FreeBSD 7.0-CURRENT Hardware Notes

The FreeBSD Documentation Project

$FreeBSD: src/release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/hardware/article.sgml,v 1.313 2007/02/15 20:14:59 bmah Exp $


Table of Contents
1 Introduction
2 Supported Processors and System Boards
2.1 amd64
2.2 i386
2.3 ia64
2.3.1 Supported Devices Overview
2.4 pc98
2.5 powerpc
2.6 sparc64
2.6.1 Fully Supported Systems
2.6.2 Partially Supported Systems
2.6.3 Unsupported Systems
3 Supported Devices
3.1 Disk Controllers
3.2 Ethernet Interfaces
3.3 Token Ring Interfaces
3.4 FDDI Interfaces
3.5 ATM Interfaces
3.6 Wireless Network Interfaces
3.7 Miscellaneous Networks
3.8 ISDN Interfaces
3.9 Serial Interfaces
3.10 Sound Devices
3.11 Camera and Video Capture Devices
3.12 USB Devices
3.13 IEEE 1394 (Firewire) Devices
3.14 Bluetooth Devices
3.15 Cryptographic Accelerators
3.16 Miscellaneous

1 Introduction

This document contains the hardware compatibility notes for FreeBSD 7.0-CURRENT. It lists devices known to work on this platform, as well as some notes on boot-time kernel customization that may be useful when attempting to configure support for new devices.


2 Supported Processors and System Boards

This section provides some architecture-specific information about the specific processors and systems that are supported by each architecture.


2.1 amd64

Since mid-2003 FreeBSD/amd64 has supported the AMD64 (“Hammer”) and Intel EM64T architecture, and is now one of the Tier-1 platforms (fully supported architecture), which are expected to be Production Quality with respects to all aspects of the FreeBSD operating system, including installation and development environments.

Note that there are two names for this architecture, AMD64 (AMD) and Intel EM64T (Extended Memory 64-bit Technology). 64-bit mode of the two architectures are almost compatible with each other, and FreeBSD/amd64 should support them both.

As of this writing, the following processors are supported:

  • AMD Athlon64 (“Clawhammer”).

  • AMD Opteron (“Sledgehammer”).

  • Intel 64-bit Xeon (“Nacona”). This processor is fabricated on 90nm process technology, and operates with 2.80 to 3.60 GHz (FSB 800MHz) and Intel E7520/E7525/E7320 chipsets.

  • Intel Pentium 4 Processor supporting Intel EM64T (“Prescott”). This is fabricated on 90nm process technology, uses FC-LGA775 package, and operates with 3.20F/3.40F/3.60F GHz and Intel 925X Express chipsets. The corresponding S-Spec numbers are SL7L9, SL7L8, SL7LA, SL7NZ, SL7PZ, and SL7PX. Note that processors marked as 5xx numbers do not support EM64T.

Intel EM64T is an extended version of IA-32 (x86) and different from Intel IA-64 (Itanium) architecture, which FreeBSD/ia64 supports. Some Intel's old documentation refers to Intel EM64T as “64-bit extension technology” or “IA-32e”.

The largest tested memory configuration to date is 8GB. SMP support has been recently completed and is reasonably robust.

In many respects, FreeBSD/amd64 is similar to FreeBSD/i386, in terms of drivers supported. There may be some issues with 64-bit cleanliness in some (particularly older) drivers. Generally, drivers that already function correctly on other 64-bit platforms should work.

FreeBSD/amd64 is a very young platform on FreeBSD. While the core FreeBSD kernel and base system components are generally fairly robust, there are likely to still be rough edges, particularly with third party packages.


2.2 i386

FreeBSD/i386 runs on a wide variety of “IBM PC compatible” machines. Due to the wide range of hardware available for this architecture, it is impossible to exhaustively list all combinations of equipment supported by FreeBSD. Nevertheless, some general guidelines are presented here.

Almost all i386-compatible processors with a floating point unit are supported. All Intel processors beginning with the 80486 are supported, including the 80486, Pentium, Pentium Pro, Pentium II, Pentium III, Pentium 4, and variants thereof, such as the Xeon and Celeron processors. All i386-compatible AMD processors are also supported, including the Am486, Am5x86, K5, K6 (and variants), Athlon (including Athlon-MP, Athlon-XP, Athlon-4, and Athlon Thunderbird), and Duron processors. The AMD Élan SC520 embedded processor is supported. The Transmeta Crusoe is recognized and supported, as are i386-compatible processors from Cyrix and NexGen.

