FreeBSD supports EIDE and SCSI drives (with a compatible controller; see the next section), and all drives using the original "Western Digital" interface (MFM, RLL, ESDI, and of course IDE). A few ESDI controllers that use proprietary interfaces may not work: stick to WD1002/3/6/7 interfaces and clones. Which SCSI controllers are supported?

FreeBSD supports the following SCSI controllers: AH-152x Series <ISA> AH-154x Series <ISA> AH-174x Series <EISA> Sound Blaster SCSI (AH-152x compat) <ISA> AH-2742/2842 Series <ISA/EISA> AH-2820/2822/2825 Series (Narrow/Twin/Wide) <VLB> AH-294x and aic7870 MB controllers (Narrow/Twin/Wide) <PCI> AH-394x (Narrow/Twin/Wide) ) BT-545 Series <ISA> BT-742 Series <EISA> BT-747 Series <EISA> BT-946 Series <PCI> BT-956 Series <PCI> NCR 53C82x based controllers <PCI> NCR 53C860/75 based controllers <PCI> Trantor 130 based controllers <ISA> UH-24f Series <EISA> UH-34f Series <VLB> Which CD-ROM drives are supported by FreeBSD?

Any SCSI drive connected to a supported controller is supported.

The following proprietry CD-ROM interfaces are also supported: Mitsumi LU002 (8bit), LU005 (16bit) and FX001D (16bit 2x Speed). Sony CDU 31/33A Sound Blaster Non-SCSI CD-ROM Matsushita/Panasonic CD-ROM ATAPI compatible IDE CD-ROMs

All non-SCSI cards are known to be extremely slow compared to SCSI drives, and some ATAPI CDROMs may not work.

As of 2.2 the FreeBSD CDROM from Walnut Creek supports booting directly from the CD. Does FreeBSD support ZIP drives?

FreeBSD supports the SCSI ZIP drive out of the box, of course. The ZIP drive can only be set to run at SCSI target IDs 5 or 6, but if your SCSI host adapter's BIOS supports it you can even boot from it. I don't know which host adapters let you boot from targets other than 0 or 1... look at your docs (and let me know if it works out for you).

There is no built in support for the parallel ZIP drive, and if you haven't bought your ZIP drive already I recommend you get the SCSI one... the price is the same, and the performance is much better, and you're unlikely to ever be able to boot from the parallel port.

If you already have a parallel ZIP, there is a port of the Linux driver available at in France.

Also check out , and . Does FreeBSD support JAZ, EZ and other removable drives?

Apart from the IDE version of the EZ drive, these are all SCSI devices, so the should all look like SCSI disks to FreeBSD, and the IDE EZ should look like an IDE drive.

I'm not sure how well FreeBSD supports changing the media out while running. You will of course need to dismount the drive before swapping media, and make sure that any external units are powered on when you boot the system so FreeBSD can see them.

See . Which multi-port serial cards are supported by FreeBSD?

There is a list of these in the section of the handbook.

Some unnamed clone cards have also been known to work, especially those that claim to be AST compatible.

Check the man page to get more information on configuring such cards. I have an unusual bus mouse. How do I set it up?

FreeBSD supports the bus mouse and the InPort bus mouse from such manufactures as Microsoft, Logitech and ATI. The bus device driver is compiled in the GENERIC kernel by default. If you are building a custom kernel with the bus mouse driver, make sure to add the following line to the kernel config file: device mse0 at isa? port 0x23c tty irq5 vector mseintr

The bus mouse usually comes with an dedicatd interface card. It may allow you to set the port address and the IRQ number other than shown above. Refer to the manual of your mouse and the man page for more information. How do I use my PS/2 (``mouse port'' or ``keyboard'') mouse?

If you're running a very recent version of FreeBSD, the necessary driver, psm, is included and enabled in the kernel. The kernel should detect your PS/2 mouse at boot time.

If you're running a previous but relatively recent version of FreeBSD then you can simply enable it in the kernel configuration menu at installation time, otherwise later with -c at the boot: prompt. It is disabled by default, so you will need to enable it explicitly.

If you're running an older version of FreeBSD then you'll have to add the following lines to your kernel configuration file and compile a new kernel: device psm0 at isa? port "IO_KBD" conflicts tty irq 12 vector psmintr

See the if you've no experience with building kernels.

Once you have a kernel detecting psm0 correctly at boot time, make sure that an entry for psm0 exists in /dev. You can do this by typing: cd /dev; sh MAKEDEV psm0

when logged in as root. Is it possible to make use of a mouse in any way outside the X Window?

If you are using the default console driver, syscons, you can use a mouse pointer in text consoles to cut & paste text. Run the mouse daemon, moused, and turn on the mouse pointer in the virtual console: moused -p /dev/xxxx -t yyyy vidcontrol -m on

Where xxxx is the mouse device name and yyyy is a protocol type for the mouse. See the man page for supported protocol types.

