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As the majority of BSD/Linux users, I use X.org for my X Window System.  I have a preference to edit my own xorg.conf to ensure that X runs properly on any of my system.  To this date, I have never failed to get X configured.  It is actually not that difficult.  Today, distros such as Debian Lenny, Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Sabayon, to name a few, can automatically create a working xorg.conf for users during installs.  With the distros like Gentoo and Arch Linux, users are required to configure their own xorg.conf.  Regardless of the configuration type you choose, you are eventually going to have to choose whether you want to use a propriety driver or open source driver.  This can be a nightmare in itself if you are not careful.

Regardless of which distro I use, I have a preference to start out with the open source drivers.  vesa is a common open source driver that I tend to start out with.  It ends to work with most video cards.  On my desktop, I have an Nvidia card so I decided to use the nv open source driver.  Both vesa and nv work on my desktop.

I decided to try the nvidia driver on my Arch Linux desktop.  Arch has a good wiki to get nvidia with 3D rendering to work. I got it to work and was quite happy, for about a month at least.  So what happened?

The nvidia drivers, like it’s propriety counterpart, ati, have a tendency to break.  For some computer users, it breaks a lot.  With Gentoo, I never install the latest nvidia drivers.  It breaks X forcing me to either revert to an older driver or switch to nv or vesa.  With Arch, an update to the Gnome desktop broke X with the cause attributed to my nvidia driver.  In Ubuntu, yes Ubuntu systems do break, an update to the kernel caused X to break as well.  In PC-BSD, I was forced to rebuild X.Org.  In all cases, I was either using the nvidia or ati propriety drivers.

When X broke earlier this week on my Arch system, I first had to find out what was the culprit (I mentioned above that I upgraded my Gnome desktop).  X was working but I was getting a low resolution with the nvidia drivers.  It did not matter if I set the Modes to reflect the resolution of my monitor, the lower resolution remained default.

Finally I decided to switch to vesa and the higher resolution (1440X900) returned.  I made some more configurations to xorg.conf and I got the open source nvidia drivers, nv, to work at the higher resolution as well.  The nvidia driver still do not work.  No problem, I will not use them on my desktop again, I will stick to open source drivers which, from my experience, have never broke on me.  Save the headache, stick with nv

I am eagerly waiting for an open source graphics card.  There is one available but the price is quite expensive, $1500 US, higher than many custom-built desktops!  Prices should drop in the future though.

Edit: This is a blog posting, not a news article, Beginner Howto, etc.  The above posting mentioned that I preferred to use open source drivers on my DESKTOP, it does not mention that I use them on my other laptops and systems.  I am also not denying anyone’s RIGHT to use propriety drivers, I use them as well.

See my latest blog posting and response to ‘Two New Software Freedoms’.

Well, I have been running Ubuntu on my desktop for over a month.  In that short period of time, I found that Ubuntu is just not for me.  I love it on my Thinkpad, do not get me wrong but on my desktop, I need something different.

I miss not having to edit something, really.  I even stopped developing on my desktop.  Weird since many developers gave up Gentoo or other distros so they could have a stable system.

Isn’t is strange that I could get a server to run on Gentoo, Arch, or FreeBSD, but not on Ubuntu.  Seriously, this is not right.  Ubuntu is supposed to make things easier for me.  That’s what all the Ubuntu users tell me.

To be honest, I got a lot of things done when I was running Gentoo and FreeBSD systems.  Arch Linux opened up a new world to me as well though I preferred to do things the Gentoo/BSD way.  If it wasn’t for that bad battery in my motherboard, I would probably still be running either PC-BSD or Gentoo now.

Right now I need a stable system to get Django to run properly.  For me, that means doing it with Gentoo, possibly with FreeBSD.

Will I give up on Ubuntu, no way.  As I mentioned many times, Ubuntu is the choice of users in Vietnam. I still need to use it but if I want to go back to my geek roots, I got to use Gentoo again.

