As others have pointed out, be very careful with the hardware you choose
with the BSDs. I said in an earlier post the problems I have had
installing FreeBSD. I had trouble with the Intel i810 video chip. I
called the tech support at the FreeBSDMall today. I was told that
FreeBSD does not and will not support Intel's i810 video chip. So, since
I cannot afford a new computer, I will give my copy of the software
away. I tried to install a PCI video card and my computer went into
revoltion. FreeBSD is not going to keep up with the technology like
Linux, and apparently purposely so. One thing I will keep in mind, that
this fall when I do buy a new computer, I will not buy anything with
shared resources like this chip. I even tried to install the new card
with Windows and it would not install because of the shared sources from
the chip, without the chip, the sound chip would not install either. So,
frankly, HP and other manufactuers that did this nasty thing can go to
hell.

plug@arcticmail.com wrote:
> 
> For a "first" BSD on an i386 platform, I would take a
> look at FreeBSD.  FreeBSD was originally targeted at
> the i386 platform so it has been optimized for (and offers
> excellent performance on) that platform.
> 
> OpenBSD is geared towards security applications, such
> as a firewall or a secure FTP/web server, although some
> JLFs use OpenBSD for their desktop.  Note that the FTP
> server or web server itself may not be secure, but at
> least you're providing a reasonably solid foundation
> for them (OS-level root exploits--ouch!)  NetBSD spawned
> OpenBSD, so OpenBSD is multi-platform like NetBSD.
> 
> NetBSD runs on LOTS of platforms, and is geared towards
> OS researchers and the like.  Got a toaster oven?  Run
> NetBSD on it!
> 
> HTH,
> 
> D
> 
> * On Tue, May 15, 2001 at 01:03:22PM -0700, AZ_Pete wrote:
> > Hello All,
> > I don't know if this is the place to ask, but I have seen other BSD threads
> > floating around, so I thought I start here.
> > I have a spare box I would like to start playing with BSD to add to my Linux
> > network at home.
> > However, I don't know which BSD to try: OpenBSD, NetBSD, FreeBSD.
> > What are  the differences among them?  Any Recommnedations?
> > Any help would be appreciated.
> >
> > The hardware is: AMD K3-450, 128MB Ram, 9GB IDE HD, 3Com NIC, AGP VGA.
> >
> > Peter
> 
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