Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 2 AMD - a fine laptop for FreeBSD (with a wifi caveat)

So it's a lottery with Lenovo laptops, you are just lucky if you get one with a wifi module that works with FreeBSD?
 
Pecka said:
So it's a lottery with Lenovo laptops, you are just lucky if you get one with a wifi module that works with FreeBSD?
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Yes, it is a lottery only for those greenhorns who do not match the specs of their emotionally hot wanted gadgets with the requirements of the FreeBSD Hardware notes like these:

https://www.freebsd.org/releases/13.2R/hardware/
There use your browser searching for terms like wireless.

You may also look at https://wiki.freebsd.org/Laptops#Laptop_support

Now regarding "luck": If you do your homework before buying you may have some more knowledge for making a good decision.
But yes, the people in these times prefer being lucky and are failing all along.

And there are the optimists who know that a feature does not work and buy nevertheless. They hope that someone will do the work required in future. That is like a lottery ticket that never expires. Hope is for the hopeless.
 
yuripv79 said:
Or its their subconsciousness telling them to buy it and finally become developers they always wanted to be by adding support ;)
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Yeah the Freudian subconscious. Freud needed this construct for explaining the desires of the wealthy women of his time.
You need to belief in Freud and this term for arguing with the subconscious. Consciousness was not enough for Freud.
 
Pecka said:
Even on later models?
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Depends on the model. I see a wide range of business grade Lenovos from the inside and most, but not all, have plug-in WiFi modules. It tends to be the thinner, smaller ones with soldered on WiFi modules. Consumer grade models might be (probably are) a different kettle of fish.
 
Pecka said:
So it's a lottery with Lenovo laptops, you are just lucky if you get one with a wifi module that works with FreeBSD?
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Kind of. You can do homework and get a sense of what you will get, see what the support is like. But the models aren’t exact the way CPU and GPU are. They have a range of wireless cards they might use, so two T14 with same part ID could still have different wireless cards.

Anything shipped with T14 Gen 2 is not likely to work well (intel using iwlwifi) or at all (realtek). They’re just too new.

That‘s why you want a replaceable card - so you can install exactly what you want.

The slim models have them soldered on, so you’re screwed. Your only option there is USB.
 
patmaddox said:
Kind of. You can do homework and get a sense of what you will get, see what the support is like. But the models aren’t exact the way CPU and GPU are. They have a range of wireless cards they might use, so two T14 with same part ID could still have different wireless cards.

Anything shipped with T14 Gen 2 is not likely to work well (intel using iwlwifi) or at all (realtek). They’re just too new.

That‘s why you want a replaceable card - so you can install exactly what you want.

The slim models have them soldered on, so you’re screwed. Your only option there is USB.
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That's a bummer. I thought Thinkpads were a safe bet regarding hardware compatibility with FreeBSD.

I guess it's the same with the alternatives, Dell, HP etc.?
 
Thanks for the write-up patmaddox

patmaddox said:
Kind of. You can do homework and get a sense of what you will get, see what the support is like. But the models aren’t exact the way CPU and GPU are. They have a range of wireless cards they might use, so two T14 with same part ID could still have different wireless cards.

Anything shipped with T14 Gen 2 is not likely to work well (intel using iwlwifi) or at all (realtek). They’re just too new.

That‘s why you want a replaceable card - so you can install exactly what you want.
Click to expand...
Searching for Thinkpad's options suitable for running FreeBSD, especially in relation with its WLAN chip, I've found it helpful to track down the:
  • Lenovo Hardware Maintenance Manual - pdf: T14 gen 2
  • Lenovo Product Specification Reference or PSREF - pdf: T14 gen 2 AMD
Both should be easily found by a www search and mostly available directly from a Lenovo site. (For the T14 as indicated; I searched for "lenovo service manual T14 gen 2" and "lenovo thinkpad t14 gen 2 AMD product specification"). IMO, the PSREF gives a better overview of the various options compared to the website.

In case of the T14 referenced, the PSREF mentions a variety of WLAN options (p. 5), of which the last entry of the Qualcomm QCNFA765 hints that the WLAN option of the T14 gen 2 is a seperate M.2 card (instead of a soldered variant). However, the Hardware Maintenace Manual describes the procedure for removing the WLAN card: "1070 Wireless LAN card (for AMD models)" - p. 74.

In the past, at Lenovo, I have seen a buyer selectable option for the brand & type of the WLAN card, but these seem absent lately; all may well be influenced by the shortage of parts of recent years.
 
Pecka said:
That's a bummer. I thought Thinkpads were a safe bet regarding hardware compatibility with FreeBSD.

I guess it's the same with the alternatives, Dell, HP etc.?
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I just got a HP Elitebook 840 G8. It's OK. Webcam and wifi (AX201) work out of the box. Suspend does not, screen brightness does not. Great keyboard. C-States only go down to C1. Very fast single core speed, but `make world` takes 1:40 hour. Replaceable RAM (2 slots, probably can take 64 GB) and NVMe M.2.
 
patmaddox said:
- T14 Gen 2 AMD works great, but you have to replace the wireless card
....
<in the article>
webcam and microphone - I don't really care about this for this machine, but I'll get around to trying it at some point.
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The webcam and microphone are really very important things nowadays.
I have an Intel-based T14, and its microphone doesn't work in FreeBSD since DMIC is not supported.
The webcam is working as expected, however, Lenovo's quality is getting worse: the camera installed incorrectly: to appear in the center of the image I have to move a foot to the right from the screen! A friend of mine got another Lenovo laptop (don't remember the model) and had to return it because its camera cut off ~20% of the field.
 
patmaddox said:
The slim models have them soldered on,
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Dunno, I used to have an Ideapad 720s-13ARR, a very slim model - and its wifi module was definitely not soldered. Had to swap the original RealTek out for an Intel 8265, but after that, FreeBSD had no issues with wifi. RAM was soldered on my unit, though, and that's a bummer, I would have kept it if it had a SODIMM slot.
 
astyle said:
Dunno, I used to have an Ideapad 720s-13ARR, a very slim model - and its wifi module was definitely not soldered. Had to swap the original RealTek out for an Intel 8265, but after that, FreeBSD had no issues with wifi. RAM was soldered on my unit, though, and that's a bummer, I would have kept it if it had a SODIMM slot.
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I wasn’t clear in the post, but I meant T14s which is the slim version of T14.
 
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