Kyle Rankin reports via Linux Journal
[...] it's rather difficult to have a fully Free Software laptop. Even if you can pick hardware that can use Free Software drivers, there's still that pesky BIOS.
[...] I found out about the Purism Librem 15 laptop crowdsourcing campaign
[...] the hardware I'm reviewing is a very early prototype [...] since I received the laptop quite a few of the hardware specs have changed
[...] While the Librem 15 doesn't necessarily match my personal tastes for laptop hardware due to the overall size and the mouse in particular, the mission of the company definitely does. Up until this point there were few options for laptops that ran purely Free Software, much less any that had modern hardware and a modern look and feel. I believe Purism genuinely wants to create a quality laptop that will appeal both to the Free Software community as well as privacy advocates and the Librem 15 is a nice start.
In this era of pervasive surveillance, rootkits bundled with corporate software, threats of hardware backdoors by nation states, and the overall increasing sophistication of attacks, I think Purism is on to something here. As more people value transparency as a means toward security, a computer that can provide the source code for every driver, application, and firmware it uses becomes more valuable.
One sticking point for some people interested in the Librem 15 might be the price. The initial crowdfunding campaign level offered an initial price of $1449 but at the time of this writing the next available level starts at $1649.
Related Stories
Youness Alaoui of Purism reports:
The good news is: Coreboot is working on the Librem 13. The laptop boots into Linux and most things are working! The only issue I have found so far is that the M.2 SATA port doesn't seem to work properly yet (see below for more info).
- Getting video output
[...] On the BeagleBone Black [...] I figured, "Maybe it's a configuration issue", [...] So I changed that, and flashed Coreboot and when I booted the machine, the video controller worked and I saw the SeaBIOS prompt. Hurray!
- The Curious Case of the M.2 SSD
Unfortunately, once I tried booting Linux, it failed with a "Read Error".
[...] I tried booting PureOS from the USB installation drive instead, and I was able to boot into the live environment without any problems. Wow, first success! PureOS is booting with Coreboot! There was much rejoicing.
[...] SeaBIOS [with] the M.2 SSD [gave wildly inconsistent results].
[...] My current theory is that since the PCI subsystem ID is different when using the vendor BIOS than from using the Coreboot BIOS, it's possible that the subsystem ID somehow tells SeaBIOS/Linux that this specific SATA controller has a quirk that changes the initialization timings. [...]
- Summarizing
My current status is that PureOS boots and is perfectly usable, however the M.2 controller doesn't work reliably. Also, the MEI PCI device as well as the USB EHCI device have disappeared from the "lspci" output (both USB ports are working though). The lspci output is also different for most of the other devices when compared to the original BIOS.
[...] Here is [my] Acceptance Test Matrix [...] where I've stricken whatever I have had time to test and confirm as working, and made bold anything known not to work.
[...] At least 22 out of 32 items [...] are considered tested and done.
[...] I hope to have the M.2 issues fixed within the next couple of weeks, then, after making sure it is perfectly safe to flash Coreboot to any Librem 13, we'll probably release a beta image for people to test (it will come with plenty of disclaimers though!) After that, I'll work on disabling the Intel [Management Engine].
Previous:
Are Purism's Goals for the Librem Laptop Possible to Achieve?
An Early Review of the Purism Librem 15 Laptop (Which Uses 100 Percent Free Software)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 02 2015, @09:44PM
Get your Swag here!
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 02 2015, @10:00PM
You seem to have missed the freeeedom! dept.
kaszz recently noted the alternative. [soylentnews.org]
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Saturday January 03 2015, @07:11AM
As another SN article [soylentnews.org] on reverse engineering [bunniestudios.com] pointed out. You have to watch out for:
* Requirement to load a manufacture supplied binary blob, often to boot at all.
* Pprocessor or device-microcontroller that will only run signed binary code.
* Proprietary protocols to re-flash new firmware or install new operating system.
* Lack of schematic documentation.
* Tie-ins or phone-home in the developer tool chain.
* Unusual connectors that you can't just order anywhere.
* Documentation on hardware APIs so you can write your own drivers.
If the board passed these disruptions. Perhaps it's open source and tinkering friendly.
