7
mishaor
5y

Does anyone here have experience with FreeBSD as a desktop/laptop OS? I want to install it on my laptop.

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  • 1
    Following this 📌
  • 2
    I barely tolerated FreeBSD as a server. God knows what pain you would have forced upon you as a DE.
  • 1
    OpenBSD was pretty neat for desktop, used it for quite a while
    idk about freebsd
  • 1
    But why?
  • 1
    Like others said already, I think other flavours are more suitable for desktop use.
  • 1
    Very little experience with PC-BSD, now called TrueOS. It was some years behind Linux back then. Ancient KDE, never got GPU acceleration to work. Other drivers no issue, actually better than Linux (where I had to compile keyboard drivers myself, wtf).
    Promises of "Unix compatibility" and "Windows alternatives" are hollow: Enough authors don't give a rat's ass about anything besides Linux. Alternatives are cool unless it's not Linux or something. Idiots like Poettering aren't helping either, though in the case of systemd I'm more than happy to keep FreeBSD's actually sane init system.
    In summary, it was usable but nowhere near cutting edge.
    The Linux compatibility layer should help nowadays, I have no experience with that though.

    In stark contrast, on my home server it's buttery smooth and well-documented (almost no hunting on StackOverflow!). The philosophy that FreeBSD is a complete OS, developed as a whole really shows. I prefer that to Linux' chaotic/mix'n'match approach now.
  • 2
    @olback Back then people were asking exactly the same about Linux. "But why?" as there already was Windows and the Mac. But Linux people kept repeating how important it was to have alternatives, how competition is good for the users, and so on.

    Now that the shoe is on the other foot, apparently we don't need alternatives and we should all just use Linux. Don't look elsewhere, there be dragons. While I know "power corrupts", it's absolutely appalling how badly the Linux community deals with its popularity.
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