Re: [lp-ca-on] Respects Your Freedom hardware, has anyone bought some?

[Blaise Alleyne]

On 07/01/16 03:09 PM, Rudolf wrote:
> http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom
> 
> I'm the proud owner of a few Raspberry Pis (1x 1 and 2x 2) but I know they
> aren't quite free (or least aren't certified as RYF).
> 
> Are there any small devices like the Raspberry Pi or laptops within the price
> range of $400-500 that are RYF or can be made to RYF?
> 

The only RYF laptops are Minifree's Libreboot ThinkPads:
http://minifree.org/product/libreboot-x200/
http://minifree.org/product/libreboot-t400/

(There's another US company, Libiquity, that does the same thing with the X200,
but they actually link to Minifree instead if you're outside the USA.)

None of ThinkPenguin's laptops are RYF certified, because they all contain a
giant backdoor -- proprietary BIOS. ThinkPenguin hasn't developed coreboot
expertise yet, and from what I've read recently, it seems unlikely that coreboot
will get support for more modern Intel chipsets anytime soon anyways (even
Google hasn't been able to persuade Intel to make it possible).

https://www.fsf.org/ryf


> Maybe by disabling the onboard wifi and using the ThinkPenguin Wifi adapter or
> something like that?
> 

I bought the USB wireless mini adapter from ThinkPenguin. It worked great,
except that I shouldn't have bought the mini one -- the range was pretty lousy
in my apartment. (TBH, I ended up re-enabling onboard WiFi after a few months.)
I might replace it with the larger USB wireless adapter the next time I put an
order into ThinkPenguin (probably for their RYF router, or a FLOSS-friendly
printer -- both on my wish list).

Though I've been looking at getting a Libreboot X200 very seriously lately. I
might do the Lireboot installation service for my X60 too.


Purism and ThinkPenguin have some great FLOSS friendly laptops, but they're not
RYF because of the BIOS. The more I read about it too, the dirtier I feel with a
proprietary BIOS... especially since my X60 is one of the few supported 
machines!