MSGID: <10ktkt3$35pmd$1@dont-email.me> b090e1ec   
   REPLY: <10ktfqf$33v6j$1@dont-email.me> 843bb6ab   
   PID: PyGate 1.5.2   
   TID: PyGate/Linux 1.5.2   
   CHRS: ASCII 1   
   TZUTC: 1100   
   REPLYADDR bp@www.zefox.net   
   REPLYTO 3:633/10 UUCP   
   Mike Scott  wrote:   
   > On 22/01/2026 15:10, bp@www.zefox.net wrote:   
   >> Tom Moore  wrote:   
   >>> Hi all,   
   >>> Anyone have any suggestions as to what BSD based os works well on the   
   >>> Raspberry Pi machines?   
   >>> I'm looking at either FreeBSD or NetBSD.   
   >>> Any ideas for one vs another?   
   >>> I have a Pi 3b device here to play with.   
   >>    
   >> It really depends on what you expect to accomplish.   
   >>    
   >> What do you want the machine to do?   
   >>    
   >> The most troublesome aspect is limited RAM. If the loading is   
   >> light, it'll work fine. If you want the machine to self-host   
   >> some gyrations will be required. X with TWM will work, an X   
   >> desktop environment will be useless. I'm using Pi3s for name   
   >> service running bind9 from microSD. It seems to work acceptably.   
   >    
   > The setup with pi4/freebsd worked reasonably well as a home server. Mine    
   > provided nfs, mail, web (apache and mojolicious), ntp, dns and dhcp on    
   > only 4Gb ram. The main issue was that nfs bulk writes were very slow.   
   >    
   There's a vast difference between Pi3 and Pi4, chiefly memory. My FreeBSD   
   Pi4s use 8GB and self-host without swapping at all.   
      
   > The crunch came when I tried processing a lot of images within a    
   > mojolicious web server. It simply could not do the job fast enough. I    
   > suspect it was overheating and lowering the clock speed. The replacement    
   > amd64 runs many times faster.   
      
   How does the power consumption compare?   
      
   Was the Pi4 cpu-bound, or memory-bound? Swap on USB3 might help,   
   especially if SSD. If it's thermal limiting a fan will help.     
      
   >>    
   >> I've a collection of notes and ramblings at   
   >> http://www.zefox.net/~fbsd [note, that's http, not https]   
   >> It's very poorly organized, but duckduckgo.com can be coaxed   
   >> to search that url via the syntax   
   >> [keyword] site:http://www.zefox.net/~fbsd   
   >>    
   >> I'm not a programmer and so handicapped in what I can fix.   
   >> Support from the freebsd-arm@freebsd.org mailing list has   
   >> been essential to what success I've enjoyed.   
   >    
   > You were luckier than I, then. I made a bad assumption that tier 1    
   > support for a pi4 meant the pi5 would eventually get good support; it    
   > didn't, at least not enough to run out of the box.   
      
   Tier 1 just means bugs will get fixed eventually. Aarch64 is tier 1,   
   so bugs reported on a Pi3 will get looked at and maybe fixed. Nothing   
   to be done about slow hardware. I too hope that Pi5, or maybe 6, will   
   get FreeBSD support eventually. But, Tier 1 does not promise platform    
   support. I asked recently about Pi5 and heard only crickets.    
      
   >    
   >>    
   >> Hope this helps, questions are welcome.   
   >>    
    bob prohaska   
      
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