Thinking about leave Linux and try Haiku: does it currently fill my needs?

1

Hello there

I’m new to the forum, and to Haiku and BeOS in general. I’m an old Amiga userin the PPC and 68K front, and these last five years I’ve been a GNU/Linux user on the X86 front, too.
The last wto years I’ve spent most of my computer time optimizing my Gentoo Linux system to a minimal, loand, lightweight and fast one with preemptive-multitasking kernel compiled with support for my very own hardware, BFS (a great CPU scheduler wich really make my emulators to work in a constant an reliable way with very small sound buffers), etc…

However, this system lacks something. It’s not the same as MorphOS and AmigaOS: they are incredible OSes in PPC and 68K, they are desktop OSes and they both make me feel “at home”, while Linux is…well, not the same. It’s cold, and even if I’m not a total newbie by now, it stills feels complicated. It’s like having a mainframe in my room, not a real “home computer”.

So I’ve two alternatives to try (or keep on with Linux, of course): AROS and Haiku.

So, I’m exposing my initial needs here, and I hope you guys can tell me if Haiku is for me as of today:

-Does it support intel-HDA in macbooks and mac minis (2009)? A silent system is not fun.

-What’s the video backend Haiku uses? Is it a decent one?
*It supports vsynced smooth screen refresh. I HATE tearing. I can’t stand it. Vsync requires an accelerated framebuffer, or a decent VESA one.
*It supports custom video modes. (and I mean custom resolutions AND refresh rates: Can I define 59.61HZ on a 1280x1024 mode, for exampe?)
*Can SLD use that backend? I don’n mind if I have to specify the backend for SDL in each app I run, but I need souch a backend to be available.

-Does the video backend have support for Nvidia 9400M based cards? It’s OK if there’s an accelerated framebuffer for Intel stuff, but I need it to work on my computer.

-Is it possible to self-compile MAME for Haiku? I use customised sources relying on custom video modes.

-Does it support BCM43XX wireless network controllers in some way?

That’s all, I think…

thanks!

PD: Note accelerated 3d stuff is something I don’t want/need. I just need a VERY flexible accelerated 2d support. Custom refresh rates AND perfect smooth vysnc-ed display is mandatory for me.

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Simply put, no.

Haiku isn’t in any state to be used currently when it comes to Macs. From what i’ve heard, you’d be lucky to get it to boot.

SDL is supported and 3D graphics have recently ben “fixed” in recent trunk builds. There’s a MESA software renderer floating around somewhere…

nVidia support only goes up to GeForce 7xxx cards :s You’d fall back to the VESA modes, which may or may not be your Mac’s native resolution.

It should support the Intel HDA in yourt macbook/mac mini, but you may have to rely on the OSS sound drivers

Wireless support is sketchy. many cards work nowadays, but there is absolutely no WPA support. You’re lucky to get WEP encryption.

MAME should work IIRC

Good luck on your endeavours, Feel free to dual-boot Haiku and try it out. But in no way should you fall back to using it day-to-day for anything more complex than web browsing and e-mail really

3

Hi vanfanel,

I totally know the feeling you describe. I too have had various Linux setups as my primary operating systems for the last several years (with occasional uses of Mac OS X and Windows) but I too never quite get that feeling of home. Honestly I think that is one of the things that keeps me motivated as a developer on Haiku.

As for your question: I think The123king summed it up pretty well, in that you probably could not YET permanently leave Linux for Haiku. But I think Haiku could certainly become a home for you one day. One thing that does strike me though is it sounds like you have the sort of skill and motivation to help shape Haiku into the home you desire. So I would urge you to seriously consider trying to do some Haiku development. I think you will find it more rewarding than endlessly tweaking a Gentoo setup.

I can say though that Haiku probably has the best VESA implementation out there, in that it is really usable day to day instead of being something that is just around as a backup. Though obviously it is better to have a proper video card driver. I am currently running at 1920x1080 on a 21.5" monitor through VGA on a Nvidia GeForce FX 5200 which I just had sitting around. Things are certainly not perfect, but it is pretty nice, and Haiku gets better every day.