they are to Linux.
Why should I be forced to look into Linux Driver's code if I wanted to write a driver for my OS? That's bad for four reasons:
1. It might be not even possible to port the Linux-driver because different OSs may have paradigmatically different Driver-APIs. It's technically very silly to make you look at another OS's code to write a driver for your OS.
2. Looking at the Linux-driver's source code in C doesn't tell me completely about what's happening at binary level.
3. Licensing issues might prevent me from using the Linux-driver's source code. The Intel Linux-driver and RadeonHD driver are released under GPL, which forbids me from including the ported driver into my closed source kernel.
4. The Linux-driver might not be completely utilizing the hardware's features, thereby creating a limiting set of features for the drivers for my OS.

For the above reasons, Source code < Documentation.

[BhaKi]

Even if you have each and every page of documentation, can you write a usable driver set in your useful lifetime? Of course, probably I can't. But the maker of my OS can. Suppose I want to use OpenBSD. Given complete documentation, the OpenBSD guys are really competent enough to write a driver. The hardware shouldn't forbid them from doing this.

[BhaKi]

I've decided not to buy Intel's hardware because of their anti-competitive pratices in the processor market. Please suggest the best GPU among the rest of the documented GPUs.

Anyways, thanks to people for attempting to suggest.

[deanjo]

I've decided not to buy Intel's hardware because of their anti-competitive pratices in the processor market. Please suggest the best GPU among the rest of the documented GPUs.

Anyways, thanks to people for attempting to suggest.


Here is your ONLY option for every requirement you have specified for graphics.

http://www.traversaltech.com/products.phtml

[BhaKi]

Here is your ONLY option for every requirement you have specified for graphics.

http://www.traversaltech.com/products.phtml
That would seem like the only option if I want hardware whose internal circuit design is also released. Actually, I don't want that. I just want the programming documentation. In other words, only the interface specification.

By the way, does anybody here use a Matrox card? Is Matrox selling any documented cards?

[energyman]

you want an amd cpu (because amd even worked with linux guys when the platform was created). AHCI for Sata. You want realtek onboard networking and realtek or cmedia sound.

[Ex-Cyber]

That would seem like the only option if I want hardware whose internal circuit design is also released. Actually, I don't want that. I just want the programming documentation. In other words, only the interface specification.Well, the problem is that pretty much no commercial chip vendor will fully document even the programmable parts. With modern GPUs the obvious problem is DRM, but even leaving that aside, there are going to be things like features that are buggy or unfinished and hence declared nonexistent, stuff in sub-blocks that's vestigial or intended for other applications and may or may not do something interesting on a consumer video card, test modes, and so on. One venerable hacker pastime is to find undocumented instructions, behavior, and even registers in ostensibly documented CPUs (see e.g. the "LAX" and "DCM" instructions on the original 6502, "unreal mode" and "LOADALL" on 286/386, etc.). Microprogramming documentation? Yeah, right; Intel even encrypts their microcode patches so you don't get any wild ideas; AMD reportedly isn't so stubborn, but you still won't find a manual for writing microcode patches; that stuff is considered a trade secret.

By the way, does anybody here use a Matrox card? Is Matrox selling any documented cards?As far as I know, none of their cards are publicly documented.

[energyman]

and none of their current cards has usable drivers. Matrox went from 'ok' to 'sucks' while others went from 'sucks' to 'ok'

[indivisible]

As Ex-Cyber has noted..

Well, the problem is that pretty much no commercial chip vendor will fully document even the programmable parts.

And this is precisely why the opengraphics (http://wiki.opengraphics.org/tiki-index.php) project exists.

So why discount it just because it has detailed hardware documentation as well as an explicitly open API?

[energyman]

As Ex-Cyber has noted..



And this is precisely why the opengraphics (http://wiki.opengraphics.org/tiki-index.php) project exists.

So why discount it just because it has detailed hardware documentation as well as an explicitly open API?

do you have a pci-x port on your board? no?
then you can't use it.

Except some server boards nobody has pci-x.

Oh - and 1500$ for radeon 7000 performance is a real bargain ...

[bridgman]

Licensing issues might prevent me from using the Linux-driver's source code. The Intel Linux-driver and RadeonHD driver are released under GPL, which forbids me from including the ported driver into my closed source kernel.

Both Radeon and RadeonHD drivers are actually MIT/X11, which is compatible with both GPL and closed-source. I think the same is true for the Intel drivers.

[Ex-Cyber]

do you have a pci-x port on your board? no?
then you can't use it.OGD1 is compatible with both PCI and PCI-X.