I am not a distro hopper, I am just a Gentoo ‘jump back and forth-er’

Using Gentoo Linux, you have to get used to things just breaking, especially in the last couple of years. Portage is probably one of the best package management systems in the open source community. I have been quite impressed with Portage 2 the last couple months. Things seem to be improving.

Yesterday I woke up to check some email. Later I needed to do some web development for an NGO. I booted up and by the time I got to the graphical login screen, I noticed that I had a problem with my screen resolution.

I checked xorg.conf but there was nothing wrong with it. I kept restarting X only to get a very low resolution screen. Everything worked fine. I experienced this problem before with Sabayon Linux and an earlier version of Gentoo. No configuration files were changed in the last couple of days. I had not emerged and updated newer versions of nvidia-drivers, xorg, or KDE.

Sadly, the same thing happened back in 2005 which forced me to switch to Kubuntu. Yesterday I really needed a stable desktop to do my work. It was my fault, I should not have used Gentoo in a work environment.

Since I did not have the whole day to figure out what my problem was, I decided to back everything up on my Linux Mint Thinkpad. Back in came PC-BSD on my desktop. Within 10 minutes, I had a working FreeBSD desktop. Now I am using portmanager to update my PC-BSD system.

I still consider Gentoo one of the best Linux distros ever. It brought me to Linux but in the last couple of years, Gentoo users have watched developers, after developers leave in large numbers. Packages are no longer maintained and updated in a timely manner. Gentoo is no longer bleeding edge. It is no longer suited for the desktop.

Instead I will focus on using Gentoo more as a server. I will stick with PC-BSD and Linux Mint as my choice for desktop distros.

Amazingly, PC-BSD is the only distro out there that can detect my Intel hda sound card and play sound on all 5 speakers. VirtualBox will be ported to FreeBSD soon as well. Things are looking good for PC-BSD.

Edit: Seems that Compiz-Fusion was the culprit here.  I am not a fan of Compiz so I just needed to remove it and everything worked fine.

PC-BSD 1.5 is now available for download on the Vietnam BSD/Linux Mirror.

From the website:

The PC-BSD Team is pleased to announce the availability of PC-BSD version 1.5! This release includes many new features and fixes, including the following:

• • NEW System Updater tool – Keeps system & PBIs up to date – Allows override variables, so that admins can use their own mirrors / servers to roll out updates to users.
  • NEW sound detection program! Uses XML backend to identify and load modules
  • NEW amd64 build of 1.5, including PBIs that are on our auto-build server
  • NEW PBI icon preview library, now a PBI file shows the embedded icon on your desktop, not the generic “PBI” format icon
  • Xorg 7.3
  • KDE 3.5.8
  • FreeBSD 6.3 Release

PC-BSD 1.5 can be downloaded from the Vietnam BSD/Linux Mirror at the following URIs:

• ftp://ftp.indochinalinux.com/pcBSD/1.5/
• ftp://202.78.230.5/pcBSD/1.5/

Cross-posted at: http://www.saigonlinux.org/?p=26

Wow, I should never gone to class Friday. My fever returned in the afternoon so I canceled my other engagements and headed home. I ended up taking some medicine and slept most of Friday evening. Got some really good sleep too but now it is nearly 2 AM in the morning and I am quite awake.

A lone cricket is making a lot of noise downstairs. I thought it was Ally, the littlest kitten, crying on the terrace so I let her in. When I brought her downstairs, I realized it was a cricket. Crickets normally do not make it out this far from District 1.

Now I am on my custom desktop updating it to FreeBSD 7.0 which was released earlier this week. I am using the freebsdupdate(8) application to update from FreeBSD 6.3 to 7.0. Currently, I am recompiling all the ports with portmanager so they will link to the new 7.0 libraries. It should take most of the night and tomorrow morning to recompile my whole system.

Maybe I will get some more sleep tonight, maybe not. That cricket is sure loud.