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How better to work on Open Source projects than to use a Libre computing device? But that's a hard goal to accomplish. If you're using a desktop computer, Libre software is easily achievable, though keeping your entire software stack free of closed source binary blobs might require a little extra work. But if you want a laptop, your options are few indeed. Lucky for us, there may be another device in the mix soon, because [Lukas Hartmann] has just about finalized the MNT Reform.
Since we started eagerly watching the Reform a couple years ago the hardware world has kept turning, and the Reform has improved accordingly. The i.MX6 series CPU is looking a little peaky now that it's approaching end of life, and the device has switched to a considerably more capable – but no less free – i.MX8M paired with 4 GB of DDR4 on a SODIMM-shaped System-On-Module. This particular SOM is notable because the manufacturer freely provides the module schematics, making it easy to upgrade or replace in the future. The screen has been bumped up to a 12.5″ 1080p panel and steps have been taken to make sure it can be driven without blobs in the graphics pipeline.
What has Soylentils' experience with open hardware been?
(Score: 3, Informative) by Reziac on Thursday January 23 2020, @02:58AM (2 children)
Um... I put Win10 on a ten year old box (Phenom II x4, but runs about 30% slower than my nominally-slower Core2Duo, so really not a very good system) -- 8GB RAM, spinning rust HD. Runs perfectly fine. Doesn't chug the HD. Might be Update got stuck on yours and just never finished wiping its ass. Also sounds like it had some serious issue with the I/O drivers.
I can't stand Win10's interface, it will never be my everyday OS, but not because of poor performance.
Meanwhile, I recently saw a Catalina setup that used... are you sitting down?? 14GB RAM just to admire its navel. Holy crap.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Common Joe on Thursday January 23 2020, @03:44AM (1 child)
I bumped you up with a point simply because the stories I have are anecdotal and it's always good to hear another perspective.
I do have some experience with running a very small fleet of individual Win 10 laptops, but not ancient tech like the one I owned. They were modern and high powered. I don't know why you and I had different experiences. The Intel i3 processor was definitely not the problem, though. I watched the processor and it's was near idle most of the time. The I/O was through the roof, though.
Yeah. Win 10's interface does suck. It won't fix all your problems, but I suggest using the open shell menu [github.com]. It's brings sanity back to the start menu. Highly customizable. And instead of Windows Explorer, I also suggest FreeCommander [freecommander.com], although personally I use Double Commander [sourceforge.io]. Last I used it, FreeCommander is more stable and better suited for Windows, but it's a Windows only application. Double Commander is less stable, but since I use more than one OS, I can run it on both Windows and Linux. Both are feature rich and nearly have the same features.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday January 23 2020, @05:30AM
Returned the favor, good info. Does sound like problem with the I/O driver... long time since I've seen that, but that's exactly what it did, made the HD chug constantly to no effect even when the system was idle. Can also happen with the default network driver. Used to see that on IBM boxen -- without their right driver, it'd look like everything worked (no bang marks in Device Mangler) until you hooked one to a network, and brought the entire network to its knees. Was the most amazing thing.
Yeah, first thing I do with Win7 onward is install OpenShell, so I can stand 'em at all. I've used FreeCommander and DoubleCommander but have not found either to be 100% stable. Explorer++ has some good features but crashes enough that I've given up on it. Search is utterly broken in W7 onward; found some 3rd party util to replace that (don't have it up this instant, must copy to the other post-XP boxen when I remember which one it's on... you can tell I don't spend a lot of time slumming there). I live in the file manager, so having it so messed up is enough to run me off. Over time I could probably fix and block and beat the rest of Win10 into submission, but there's no making it not ugly. I don't require beauty on the desktop, but it's eye-searing brutalism.
I have... um, four different Win10 installs (original, some later version, whatever is most recent, and "Lite" which runs about 30% lighter but only worth bothering on a really cramped system -- 1GB idle instead of 1.5GB idle) ... they all perform well enough, but I still hate them all, and they only exist because Experimental and extra HDs and spare PCs with no real mission in life, so just in case. Hopefully I'll never get stuck using the damn thing for lack of choice. Win10 is what finally got me to trawl distros until I found a linux I can live with. Way to go, Microsoft... run off the users who used to actually LIKE Windows!!
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.