Broadcom (was: Laptop Suggestions)

Benjamin Scott dragonhawk at iname.com
Wed Aug 24 20:47:01 EDT 2005


On Aug 24 at 5:20pm, Dan Jenkins wrote:
>>> ... Apple "Airport Extreme" is a Broadcom chipset, and Broadcom doesn't 
>>> play well with Open Source.
>> 
>> The butthead mentality appears to be dominant at Broadcom, doesn't it?
>> 
>> ... companies where that butthead mentality reigns
>> (Broadcom being just one example) so HW specs aren't available
>> from which FOSS drivers can be developed.
>
> Is this a problem mainly with the wireless Broadcom products, or all?

   I've developed a pretty low opinion of Broadcom.  They're indifferent or 
actively hostile to FOSS.  They don't release specs.  Some of their early 
gigabit Ethernet stuff was notoriously flaky, even when running "their" 
drivers.  And they still haven't figured out how to release a proper Windoze 
drivers (one that doesn't have syntax violations for the RIS INF parser).  In 
short, they appear to suck.  Maybe I've just had back luck with them.


-- 
Ben <dragonhawk at iname.com>



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