There is a wide variety of motherboards available for this architecture. Motherboards using the ISA, VLB, EISA, AGP, and PCI expansion busses are well-supported. There is some limited support for the MCA (“MicroChannel”) expansion bus used in the IBM PS/2 line of PCs.

Symmetric multi-processor (SMP) systems are generally supported by FreeBSD, although in some cases, BIOS or motherboard bugs may generate some problems. Perusal of the archives of the FreeBSD symmetric multiprocessing mailing list may yield some clues.

FreeBSD will take advantage of HyperThreading (HTT) support on Intel CPUs that support this feature. A kernel with the options SMP feature enabled will automatically detect the additional logical processors. The default FreeBSD scheduler treats the logical processors the same as additional physical processors; in other words, no attempt is made to optimize scheduling decisions given the shared resources between logical processors within the same CPU. Because this naive scheduling can result in suboptimal performance, under certain circumstances it may be useful to disable the logical processors with the the machdep.hlt_logical_cpus sysctl variable. It is also possible to halt any CPU in the idle loop with the machdep.hlt_cpus sysctl variable. The smp(4) manual page has more details.

FreeBSD will take advantage of Physical Address Extensions (PAE) support on CPUs that support this feature. A kernel with the PAE feature enabled will detect memory above 4 gigabytes and allow it to be used by the system. This feature places constraints on the device drivers and other features of FreeBSD which may be used; consult the pae(4) manpage for more details.

FreeBSD will generally run on i386-based laptops, albeit with varying levels of support for certain hardware features such as sound, graphics, power management, and PCCARD expansion slots. These features tend to vary in idiosyncratic ways between machines, and frequently require special-case support in FreeBSD to work around hardware bugs or other oddities. When in doubt, a search of the archives of the FreeBSD laptop computer mailing list may be useful.

Most modern laptops (as well as many desktops) use the Advanced Configuration and Power Management (ACPI) standard. FreeBSD supports ACPI via the ACPI Component Architecture reference implementation from Intel, as described in the acpi(4) manual page. The use of ACPI causes instabilities on some machines and it may be necessary to disable the ACPI driver, which is normally loaded via a kernel module. This may be accomplished by adding the following line to /boot/device.hints:

hint.acpi.0.disabled="1"

Users debugging ACPI-related problems may find it useful to disable portions of the ACPI functionality. The acpi(4) manual page has more information on how to do this via loader tunables.

ACPI depends on a Differentiated System Descriptor Table (DSDT) provided by each machine's BIOS. Some machines have bad or incomplete DSDTs, which prevents ACPI from functioning correctly. Replacement DSDTs for some machines can be found at the DSDT section of the ACPI4Linux project Web site. FreeBSD can use these DSDTs to override the DSDT provided by the BIOS; see the acpi(4) manual page for more information.


2.3 ia64

Currently supported processors are the Itanium and the Itanium 2.

Supported chipsets include:

  • HP zx1

  • Intel 460GX

  • Intel E8870

Both Uniprocessor (UP) and Symmetric Multi-processor (SMP) configurations are supported.


2.3.1 Supported Devices Overview

Most devices that can be found in or are compatible with ia64 machines are fully supported. The notable exception is the VGA console. The FreeBSD support for VGA consoles is at this time too much based on PC hardware and not all ia64 machines have chipsets that provide sufficient PC legacy support. As such syscons(4) can not be enabled and the use of a serial console is required.


2.4 pc98

NEC PC-9801/9821 series with almost all i386-compatible processors, including 80486, Pentium, Pentium Pro, Pentium II, and variants. All i386-compatible processors by AMD, Cyrix, IBM, and IDT are also supported.

NEC FC-9801/9821 series, and NEC SV-98 series (both of them are compatible with PC-9801/9821 series) should be supported.

EPSON PC-386/486/586 series, which are compatible with NEC PC-9801 series are supported.

High-resolution mode is not supported. NEC PC-98XA/XL/RL/XL^2, and NEC PC-H98 series are supported in normal (PC-9801 compatible) mode only.

Although there are some multi-processor systems (such as Rs20/B20), SMP-related features of FreeBSD are not supported yet.

