Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD?

[hildebrandt at chello.at]

Besides XP and several different Linux distros (Fedora, Gentoo, Debian, 
Slackware, Mepis) I had no problem to install openBSD and netBSD on my 
Sony Vaio PCG-K115Z. However, with FreeBSD booting stops in the middle 
of the hardware detection. This was true for older versions and is the 
same for the new 5.3.

freebsd-mobile-request at freebsd.org wrote:

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>Today's Topics:
>
>   1. Fwd: Commitable R3000Z Patch! (Astrodog)
>   2. Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (David Wolfskill)
>   3. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Thomas Beer)
>   4. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Peter Radcliffe)
>   5. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Randy Bush)
>   6. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Rhian Resnick)
>   7. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Toxa)
>   8. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Toxa)
>   9. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Thomas Beer)
>  10. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Brian Reichert)
>  11. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD? (Toxa)
>  12. New R3000Z Patch (Astrodog)
>  13. Re: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD?
>      (Vladimir Grebenschikov)
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Message: 1
>Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 10:30:41 -0600
>From: Astrodog <astrodog at gmail.com>
>Subject: Fwd: Commitable R3000Z Patch!
>To: freebsd-mobile at freebsd.org
>Message-ID: <2fd864e041111083017ac9fa2 at mail.gmail.com>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
>
>I apologize for posting this yet again. Just want to make sure if
>someone's digging around for laptop info they'll get it. More
>information is avalibile on freebsd-current and freebsd-amd64.
>
>Thanks,
>Harrison Grundy
>
>---------- Forwarded message ----------
>From: Astrodog <astrodog at gmail.com>
>Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 05:55:20 -0800
>Subject: Commitable R3000Z Patch!
>To: freebsd-amd64 at freebsd.org, freebsd-current at freebsd.org
>
>
>The patch is located at
>http://evogaming.il.us.tveps.net/~astrodog/atkbdc.patch testing was
>quite limited, but essentally, if you set hint.atkbd.0.disabled to 1,
>it disables the test. I suppose it could be renamed to any number of
>things, the code is a whole 2 lines, and is quite obvious. I'm gonna
>wait to see if it makes -CURRENT in the next day or so, so I don't end
>up with people grabbing ISOs from me if I don't have to (Snapshots
>servers are your freind). Automatic detection code to follow in the
>next day or so. This was tested on a Compaq 3004US, and it solved the
>reboot problem. I also tested on a dual opteron 240 machine, and when
>the hint is not set, it has no effect. I'm going to double-post to
>freebsd-current in hopes of getting it committed sooner, so all of us
>3000Z-base laptop owners can have our fun with FreeBSD.
>
>--- Harrison Grundy
>
>------------------------------
>
>Message: 2
>Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 09:37:51 -0800 (PST)
>From: David Wolfskill <david at catwhisker.org>
>Subject: Suitability of Sony VAIO laptop for FreeBSD?
>To: mobile at freebsd.org
>Message-ID: <200411111737.iABHbpFp014244 at bunrab.catwhisker.org>
>
>Last Saturday, my laptop (a Dell Inspiron 5000e) apparently stopped
>working for the last time.  (Ugly mode of failure -- won't stay powered
>up (even via AC adaptor) to complete a boot sequence; usually doesn't
>even get as far as illuminating the screen.  I suspect either thermal
>stress on the CPU, a crack in teh system board, or bad RAM -- and I
>tried swapping the RAM, to no avail.)
>
>I see that Fry's is advertising a Sony VAIO with the following
>characteristics (none of which is a model ID, of course) for $1100:
>
>* 2.8 GHz P4 CPU
>* 15.4" WXGA screen ("TFT With XBRITE Technology")
>* 512 MB DDR SDRAM
>* 60 GB disk
>* CD/RW/DVD-ROM combo drive
>* Integrated 802.11g
>* 10/100 NIC & v.90 MODEM
>* ILink (1394) & Memory stick slot
>* Some M$ "software" that I fully intend to ignore
>
>I suspect that it also has a plausibly reasonable audio component,
>though that isn't critical for my primary intended uses.  The
>illustration that accompanies the ad shows a "touchpad"-type pointing
>device, which should serve OK for me.
>
>I do tend to do a lot of "make buildworld" (and friends) type things on
>a laptop; that may have contributed to the demise of the i5ke mentioned
>above.
>
>One of the "scarce resources" that I tend to value in a laptop is screen
>"real estate" -- my eyes work reasonably well, and I prefer
>higher-resolution screens.  The 1400x1050 of the i5ke was OK, but a
>little cramped.
>
>I would expect that with a 2.8 GHz P4, it would suck a battery "dry"
>rather quickly; this would be a rather negative attribute.  The ad
>didn't indicate the number or nominal run-time for batteries.
>
>Any warnings as far as running FreeBSD 4.x or 5.x (or 6) on such a
>beast?
>
>Thanks!
>
>Peace,
>david
>  
>