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http://www.internetnews.com/dev-news...or+FreeBSD.htm
I read this article a little bit ago and thought it was good so I'm posting it here. I think it's neat they managed to do this and raise performance.
I haven't had a shot to use it yet because I've been so busy but apparently a lot of people are getting VERY noticeable improvement and things with the speed of it now.
Anyway, enjoy!
Interesting. I had problems with the Linux compatibility in my prior tests of FreeBSD. I may have to give it another run through. I was always very impressed with the ports system that they had. Other than some of the proprietary apps where the compatibility issues came up, it always seemed almost as trouble free as my Slackware was.
I'm a happy Freebsd user for a decade now.. I'm very impressed with 7 and the way they're moving forward.
Never really had the need for the linuxilator until recently. I now use it to get youtube to work by using linux-flashplayer7.
Haven't tried 9 yet as it seems it's rather buggy. 7 works for most sites.
Love the little known fact that fbsd has the fastest tcp/ip stack :)
NB To get the most out of fbsd I do advise to compile the kernel and world yourself. The default kernel/world has all sorts of debugging options turned on. Needless to say this is a bit of a performance drain. Compiling it yourself is really easy and will really improve performance.
I finished downloading FreeBSD 7 and I'm going to be burning the install disks so I can give it a shot.
I've been toying with FreeBSD since 4.0. I still remember walking through Best Buy noe day and seeing "BSDPowerPak" on the shelf and thinking "Wow, now that looks awesome! And it says it's a UNIX OS!" so I ended up buying it and still have the box!
Heh, it's odd but yea, I know. Anyway, I always like "The Complete FreeBSD" book, which I have two copies of. One third edition, and one fourth edition. I like the overall design of 3rd better but 4th is nice too.
In my early intro to computing days FreeBSD was like that thing not very many people here knew about and no one could seem to run it because they couldn't get it installed, and one day I finally did it and thought it was neat.
Wow that was a long time ago. The only reason I don't use it more is really just the fact that I simply can use something else to do the same thing. I still use it because I want too, but nothing really requires me to.
I go by the idea of "BSD and Linux differences are more philosophical than technical, and both can do the same things, just differently".
I think there is truth in that. In the OS forum stickies, once the "Which version of Linux" thread was made sticky and I became a mod here, I decided to do one for BSD as well because I had an inbox full of questions from people asking me which one to use. I don't get messages like that as often now as I've made both threads and added what was at the time new info that would really help, I still should update them again, but I'm not really sure what I'd put. The same principles apply:
What do you want to use it for? What do you like? Those are the only two things you need to ask yourself other than will it run when you're installing one of them.
I'm still trying to think of which machine I'm going to put it on since right now I dno't have a spare. All of the machnies here are used for something different, so I'm going to most likely just redo the partitions on one of my machines I use for testing, and then install FreeBSD 7 on that.
The only thing I really don't like about FreeBSD personally, which again, is a matter of opinion and taste more than tech related, is the update process in FreeBSD VS Linux and Windows.... I hate having to compile stuff, and using binary patches, though much better for what I do, can take some time to get going with that update tool.
And of course, the whole thing where if you edit muttrc, and then load mutt, it doesn't seem to just re-read the configuration file, it has to have something else done.
I always wondered about that, I have a muttrc I use for different accounts, and when I use it for FreeBSD or edit the one it has, I can't seem to get it to work in a similar manner, which is weird considering it's the same software...lol.
anyway, I do like FreeBSD, and I do think they do one REALLY good job with the stuff they make, and I think everyone could probably find a use for it at some point regardless of what you do with your computer, which is why I always like posting about UNIX style things, basically spreading the word :)
If you're a Linux only user, give it a shot, seriously. You may find it even better than Linux. I personally won't pick one because I use BOTH but I do know FreeBSD is one of the MOST STABLE OSs in the entire world.
Other than Netware which people all have a story about (You know, everyone here has heard at least ONCE that they saw a Netware machine running for like 5 years that had been cemented in behind a wall and it was still running when they smashed through it to find it) well for PC stuff and a desktop machine, FreeBSD can stand up to that as can Linux, which is what I look for. If I can load the thing up, do a little maintenance and leave it be and it just works, then it's good. lol.
I agree that updating freebsd can be a pain especially for new users. The best way to do it is by compiling everything yourself. Yes, that takes a lot of time.
It does have some advantages though. I use one machine to build the base OS and all the ports I need (creating my own packages in the process). Building things from the ground up means I can add/remove certain options and/or features. Can't really do that with pre-compiled packages.
But yeah, it takes time. Building world takes about 2 hours on my core2dual, Xorg a little longer. Installing the finished builds only takes a few minutes though. I simply mount /usr/src, /usr/obj and /usr/ports on the machine I need to upgrade and do the installs.