(Score: 2) by arashi no garou on Friday January 02 2015, @09:54PM
Instead of paying $1500 for this otherwise midrange laptop, why not buy a $500 laptop that supports Coreboot, swap out the wifi for an open source friendly one (if necessary), replace the BIOS/EFI and be done with it? There's an extensive list of Coreboot supported machines[1].
Unless, that is, you'd rather pay someone else $1000 to do a BIOS/EFI swap for you, which is essentially all this is. Besides, with this machine you're also stuck with that pesky non-Free Intel microcode. So it's really only a 99% Free and Open Source laptop, right?
[1] http://www.coreboot.org/Supported_Motherboards#Laptops [coreboot.org]
(Score: 1) by MilanorTSW on Saturday January 03 2015, @03:26AM
Or you can even get yourself one of the recent Chromebooks which ship with SeaBIOS by default for like $150 and swap Chrome OS with whatever GNU/Linux distribution you prefer.
Most still run Intel though.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Hairyfeet on Saturday January 03 2015, @10:37AM
Can you install ANY X86 OS on these Chromebooks, like BSD or Haiku or ReactOS? If not its still restricted. People here an bitch about Windows but at least I can grab ANY Worst Buy Special laptop and be booting into any X86 OS I want in the time it takes to install the OS, last I checked you still can't do that with Chromebooks.
But if folks are willing to shell out the $$$$ to have a laptop free from UEFI on up? I'll support 'em 110%, nothing more pure IMHO than voting with your wallet. You go Kickstarters!
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Monday January 05 2015, @04:55PM
...or maybe it's just not an x86 machine? There are a number of ARM chromebooks so *of course* you can't install any random x86 OS on one of those! But I see a number of people have successfully installed Windows on Chromebooks so it seems the ones that do use x86 chips can have alternate OSes installed without much trouble.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Monday January 05 2015, @05:24PM
Citation please? Because last I checked it took an act of God to get anything but a few Linux distros with hacked bootloaders to run on the things. And we aren't talking about the Samsung Exynos, which last I checked is the only ARM Chromebook being sold and from reviews runs worse than an Intel Atom first gen.
If you can install anything from BSD to WinXP on one of these things I'll be happy to stand corrected as the local Craigslist is full of 'em under $80 so I could actually refurb the things but last I checked anything other than the few approved Linux distros? Yeah good luck.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Monday January 05 2015, @06:56PM
http://gbatemp.net/threads/how-to-install-windows-8-on-your-google-chromebook-pixel.350111/ [gbatemp.net]
Granted, it's not quite the simplest thing in the world, but the most complicated step seems to be getting the Windows installer onto USB media. There are a few device drivers that simply don't exist on Windows either, but that's got nothing to do with it being a locked-down restricted device -- same thing could happen trying to install a different OS on a random Windows box.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday January 06 2015, @07:50PM
ROFL...that is the fucking $1500 Chromebook, NOBODY BUYS THAT THING! Talk about moving the fucking goalposts LOL! The biggest fucking selling point of the Chromebook IS THE PRICE, did you HONESTLY think I was talking about the fucking PIXEL? Really? When I had already told you they were selling on CL for $80?
How about you stop waving the Google flag and show us a REAL CITATION, show us Windows running on the Intel Celeron Chromrbook, because you have as much odds of running into a Pixel in the wild as I do winning the powerball.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Tuesday January 06 2015, @09:04PM
I don't know man, to me a pixel is just what an image is made of. But you wanted to know about installing Windows on a Chromebook, and that is apparently a Chromebook and there are instructions for installing Windows. You're the one moving goalposts. If you want to restrict it further you can go Google for yourself and figure it out, there were plenty of results when I looked.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday January 28 2015, @09:24PM
Found on the OpenBSD mailing list:
It appears there is a big lie going on about this machine
The "absolutely no mystery code" is fake, the same page say:
"which includes a binary from Intel, called FSP."
The FPS is the Firmware Package Support[1]. It have "CPU, memory controller,
and Intel(R) chipset initialization functions as a binary package".
- Run proprietary microcode[2];
- Blobs on Embedded Controller[3];
- Support Intel "features" (Management Engines):
- SMM [4], It have many allegations of backdoor inside;
- SMC [5] . It's a mechanism that have total controll of your hardware;
- AMT[6] (Active Management Technology); and
- This processor have a cryptoprocessor (or accelerator, I don't know exactly)
inside [7]. This processor perform the "Intel Indentity Protection Technology"
(on Public Key Generation step) and AES acceleration (if enabled).