PC-9801/9821 standard bus (called C-Bus), PC-9801NOTE expansion bus (110pin), and PCI bus are supported. New Extend Standard Architecture (NESA) bus (used in PC-H98, SV-H98, and FC-H98 series) is not supported.


2.5 powerpc

The information for this paragraph has yet to be compiled.


2.6 sparc64

This section describes the systems currently known to be supported by FreeBSD on the UltraSPARC platform. For background information on the various hardware designs see the Sun System Handbook.

SMP is supported on all systems with more than 1 processor.

If you have a system that is not listed here, it may not have been tested with FreeBSD 7.0-CURRENT. We encourage you to try it and send a note to the FreeBSD SPARC porting mailing list with your results, including which devices work and which do not.


2.6.1 Fully Supported Systems

The following systems are fully supported by FreeBSD.

  • Blade 100

  • Blade 150

  • Enterprise 220R

  • Enterprise 250

  • Enterprise 420R

  • Enterprise 450

  • Fire V100

  • Fire V120

  • Netra t1 105

  • Netra T1 AC200/DC200

  • Netra t 1100

  • Netra t 1120

  • Netra t 1125

  • Netra t 1400/1405

  • Netra 120

  • Netra X1

  • SPARCEngine Ultra AXi

  • SPARCEngine Ultra AXmp

  • Ultra 1 (serial console)

  • Ultra 1E

  • Ultra 2

  • Ultra 5

  • Ultra 10

  • Ultra 30

  • Ultra 60

  • Ultra 80


2.6.2 Partially Supported Systems

The following systems are partially supported by FreeBSD. In particular the onboard scsi controller in sbus systems is not supported.

  • Enterprise 3500

  • Enterprise 4500


2.6.3 Unsupported Systems

The following systems are not supported by FreeBSD. This may be due to lack of processor support (UltraSPARC III), due to a quirk in the system design that makes FreeBSD unstable, or due to lack of support for sufficient onboard devices to make FreeBSD generally useful.

  • All systems containing UltraSPARC III processor(s).


3 Supported Devices

This section describes the devices currently known to be supported by FreeBSD. Other configurations may also work, but simply have not been tested yet. Feedback, updates, and corrections to this list are encouraged.

Where possible, the drivers applicable to each device or class of devices is listed. If the driver in question has a manual page in the FreeBSD base distribution (most should), it is referenced here. Information on specific models of supported devices, controllers, etc. can be found in the manual pages.

Note: The device lists in this document are being generated automatically from FreeBSD manual pages. This means that some devices, which are supported by multiple drivers, may appear multiple times.


3.1 Disk Controllers

[amd64, i386, ia64, pc98, sparc64] IDE/ATA controllers ( ata(4) driver)

[pc98] IDE/ATA controllers (wdc driver)

  • On-board IDE controller



The ahc(4) driver supports the following SCSI host adapter chips and SCSI controller cards:

  • Adaptec AIC7770 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7850 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7860 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7870 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7880 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7890 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7891 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7892 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7895 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7896 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7897 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec AIC7899 host adapter chip

  • Adaptec 274X(W)

  • Adaptec 274X(T)

  • Adaptec 284X

  • Adaptec 2910

  • Adaptec 2915

  • Adaptec 2920

  • Adaptec 2930C

  • Adaptec 2930U2

  • Adaptec 2940

  • Adaptec 2940J

  • Adaptec 2940N

  • Adaptec 2940U

  • Adaptec 2940AU

  • Adaptec 2940UW

  • Adaptec 2940UW Dual

  • Adaptec 2940UW Pro

  • Adaptec 2940U2W

  • Adaptec 2940U2B

  • Adaptec 2950U2W

  • Adaptec 2950U2B

  • Adaptec 19160B

  • Adaptec 29160B

  • Adaptec 29160N

  • Adaptec 3940

  • Adaptec 3940U

  • Adaptec 3940AU

  • Adaptec 3940UW

  • Adaptec 3940AUW

  • Adaptec 3940U2W

  • Adaptec 3950U2

  • Adaptec 3960

  • Adaptec 39160

  • Adaptec 3985

  • Adaptec 4944UW

  • NEC PC-9821Xt13 (PC-98)

  • NEC RvII26 (PC-98)

  • NEC PC-9821X-B02L/B09 (PC-98)

