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.