Intel already have accusations about backdoor on this [8].
OpenBSD don't allow this to run.
- Blobs on GPU. It run a Intel Iris Pro 5200, that is VBIOS closed;
- Blobs on USB 3.0; and
- The SSD/HDD have blobs on microcontrollers on drive board.
If you want something more "free", try out some ARM board, like SABRE lite or
something like that.
[1] https://archive.today/hWkT3 [archive.today]
[2] https://archive.today/GKqXM [archive.today]
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embedded_controller [wikipedia.org]
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_Management_Mode#Problems [wikipedia.org]
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_Management_Controller [wikipedia.org]
[6] https://archive.today/YTuP8 [archive.today]
[7] https://archive.today/89RGl [archive.today]
[8] https://archive.today/R8MXN [archive.today]
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by gallondr00nk on Friday January 02 2015, @10:03PM
I wonder why they chose a Mac design, rather than a replica of the old IBM ThinkPad designs. Free software and ThinkPads used to go hand in hand, and it's not like Lenovo produce anything decent any more.
I'd happily part with $1449 for say, something close to a X40 with a i3 and 8GB RAM. I'm a big more reluctant to do it for what looks like a very expensive Acer.
Get off my lawn, etc.
Oh, and surely the Nvidia card has a blob driver? I'd have expected Purism to use an Intel GPU.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday January 02 2015, @10:25PM
What part of that makes it a Mac Design?
Looks pretty much like every other HP or Dell laptop. Other than something like the Inspiron 15 5000 Series, sporting almost the same specs [dell.com], would cost almost a thousand dollars less.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by cockroach on Friday January 02 2015, @11:24PM
The keyboard, touchpad, colour, and shape?
(Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday January 03 2015, @12:46AM
Like I said, pretty much like any one of a dozen modern laptops.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Saturday January 03 2015, @01:26AM
All trying to copy the Mac, and all failing to live up to the quality.
Thinkpads from the IBM era, or even the early Lenovo era, is what they should be aiming at. Lenovo really jumped the shark with the t430, there's no reason to get a thinkpad over a macpro now.
Give me a good keyboard, trackpoint, great battery, plenty of ram, large SSD, built in 3G, and full linux support (including great power management, fast and stable suspend/resume/hibernate) and im happy.
(Score: 2) by cockroach on Friday January 02 2015, @11:21PM
Oh hell yes!
I mean, at least give it a decent keyboard / "mouse". Other than the freedom (which is something that I would indeed be willing to spend quite a bit of money on) this looks awful. I suppose I'll stick with my X41 and X201 for the foreseeable future.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Saturday January 03 2015, @05:01AM
I wonder why they chose a Mac design
Because all laptops are Apple designs now. I haven't seen an actual keyboard offered in years. I had a chicklet keyboard on my Tandy CoCo, not feeling nostalgic enough to want another one. So I'm still on a Thinkpad X200s. Even Lenovo can't get a standard Thinkpad keyboard anymore, apparently, they can't even get the basic key layout right. Meh.
This is the usual crowdfunded scam. What this product is is simple enough to grasp. Go to China and look at the available generic crap, find one with midlevel specs, a basic Intel video and either shipping with one of the only WiFi cards (a few Atheros, etc) with blobfree support or a factory willing to switch out for one (i.e. any of them. hint: It is China, they will do whatever you can pay for) and BAM! Lots of that sort of product for sale to anyone willing to buy a few, they will even put your badge on it, brand the BIOS splash, whatever you will pay for. These guys add lots of PR spin about Freedom! and watch the money roll in. Crap Chinese hardware with zero warranty support (this company will be gone a few months after shipping product) and oh Hell yea, sign me up for one! Not.
Oh, and surely the Nvidia card has a blob driver?
RTFWP, they did. Nvidia would have been an instant giveaway.
(Score: 2) by gallondr00nk on Saturday January 03 2015, @01:23PM
I hadn't really thought of it like that, but you're probably right. It was a bit naive of me to think that it might have actually been designed by someone involved in the crowdsourcing.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by joekiser on Friday January 02 2015, @10:06PM
This project seems like something that will be in perpetual development, like the Neo900. I am also not a fan of the 16:9 ratio and the off-centered keyboard/trackpad.