  • NEC SV-98/2-B03 (PC-98)

  • Many motherboards with on-board SCSI support

Controllers supported by the amr(4) driver include:

  • MegaRAID SATA 150-4

  • MegaRAID SATA 150-6

  • MegaRAID SATA 300-4X

  • MegaRAID SATA 300-8X

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-1E

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-2E

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-4E

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-0X

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-2X

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-4X

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-0

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-1

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-2

  • MegaRAID SCSI 320-4

  • MegaRAID Series 418

  • MegaRAID i4 133 RAID

  • MegaRAID Elite 1500 (Series 467)

  • MegaRAID Elite 1600 (Series 493)

  • MegaRAID Elite 1650 (Series 4xx)

  • MegaRAID Enterprise 1200 (Series 428)

  • MegaRAID Enterprise 1300 (Series 434)

  • MegaRAID Enterprise 1400 (Series 438)

  • MegaRAID Enterprise 1500 (Series 467)

  • MegaRAID Enterprise 1600 (Series 471)

  • MegaRAID Express 100 (Series 466WS)

  • MegaRAID Express 200 (Series 466)

  • MegaRAID Express 300 (Series 490)

  • MegaRAID Express 500 (Series 475)

  • Dell PERC

  • Dell PERC 2/SC

  • Dell PERC 2/DC

  • Dell PERC 3/DCL

  • Dell PERC 3/QC

  • Dell PERC 4/DC

  • Dell PERC 4/IM

  • Dell PERC 4/SC

  • Dell PERC 4/Di

  • Dell PERC 4e/DC

  • Dell PERC 4e/Di

  • Dell PERC 4e/Si

  • Dell PERC 4ei

  • HP NetRAID-1/Si

  • HP NetRAID-3/Si (D4943A)

  • HP Embedded NetRAID

  • Intel RAID Controller SRCS16

  • Intel RAID Controller SRCU42X

Note: [amd64, i386] Booting from these controllers is supported. EISA adapters are not supported.

Cards supported by the isp(4) driver include:

  • ISP1000

  • ISP1020

  • ISP1040

  • Qlogic 1240

  • Qlogic 1020

  • Qlogic 1040

  • Qlogic 1080

  • Qlogic 1280

  • Qlogic 12160

  • Qlogic 210X

  • Qlogic 220X

  • Qlogic 2300

  • Qlogic 2312

  • Qlogic 234X

  • Qlogic 2322

  • Qlogic 200

  • Qlogic 2422

  • Qlogic 2432

Note: [amd64, i386] Booting from these controllers is supported. EISA adapters are not supported.

The following controllers are supported by the mpt(4) driver:

  • LSI Logic 53c1030, LSI Logic LSI2x320-X (Single and Dual Ultra320 SCSI)

  • LSI Logic AS1064, LSI Logic AS1068

  • LSI Logic FC909 (1Gb/s Fibre Channel)

  • LSI Logic FC909A (Dual 1Gb/s Fibre Channel)

  • LSI Logic FC919, LSI Logic 7102XP-LC (Single 2Gb/s Fibre Channel)

  • LSI Logic FC929, LSI Logic FC929X, LSI Logic 7202XP-LC (Dual 2Gb/s Fibre Channel)

  • LSI Logic FC949X (Dual 4Gb/s Fibre Channel)

The SCSI controller chips supported by the mpt(4) driver can be found onboard on many systems including:

  • Dell PowerEdge 1750 thru 2850

  • IBM eServer xSeries 335

These systems also contain Integrated Raid Mirroring and Integrated Raid Mirroring Enhanced which this driver also supports. The SAS controller chips are also present on many new AMD/Opteron based systems, like the Sun 4100. Note that this controller can drive both SAS and SATA drives or a mix of them at the same time. This driver also supports target mode for Fibre Channel cards. This support may be enabled by setting the desired role of the core via the LSI Logic firmware utility that establishes what roles the card can take on - no separate compilation is required.