What a beautiful OS =)
I don't have much time using computers, maybe 4 years or so which is little compared with many of the people who are using them since 80's, anyway, I think the first version I tried was the 6.2, all I new back then beside windows was debian so getting freebsd installed was awful the first time, I remember that I misread the docs and suddenly I erase the windows partition he he
Since all I new was debian's dpkg it was very confusing read about ports, but after trying them I just loved, although compiling can take time depending on the package, I really like the way you can compile everything, to me, is the best way to adapt the system not only to your needs as a user but your system's needs and capabilities.
But even if you don't want to compile, you still have the change to install precompiled packages, which is a win-win to everybody.
I agree with SirDice about recompiling the default kernel, it's very easy and you can gain a lot of improvement regarding performance and stability, as anyother system, the default kernel is compiled to cover the needs of the biggest amount of people at the same time thus your system may end up using resources in things you don't use or need.
I like the system because I share its ideals about stability, availability, customization and the most of all, security. I remember one time when I was installing cups and suddenly the install stop saying that cups won't be installed because it had a bug, although you could edit the make file to install it anyway, to me this was great because when you see something like this you know that developers and maintainers know that security is 'a most' not just a clichè like many others think
One of the most stable and great system I've ever tried and like SirDice said, is great to see the system keeping up and moving forward =)
Well, I wasn't really shocked with how stable it was. Of course that's because I knew Yahoo! had been using FreeBSD since the early days and had already given it some spot light even back then as a stable good OS, and they said they used it almost exclusively for development and in house work.
When a company like that, who gets major traffic each day, gives the green light on software you can get for free, and says how great it is, it's obvious heh.
Also hotmail.com was running FreeBSD for the longest time, until Microsoft finally got it switched to Windows 2000....Which I can't imagine the job of the poor bastard they said to switch it.
Sony was another company running FreeBSD as was xoom, and even google back then.
Google right now is a rock star with geeks. It started as a search engine, and now it's working it's way into every market you can imagine.
They're pretty much sitting around probably planning what's next... I've heard a lot from GoogleOS (I know they use a custom Ubuntu Linux there) to a Googlephone.
Netcraft I think might still be running FreeBSD but I know they were back in 4.0. Again, these are well known companies and thing on the net who all gave FreeBSD a green light even back when it wasn't what it is now.
AND just to be funny, Microsoft's "We have the way out" campaign against UNIX.... The web server saying they had found the way out and how to get away from UNIX and run Windows on servers, was running on FreeBSD.
I know I'm not the only one who laughed at that.
Also if someone else reads this and is like the above poster who had only used Windows and Linux, and didn't get the best possible first step into FreeBSD, here's a little secret:
Install Slackware, THEN install FreeBSD. Slackware is a little closer to BSD and if you can get that going it'll make going and trying BSD much easier than coming from Ubuntu or RedHat.
I used to dual boot Slackware and FreeBSD on one of my machines here. It works great.
Nah., my first experience wasn't so bad, I only erased the windows partition by accident, thing which many could say it was actually a good thing he he
To me the most difficult thing when tested it the first time was to understand the hard disks naming but besides that it was a pretty good experience :)
With slackware I agree, although gentoo is a little closer (if you think on the emerge system for example)
Gentoo is not exactly on my good list. I just don't like it. Something about compiling everything for a speed increase you won't notice because it'll be compiling KDE and OpenOffice in the BG lol.
Slackware is close enough to the point that if you order something off FreeBSD mall and Slackware store it'll come in the same box. And of course the Slackware books have the BSD logo on them on the back.
lol good point, but even if you aren't compiling kde and Oo in the BG, still you won't notice much difference, maybe with a few packages but overall wise its pretty much the same performance =)Quote:
Originally Posted by gore
I did the Gentoo thing a few years ago. It was a lot of work to get up and running and as you say, I didn't see any real noticeable speed difference over Slack. ArchLinux was pretty nifty and I played with it for quite awhile. I just didn't like having a different file hierarchy and placement of packages than Slack. I also had more problems compiling apps. It was just a matter of what I was used to. Setting up the inits manually was fun though.
Slackware is one of the more useable Linux distros made available. Something weird I've noticed is that when people start using Linux, they generally start with either RedHat / Fedora, or Mandrake, or SUSE.
Now, this was a few years ago but I do know this to be true:
Everyone I knew who was into RedHat back then, started using Debian or Gentoo.
The people who used Mandrake and SUSE, started using Slackware.
I'm not sure what I'd call it other than an observation of what was happening, but that's what I saw. Everyone I knew who used RedHat literally started suing Debain ad Gentoo.
It was odd but ah well.