Oh - and 1500$ for radeon 7000 performance is a real bargain ...OGD1 is an FPGA development board meant for people developing/testing the Open Graphics Project core(s), not so much for end users who just want a graphics card. As a PCI board with a reasonably large FPGA, it's not terribly expensive.

[jreeve0805]

Use the hardware your OS maker is using. What exactly is the OS you are trying to use? Not that it really matters I am just curious.



Hi guys (and gals, if any)!!

I'm looking to buy a new PC. The problem with my existing PC is that the manufacturers of its various components (including GPU, Network Card, Sound Card and IO controllers) are exerting control over what OSs I can use. The GPU manufacturer says that I can only use Windows, Linux, FreeBSD or Solaris but not any other OS. The Network Card manufacturer and the Chipset manufacturer say that I can only use Windows or Linux. All these manufacturers are refusing to provide documentation on how to program their hardware. I feel that the only purpose served by this secracy is to give Windows and Linux an unfair advantage over other OS manufacturers (OpenBSD, for example). And if I blame my OS-maker, he replies "Programming specifications for your hardware are not published by the hardware-manufacturer. So I can't make my OS compatible with your hardware, no matter how competent I am and no matter how great my OS is."

All this seems to me like very irrational behaviour by hardware manufacturers. I've come to realize that infinite freedom is possible only with completely documented hardware. (By "documented hardware", I mean hardware for which the complete programming documentation is officially available publicly). So I've decided to buy only such hardware. But hardware manufacturers with this common sense are amazingly rare, if any.

I intend to build the best PC possible from documented components. I'm currently looking for suggestions regarding the following components:

GPU: IGPs and cards, both are okay. (The AMD/ATI guys are doing a decent job but still the documentation is not 100%.)

Network Card: Again, both integrated and separated are okay.

Sound Card: (Ditto)

MoBo: One that's compatible with the answers for above ones.

All help is appreciated, not only because you are helping me but because you are helping the greater cause of fair competition. Thank you in advance.

[Dieter]

>> completely documented computer system

Assuming you want this (a) soon, and (b) reasonably
modern hardware, good luck. Please let us know if
you find anything.

GPU: AMD/ATI is making progress, but XvMC isn't
available yet.

VIA Chrome supposedly has FLOSS XvMC.

Open Graphics Project - If you want completely
documented, this is it. TT is taking preorders
for the OGD1 (FPGA) with 2 dual link DVI plus s-video.
PCI-X can be used with regular PCI slots. Not cheap,
$1500 USD for commercial use (single unit)
$1200 USD for personal and academic use.
This is intended as a development card, not really
intended as a regular video/graphics card. They
want to build an ASIC based card, but getting an
ASIC mask made is very very expensive, so it will
likely be awhile. (donations and investors welcome)

You left out an important problem: firmware.
Even first tier mainboards come with crap quality
firmware, and being closed source we can't fix the bugs.
There is LinuxBIOS, if it supports the mainboard you
want, but you mention OpenBSD and LinuxBIOS doesn't
support the *BSDs.

> Linux compatible kinda does equal open hardware. I mean,
> there's really no way to lock you into Linux except by
> using a binary blob or obfuscated source code.

Well, sorta. Many (not all) BSD developers refuse to use
Linux source code for a variety of reasons. (a) it is
frequently wrong. (b) it is frequently difficult to read,
even if it doesn't qualify for the obfuscated code
contest. (c) Some people feel that looking at GPL code
would "contaminate" their brain, and they then couldn't
write BSDL code.

>> my closed source kernel

What kernel is this? You mention OpenBSD, but OpenBSD
isn't closed source, it is Free Software.

[BhaKi]

The Open Graphics project's hardware is too expensive for me. I was kind of hoping that there should a cheaper option because I don't want the internal design documentation that's provided by OGP but just the programming specification.

[BhaKi]

Both Radeon and RadeonHD drivers are actually MIT/X11, which is compatible with both GPL and closed-source. I think the same is true for the Intel drivers.

Yeah. I made a mistake in hurry. My point essentially is that source code != documentation.

[BhaKi]

you want an amd cpu (because amd even worked with linux guys when the platform was created). AHCI for Sata. You want realtek onboard networking and realtek or cmedia sound.

So, only the GPU part remains to be decided. I'm gonna buy AMD64 CPU, realtek ethernet. How HD-capable are cmedia sound chips? Aren't they quite old in terms of technology?

[BhaKi]

Use the hardware your OS maker is using. What exactly is the OS you are trying to use? Not that it really matters I am just curious.

I'm actually trying to use OpenBSD. But ideally, I want to buy hardware that is documented enough to let me run any OS and with all the features present in the hardware.