The sym(4) driver provides support for the following Symbios/LSI Logic PCI SCSI controllers:

  • 53C810

  • 53C810A

  • 53C815

  • 53C825

  • 53C825A

  • 53C860

  • 53C875

  • 53C876

  • 53C895

  • 53C895A

  • 53C896

  • 53C897

  • 53C1000

  • 53C1000R

  • 53C1010-33

  • 53C1010-66

  • 53C1510D

The SCSI controllers supported by sym(4) can be either embedded on a motherboard, or on one of the following add-on boards:

  • ASUS SC-200, SC-896

  • Data Technology DTC3130 (all variants)

  • DawiControl DC2976UW

  • Diamond FirePort (all)

  • I-O DATA SC-UPCI (PC-98)

  • Logitec LHA-521UA (PC-98)

  • NCR cards (all)

  • Symbios cards (all)

  • Tekram DC390W, 390U, 390F, 390U2B, 390U2W, 390U3D, and 390U3W

  • Tyan S1365

[i386] The wds(4) driver supports the WD7000 SCSI controller.

With all supported SCSI controllers, full support is provided for SCSI-I, SCSI-II, and SCSI-III peripherals, including hard disks, optical disks, tape drives (including DAT, 8mm Exabyte, Mammoth, and DLT), medium changers, processor target devices and CD-ROM drives. WORM devices that support CD-ROM commands are supported for read-only access by the CD-ROM drivers (such as cd(4)). WORM/CD-R/CD-RW writing support is provided by cdrecord(1), which is a part of the sysutils/cdrtools port in the Ports Collection.

The following CD-ROM type systems are supported at this time:

  • SCSI interface (also includes ProAudio Spectrum and SoundBlaster SCSI) (cd(4))

  • [i386] Sony proprietary interface (all models) ( scd(4))

  • ATAPI IDE interface ( acd(4))



[i386] The following device is unmaintained:

  • Mitsumi proprietary CD-ROM interface (all models) ( mcd(4))




3.2 Ethernet Interfaces

[amd64, i386] Broadcom BCM4401 based Fast Ethernet adapters ( bfe(4) driver)

[amd64, i386] Crystal Semiconductor CS89x0-based NICs (cs(4) driver)

The dc(4) driver provides support for the following chipsets:

  • DEC/Intel 21143

  • ADMtek AL981 Comet, AN985 Centaur, ADM9511 Centaur II and ADM9513 Centaur II

  • ASIX Electronics AX88140A and AX88141

  • Conexant LANfinity RS7112 (miniPCI)

  • Davicom DM9009, DM9100, DM9102 and DM9102A

  • Lite-On 82c168 and 82c169 PNIC

  • Lite-On/Macronix 82c115 PNIC II

  • Macronix 98713, 98713A, 98715, 98715A, 98715AEC-C, 98725, 98727 and 98732

  • Xircom X3201 (cardbus only)

The following NICs are known to work with the dc(4) driver at this time:

  • 3Com OfficeConnect 10/100B (ADMtek AN985 Centaur-P)

  • Abocom FE2500

  • Accton EN1217 (98715A)

  • Accton EN2242 MiniPCI

  • Adico AE310TX (98715A)

  • Alfa Inc GFC2204 (ASIX AX88140A)

  • Built in 10Mbps only Ethernet on Compaq Presario 7900 series desktops (21143, non-MII)

  • Built in Sun DMFE 10/100 Mbps Ethernet on Sun Netra X1 and Sun Fire V100 (DM9102A, MII)

  • Built in Ethernet on LinkSys EtherFast 10/100 Instant GigaDrive (DM9102, MII)

  • CNet Pro110B (ASIX AX88140A)

  • CNet Pro120A (98715A or 98713A) and CNet Pro120B (98715)

  • Compex RL100-TX (98713 or 98713A)

  • D-Link DFE-570TX (21143, MII, quad port)

  • Digital DE500-BA 10/100 (21143, non-MII)

  • ELECOM Laneed LD-CBL/TXA (ADMtek AN985)

  • Hawking CB102 CardBus

  • IBM EtherJet Cardbus Adapter

  • Intel PRO/100 Mobile Cardbus (versions that use the X3201 chipset)

  • Jaton XpressNet (Davicom DM9102)

  • Kingston KNE100TX (21143, MII)

  • Kingston KNE110TX (PNIC 82c169)

  • LinkSys LNE100TX (PNIC 82c168, 82c169)

  • LinkSys LNE100TX v2.0 (PNIC II 82c115)

  • LinkSys LNE100TX v4.0/4.1 (ADMtek AN985 Centaur-P)

  • Matrox FastNIC 10/100 (PNIC 82c168, 82c169)

