Thread: *BSD Laptops
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Old 1st November 2008
JMJ_coder JMJ_coder is offline
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So my laptop finally came. I am slowly making my way through configuring it and trying to get everything working. Much to my delight, many things "just work" in a way that is pleasing to me.

For instance, the touchpad/trackpoint/wireless_usb_notebook_mouse automatically are recognized and function properly. And I was easily able to disable the touchpad via the BIOS and the trackpoint and wireless mouse still work as expected. The reason I disabled the touchpad is because when I type, my palms have a tendency to move the cursor via the touchpad - and I don't like using it anyway. But the trackpoint is a nice feature, so it stays. And the wireless mouse is instantly and automatically recognized when I plug and unplug it. And I'm using /dev/wsmouse.


One thing that has been a bear is configuring X. I first tried just plain XFree86 that ships with NetBSD. That didn't work - and I can't blame it, the 'intel' driver is too new to have been compiled for it. So, I installed modular X.org. Everything compiled smoothly, but when I tried to startx, nothing. The two main errors I received was that the glx module didn't exist and that agpgart wasn't configured (or didn't exist - I can't remember). I fought with it for about two days. Many people mentioned a similar problem, but their solutions didn't work for me. So, I finally went back to plain old XFree86, used the 'vesa' driver - and all is peachy. I really don't need 3D acceleration, so a basic driver will work. The only reason I have X installed is to use programs like Firefox, OpenOffice, GIMP, and maybe watch a DVD.

- speaking of graphical needs, does anyone know if NetBSD ships with an image viewer? I thought that X would come with xv, but it's not there. -


There is still a bit to configure - installing programs, getting wireless setup, possibly mapping the special function keys (does any know where I can find the key event codes for those special keys?), etc. I'll keep you guys updated and give a full review at the end.



The only thing that I don't like about this computer so far is the placement of the F1 and the Function keys. F1 interferes with Escape and Function interferes with left-Control. I guess my fingers will adapt, and I may switch the Caps Lock and Escape if I can figure how to do it in the console (I can do it in X), but it is an inconvenience.
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