In the meantime, one can purchase a Lenovo T60 (probably the pinnacle of Thinkpad design) for around $100, and install LibreBoot [libreboot.org]. The Boe Hydis 15" IPS display is supported.
Debt is the currency of slaves.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday January 02 2015, @10:30PM
16:9 ratio is great is all you do is watch movies.
I too lament the rush toward wide instead of tall. In just about all work scenarios tall is better.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 02 2015, @11:47PM
Like 16:9 is better for watching a movie, because you will have those black lines at the top and bottom of the screen with 4:3 screen, unlike now when i have the black lines made of plastic with this 16:9 laptop?
(Score: 2) by Marand on Saturday January 03 2015, @07:58AM
I am also not a fan of the 16:9 ratio and the off-centered keyboard/trackpad.
I prefer 16:10 (8:5 if you want to be a pedant), but I can't disagree with the keyboard/trackpad criticism strongly enough. Usually when a keyboard has the off-center keyboard and trackpad, it's because it's including a numpad. Numpads are awesome and having a bult-in one is way better than using some shitty USB numpad. It's actually one of the things I look for in a laptop, because numpads are useful in some programs for shortcuts. Some are made with the expectation of having one (like blender), and others you can bind useful things to them since they're separate keys from the other numbers.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Friday January 02 2015, @10:13PM
With 1,500$ budget you can build a super sweet desktop : ) Very cool goal though! Maybe starting with an existing laptop and modifying it would be cheaper. So many companies are trying to escape the laptop hardware market because there is little profit. These guys are trying to get into the market with something very expensive. People will buy it because freeeeedom but that market will saturate quickly.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 3, Funny) by wonkey_monkey on Friday January 02 2015, @10:31PM
Purism Librem
I can't imagine anyone but Marlon Brando as the Godfather saying that.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 5, Insightful) by keplr on Friday January 02 2015, @10:42PM
If it has a modern Intel chip in it, how can it be considered fully free? These chips are running an entire second OS that can take over all the hardware of the computer, lock it down, brick it, or just passively spy on you all through a 3G modem which doesn't require the computer even be fully powered on. Every computer made with an Intel chip that has Vpro, and every modern Core series has this.
The really sinister stuff is being baked into the hardware now. You can run entirely free software, no proprietary binary blobs or firmware, and still be completely owned by the Government.
I don't respond to ACs.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Friday January 02 2015, @11:16PM
I think it's important to note that the claim is "free software", so my mind immediately excludes firmware from that statement...However the review goes on to say:
Which is immediately contradicted by:
So, I do not buy for a second that there's no binary blobs on the Intel i7 chips they're using, or indeed much of the other hardware. I hope i'm wrong. Not sold on this project at all.
(Score: 2) by khedoros on Friday January 02 2015, @11:38PM
These chips are running an entire second OS that can take over all the hardware of the computer, lock it down, brick it, or just passively spy on you all through a 3G modem which doesn't require the computer even be fully powered on. Every computer made with an Intel chip that has Vpro, and every modern Core series has this.
Citation needed. Not all modern Intel CPUs support vPro, and of the ones that do, not all of them support AMT, which seems to have the features that you're the most worried about. The review states that the machine he's reviewing has a Core i7 4770HQ [intel.com], which doesn't support vPro. Further, I've never seen or heard any indication that Intel had put a 3G modem into every machine, even ones that have the (admittedly scary-sounding) vPro stuff.
(Score: 2) by fnj on Friday January 02 2015, @11:42PM
Forget it, he doesn't have the slightest conception what VPro is and isn't.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Saturday January 03 2015, @01:22AM
Perhaps you could enlighten us?
Wikipedia seems to suggest vpro is a bunch of more modern Intel cpu bits, with trusted computing and amtbeing the suspicious parts.
AMT to the layman looks like a standard ilo style management engine - presumably disableable in the bios. The trusted computing bit looks useful if you control the keys, and fairly benign if you can disable it, but if not you're in the "right to read" area, and have to wait until the lunar uprisings to get it back.
(Score: 2) by fnj on Friday January 02 2015, @11:40PM
Utter and total horseshit. Proof that excessive tinfoil rots the brain. Yeah, I'm being ugly and harsh, but being confronted with complete worshipping of fantasy does that to me.