  • Melco LGY-PCI-TXL

  • Microsoft MN-120 10/100 CardBus (ADMTek Centaur-C)

  • Microsoft MN-130 10/100 PCI (ADMTek Centaur-P)

  • NDC SOHOware SFA110A (98713A)

  • NDC SOHOware SFA110A Rev B4 (98715AEC-C)

  • NetGear FA310-TX Rev. D1, D2 or D3 (PNIC 82c169)

  • Netgear FA511

  • PlaneX FNW-3602-T (ADMtek AN985)

  • SMC EZ Card 10/100 1233A-TX (ADMtek AN985)

  • SVEC PN102-TX (98713)

  • Xircom Cardbus Realport

  • Xircom Cardbus Ethernet 10/100

  • Xircom Cardbus Ethernet II 10/100

The em(4) driver supports Gigabit Ethernet adapters based on the Intel 82540, 82541ER, 82541PI, 82542, 82543, 82544, 82545, 82546, 82546EB, 82546GB, 82547, 82571, 82572 and 82573 controller chips:

  • Intel PRO/1000 CT Network Connection (82547)

  • Intel PRO/1000 F Server Adapter (82543)

  • Intel PRO/1000 Gigabit Server Adapter (82542)

  • Intel PRO/1000 GT Desktop Adapter (82541PI)

  • Intel PRO/1000 MF Dual Port Server Adapter (82546)

  • Intel PRO/1000 MF Server Adapter (82545)

  • Intel PRO/1000 MF Server Adapter (LX) (82545)

  • Intel PRO/1000 MT Desktop Adapter (82540)

  • Intel PRO/1000 MT Desktop Adapter (82541)

  • Intel PRO/1000 MT Dual Port Server Adapter (82546)

  • Intel PRO/1000 MT Quad Port Server Adapter (82546EB)

  • Intel PRO/1000 MT Server Adapter (82545)

  • Intel PRO/1000 T Desktop Adapter (82544)

  • Intel PRO/1000 T Server Adapter (82543)

  • Intel PRO/1000 XF Server Adapter (82544)

  • Intel PRO/1000 XT Server Adapter (82544)

Adapters supported by the fxp(4) driver include:

  • Intel EtherExpress PRO/10

  • Intel InBusiness 10/100

  • Intel PRO/100B / EtherExpressPRO/100 B PCI Adapter

  • Intel PRO/100+ Management Adapter

  • Intel PRO/100 VE Desktop Adapter

  • Intel PRO/100 VM Network Connection

  • Intel PRO/100 M Desktop Adapter

  • Intel PRO/100 S Desktop, Server and Dual-Port Server Adapters

  • Contec C-NET(PI)-100TX (PC-98)

  • NEC PC-9821Ra20, Rv20, Xv13, Xv20 internal 100Base-TX (PC-98)

  • NEC PC-9821X-B06 (PC-98)

  • Many on-board network interfaces on Intel motherboards

The hme(4) driver supports the on-board Ethernet interfaces of many Sun UltraSPARC workstation and server models. Cards supported by the hme(4) driver include:

  • Sun PCI SunSwift Adapter

  • Sun SBus SunSwift Adapter “( hme” and “SUNW,hme”)

  • Sun PCI Sun100BaseT Adapter 2.0

  • Sun SBus Sun100BaseT 2.0

  • Sun PCI Quad FastEthernet Controller

  • Sun SBus Quad FastEthernet Controller

The re(4) driver supports RealTek RTL8139C+, RTL8169, RTL816xS, RTL811xS, and RTL8101E based Fast Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet adapters including:

  • Alloy Computer Products EtherGOLD 1439E 10/100 (8139C+)

  • Compaq Evo N1015v Integrated Ethernet (8139C+)

  • Corega CG-LAPCIGT Gigabit Ethernet (8169S)

  • D-Link DGE-528(T) Gigabit Ethernet (8169S)

  • Gigabyte 7N400 Pro2 Integrated Gigabit Ethernet (8110S)

  • LevelOne GNC-0105T (8169S)

  • LinkSys EG1032 (32-bit PCI)

  • PLANEX COMMUNICATIONS Inc. GN-1200TC (8169S)

  • USRobotics USR997902 Gigabit Ethernet (8169S)

  • Xterasys XN-152 10/100/1000 NIC (8169)

Adapters supported by the rl(4) driver include:

  • