[Trisquel-users] Re : Re: diy desktop

[magicbanana]

The only graphical chipsets that optimally work with Linux-libre are Intel's.  
Everything needed to drive them (including firmware) is free software  
provided by Intel itself. I believe AMD mainboards only accept AMD processors  
with no integrated graphical chipset. You therefore need a video card on top  
of them. Both AMD and nVidia cards can be plugged. Both will give you a  
display with free drivers. However those free drivers do not offer as many  
functionalities and as much performance as the proprietary ones (that you do  
not want). This is particularly true for AMD video cards that lack some free  
firmware to enable 3D acceleration. The situation with nVidia cards is  
better. 3D acceleration is available for some of them. You can even obtained  
performances that are higher than those provided by an Intel chipset (but the  
price is not the same!). You however need to inform yourself to know what  
specific models provide good performances with the "nouveau" driver. One of  
them is the GeForce 9500GT and is sold by ThinkPenguin:  
https://www.thinkpenguin.com/gnu-linux/geforce-9500gt-1gb-pci-express-20-video-card-gnulinux

It may be true that gNewSense 3.0 currently is more stable than Trisquel  
(although Trisquel 6.0 is base on a Long-Time-Support release of Ubuntu and I  
have not had any trouble with it yet). However, Debian "oldstable"'s base for  
gNewSense 3.0 will stop receiving updates next year. Probably by May. Given  
the (very) long time it took for the gNewSense project to release its 3.0  
version, one could worry that no new version (based on Debian's current  
stable release) would be available by then. If that happens, the user who  
cares about security would have to switch to Trisquel (or any other other  
GNU/Linux distribution that still receives proper updates).