(Score: 2) by arashi no garou on Saturday January 03 2015, @12:46AM
Not to mention that vPro and AMT can be disabled in the BIOS/EFI, and on top of that, this machine seems to have a FOSS BIOS/EFI installed. So even if it was a vPro-supported CPU, it likely wouldn't even be possible to turn it on.
Idiots abound.
(Score: 1) by boltronics on Saturday January 03 2015, @09:45AM
Actually, ignorance on your behalf, it seems. :) Look at the Intel Management Engine (ME) section on the bios-freedom-status [puri.sm] which I mentioned in a different sub-thread.
It's GNU/Linux dammit!
(Score: 2) by arashi no garou on Saturday January 03 2015, @12:25PM
Sounds like fearmongering on Purism's part in order to sell more laptops. According to an Intel employee[1], it can indeed be disabled in the BIOS/EFI settings of most computers (besides which, I've done it myself on vPro-enabled machines I've administered, and I was unable to contact the machines after disabling it in BIOS).
That said, why didn't Purism choose an AMD based machine in the first place if they're so worried about pure FOSS and customer privacy? Oh, right, then they couldn't charge $1500 for what is essentially a $500 laptop!
[1]: "In order to disable Intel AMT completely, you can enter your BIOS setup and look for an Intel AMT menu (not always existent, but many BIOS present it). If you find it, you can simply 'disable' Intel AMT, its devices and features." -- https://software.intel.com/en-us/forums/topic/297931 [intel.com]
(Score: 1) by boltronics on Sunday January 04 2015, @04:15AM
AMT and ME are different technologies. ME cannot be disabled. If you do so, the system won't boot.
I agree with you that they should have used AMD to avoid this issue. I don't agree the laptop is overpriced. These aren't mass-produced machines, the chips and components were chosen based on free software drivers (not cost) and there's no money from demo software pre-loading. Having looked into laptops recently, the price is about what I expect with the above considerations.
It's GNU/Linux dammit!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 03 2015, @08:07AM
the hardware community has been making planned obsolescence a reality since the nintendo entertainment system was released. the nintendo literally used about 6 $3 microprocessor array to get a crappy 8-bit environment. the price you pay for devices these days hasn't changed much. i decided to really pay close attention to computers and their uses and misuses, and ultimately they are all a joke. i have a display port graphic processor that can drive 6 display port screens, but not at 1080p they don't even mention in the technical specs what the actual resolution is. meanwhile a 500 pound satellite can do between 1000-5000 streams of video depending on resolution, in space where they can't cool the device effectively. meanwhile google can roll out gigabit fiber in select cities where someone can send terabytes of data unnoticed by using tools to share video within his circle of friends... until it gets found out. so there you have it, as awesome as tech is, it is sold to us by people who lie and cheat people for fun and profit.
(Score: 2) by Magic Oddball on Saturday January 03 2015, @09:34AM
meanwhile a 500 pound satellite ...
I'm torn between:
Don't satellites weigh much more than that?
and
Damn, I know the laptop I lugged around in college was heavy, but not that heavy!
(I could take the time to read the rest of the sentence to find out the full context, but stream-of-consciousness writing without capital letters gives me a headache and I'm already feeling irritable enough, so fuck it.)
(Score: 1) by boltronics on Saturday January 03 2015, @09:30AM
I think the parent was referring to the Intel Management Engine (ME) [me.bios.io].
My understanding from a talk I attended on the subject last year was that it can communicate using a NIC supported by the chipset without operating systems awareness.
It's GNU/Linux dammit!
(Score: 1) by boltronics on Saturday January 03 2015, @09:42AM
I should have taken a look at the Purism website before posting. They have a section dedicated to this here [puri.sm].
It's GNU/Linux dammit!
(Score: 2) by egcagrac0 on Sunday January 04 2015, @12:01AM
At a $1600+ for a laptop, I guess that just underscores that freedom isn't free.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 09 2015, @09:23PM
No, and if take a casual look around yourself, you'll find that people happily pay for chains that look attractive enough to them.
Due to this, those without the chains often are simply not fashionable--cell phones are a key indicator of how fashionable enslavement appears today. They even deliver ads to help tell people what to do!