You can run BSD on a toaster. Genuine question but how come you're aiming to spend so much on a PC that you can't really do much on? Not hating on BSD at all but using it as a daily would be fricken hell. Are you just looking for an uber secure, lightweight and unfriendly OS?
On Wed, Mar 5, 2025, 1:32 PM Polarian <polar...@polarian.dev> wrote: > Hello, > > > I'm thinking of purchasing parts to an all-purpose *BSD personal > > computer. My budget is ~€3000 (+1k). Ideally I would like it not too > > noisy while staying as cool as possible (I live in a studio), and > > dual screen monitor (I'm thinking of one HD screen to also watch > > movies on and one square screen on the left for the console). > > This is very personal to you, everyone has their own preference on > doing things. Some people are happy with just a laptop, some people > like one big monitor, some people like 2-3 smaller monitors tiled > together in different ways depending on their workload. > > You got to experiment and see what you like. > > > First thing is the motherboard, processor, and RAM. Here also lies the > > bottleneck : is there a motherboard/processor combo that can host > > all four BSD's and derivatives ? If I'm not mistaken, I think the > > blowfish does not maximally exploit multi-core processor, so a quad > > core (for instance) is enough. It'd also be great to have it without > > MINIX's IME/PSP, but I know this is asking too much ! Or is it ? > > I have two comments on this. > > Firstly, the specs you need is based on your workload, nobody here is > able to answer this or give any advice without knowing what sort of > work you do. Also companies are always selling off old desktops, old > being 8th/9th gen currently afaik, these are still solid systems but > wouldn't run Windows fast enough for companies, slapping BSD these will > make them run FASSSTTT. Good way to save money than building an > entirely new computer. > > Secondly, for IME disabling you will need an older device, older intel > bootguard has been recently cracked by a libreboot contributor and Dell > Optiplex 3050 Micro has been ported [1], this is the newest device > which can run coreboot/libreboot. There is also a select number of > motherboards which can be corebooted/librebooted with me disabled. [2] > > Custom boot payloads can cause issues though, so make sure you check if > there is any drawbacks for whatever you want to flash before doing so. > > > There's a long time since I haven't proerly hacked and built my own > > tower, I don't remember all particular caveats of the best > > optimisation. Suffice to say the computer hacking's main use would be > > to compile, fetch various things from the network (no brainer, right > > ?), as well as, more touchy, embedded / RISC-V development (hence > > connectics). > > If you haven't built a pc before then maybe upgrading a decommissioned > office pc would be better? However this is entirely on your use case. > > > Then I would also browse the web and use Word. > > > > Haha. Just kidding. But I'd like to watch a movie at times and have a > > good HD screen and 5.1/7.1 speakers for that (the latter can come > > later). > > Literally any device made in the last 15 years could do that, maybe the > older ones wouldn't be able to play 4k video, but it sure can do lower > resolutions. As long as you upgrade the memory on older devices (web > browsers eat a lot of memory) and stick a SSD in (HDDs have slow random > IO so can be annoying for desktop use). > > As for word, please consider using a different implementation [3]. > > > In terms of ergonomics, I already have an all-black basic keyboard, > > as well as a small bépo one, and am thinking particularly of the > > mechanical and TypeMatrix keyboards. Someone advised an incurved > > monitor as well as blue light filter. I don't know much about mices, > > but I have short hands (I'm 5"3). > > Personal preference again, nobody can help you with this, you got to > figure this one out on your own. > > Take care, > -- > Polarian > GPG signature: 0770E5312238C760 > Jabber/XMPP: polar...@icebound.dev > > [1] https://libreboot.org/docs/install/dell3050.html > [2] https://libreboot.org/docs/install/#desktops-amd-intel-x86 > [3] https://www.libreoffice.org/ > >
