• 5 Posts
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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: July 21st, 2023

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  • It doesn’t make any sense. If I make a box with a screen that runs linux (idk for ordering lunch in school canteen) and only update the OS by physically removing the hard drive and installing it from different computer, does that justify it being proprietary?

    On the other end a circuit can be changed e.g. by tuning a potentiometer or straight up changing a component. That’s not any different than changing a value of a variable in the firmware. There is no actual difference in hardware and software, just different level of abstraction like C vs Python.




  • It sounded like you got annoyed that I was guessing and it sounded like you tried to make it clear to me that the guess was not helpful to you with the use of sarcasm. I guess I misunderstood, sorry.

    Regarding the actual questions: You asked how does it compare to Coreboot. Canoeboot is actually coreboot, just slightly modified to work with Free Software Foundation’s rules but these rules are kind of absurd. See [1]. Libreboot is also modified Coreboot but one that’s actually good. The difference between them is that Libreboot should be a bit easier to install and that they support different hardware.

    In terms of battery life the same laptop with or without Coreboot should perform the same. Coreboot really only handles the booting. Battery life should depend on the “EC firmware”, which is like a second chip on your motherboard that handles stuff like blinking LEDs or checking if your lid is opened or closed. It also depends on the OS itself so Linux vs Windows will make a difference. Canoeboot is an exception because it does not include “microcode updates” for ideological reasons. Microcode is code that runs on a “CPU inside of your CPU”. Not updating it will A) make your CPU buggy and vulnerable to attacks like Spectre [2] and B) maybe even have worse battery life because Microcode can control the voltage your CPU runs at. More voltage -> more power (P ~ V^2)

    [1] https://libreboot.org/news/policy.html [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectre_(security_vulnerability)



  • I haven’t read the multi episode argument between him and the person from freedesktop but the more I see comments like yours the more I’m inclined to side with him. (Though skimming his linux related blogs makes him look like an edgy kid to me.)

    Your first source does not prove he is a nazi sympathizer. It just says he does not want to ban nazis from his discord. That’s 2 different things. It could for example mean that he does not want to ban people that some person labels nazis. (everyone on reddit that disagrees with me is a nazi)

    The second source is made from a clown. That’s the same guy that’s suspected of doing the Stallman hitpiece. (it was at some point hosted from his IP or something) That article is full of half-truths. For example it frames Stallman’s opinions on age of consent like he is a sex offender. Or his jokes about not caring about what will happen with his body after his death like he goes around munching.

    I guess my point is that overblowing things only digs deeper trenches between the “sides” for no reason. I am not arguing that he is innocent, just that your comment might make some people think that “the wokies are trying to cancel vaxry” and ignore even legitimate critiques of him (or generally ${CONTROVERSIAL_PERSON}).




  • You are confused and mean. You cannot compare 2 different laptops and say that one has worse battery management because of coreboot. You would need to have the same laptop with and without coreboot to do any comparison.

    I don’t really get what you are trying to say in the second paragraph but Canoeboot is not a good daily driver because it’s basically a “drug substitute” for GNU dummies. The author of it does not recommend using it. Use Libreboot instead as it does not break your CPU.











  • Don’t worry, the whole thing is that GNU boot contains proprietary firmware for testing coreboot. The only distros affected are GNU Boot and Canoe Boot. Upstream coreboot has that testing firmware there intentionally so it’s silly to call it “affected”.

    FSF is doing great stuff for the world but I think FOSS is kinda held back by being led by nerds that are “a bit different”. (edit: I mean that with respect. These nerds are surely nice people and great coders but imo not great philosophical leaders)


  • It’s pretty good with adaptive sync and nVidia Reflex otherwise it’s terrible. Reflex seems to work on linux too so I guess single player linux gamers will be happy.

    Useless blabbering incoming: With that said I am a proud frame generation hater. On its own it effectively halves your frame rate even though the frame counter will say that it doubled it. With Reflex the latency is not “that bad” but still I don’t get why anyone would want that. The reason I want more frames is better responsiveness. I cannot really tell the difference between 60 Hz and 120 Hz video. I’ve seen Avatar 2 at high refresh and did not really notice anything (other than that the movie sucked). But I can tell that my mouse feels like it’s sliding on jelly.

    Obviously it’s great for the people that like it. I won’t be like the wayland dev who blocked the tearing protocol (aka. just allowing frames to show on screen as soon as they are created) because they did not use it.