You may wish to run the mouse daemon automatically when the system starts. In version 2.2.1, set the following variables in /etc/sysconfig. mousedtype="yyyy" mousedport="xxxx" mousedflags="" In versions 2.2.2 or later, set the following variables in /etc/rc.conf. moused_type="yyyy" moused_port="xxxx" moused_flags=""

Staring from FreeBSD 2.2.6, the mouse daemon is capable of determining the correct protocol type automatically unless the mouse is a relatively old serial mouse model. Specify ``auto'' as the protocol to invoke automatic detection.

When the mouse daemon is running, access to the mouse needs to be coordinated between the mouse daemon and other programs such as the X Window. Refer to on this issue". How do I cut and paste text with mouse in the text console?

Once you get the mouse daemon running (see ), hold down the button 1 (left button) and move the mouse to select a region of text. Then, press the button 2 (middle button) or the button 3 (right button) to paste it at the text cursor.

In versions 2.2.6 and later, pressing the button 2 will paste the text. Pressing the button 3 will ``extend'' the selected region of text. If your mouse does not have the middle button, you may wish to emulate it or remap buttons using moused options. See the man page for details. My mouse has a fancy wheel and buttons. Can I use them in FreeBSD?

The answer is, unfortunately, ``It depends.'' These mice with additional features require specialized driver in most cases. Unless the mouse device driver or the user program has specific support for the mouse, it will act just like a standard two, or three button mouse. How do I use the mouse/trackball/touchpad on my laptop?

Please refer to . And check out on the Mobile Computing page. What types of tape drives are supported?

FreeBSD supports SCSI, QIC-36 (with a QIC-02 interface) and QIC-40/80 (Floppy based) tape drives. This includes 8-mm (aka Exabyte) and DAT drives. The QIC-40/80 drives are known to be slow.

Some of the early 8-mm drives are not quite compatible with SCSI-2, and may not work well with FreeBSD. Does FreeBSD support tape changers?

FreeBSD 2.2 supports SCSI changers using the device and the command. The details of how you actually control the changer can be found in the man page.

If you're not using or some other product that already understands changers, remember that they're only know how to move a tape from one point to another, so you need to keep track of which slot a tape is in, and which slot the tape currently in the drive needs to go back to. Which sound cards are supported by FreeBSD?

FreeBSD supports the SoundBlaster, SoundBlaster Pro, SoundBlaster 16, Pro Audio Spectrum 16, AdLib and Gravis UltraSound sound cards. There is also limited support for MPU-401 and compatible MIDI cards. The SoundBlaster 16 ASP cards are not yet supported. The Microsoft Sound System is also supported.

Which network cards does FreeBSD support?

See the section of the handbook for a more complete list. Since it doesn't list the drivers you need to use for each of the cards, this incomplete list will have to do. driver/ DEC DC21x40 and compatible PCI controllers (including 21140 100bT cards) driver/ NE2000 and 1000 WD/SMC 8003, 8013 and Elite Ultra (8216) 3Com 3c503 HP 27247B and 27252A And clones of the above driver/ DEC EtherWORKS II and EtherWORKS III controllers. driver/ AT&T EN100/StarLAN 10 3COM 3c507 Etherlink 16/TP NI5210 Intel EtherExpress driver/ Isolan AT 4141-0 Isolink 4110 driver/ 3com 3c501 (does not support Multicast or DMA) driver/ 3com 3c505 Etherlink/+ driver/ IBM PCMCIA credit card adapter drive/ Lance/PCnet cards (Isolan, Novell NE2100, NE32-VL)(*) driver/ 3com 3c509 (Must disable PNP support on card) driver/ Cronyx/Sigma multiport Sync/Async (Cisco and PPP framing) driver/ 3Com PCMCIA Etherlink III (aka 3c589)(A-C only) driver/ DEC DEFEA EISA FDDI controller driver/ DEC DEFPA PCI FDDI controller driver/ Fujitsu MB86960A/MB86965A Ethernet cards

I don't have a math co-processor - is that bad?

In general this will not cause any problems, but there are circumstances where you will take a hit, either in performance or accuracy of the math emulation code (see the section ). In particular, drawing arcs in X will be VERY slow. It is highly recommended that you buy a math co-processor; it's well worth it.

What other devices does 2.X support?

Here is a listing of drivers which do not fit into any of the earlier categories. Driver for B004 compatible Transputer boards ``ctx'' driver Driver for CORTEX-I Frame grabber ``gp'' driver Driver for National Instruments AT-GPIB and AT-GPIB/TNT boards ``pca'' driver Driver for PC speakers to allow the playing of audio files ``spigot'' driver Driver for the Creative Labs Video Spigot driver Driver for the Genuis GS-4500 Hand scanner driver Driver for a joystick driver/ Driver for National Instrument's Lab-PC and Lab-PC+ driver/ PS/2 mouse port Driver for the X-10 POWERHOUSE Does FreeBSD support power management on my laptop?

FreeBSD supports APM on certain machines. Please look in the keyword.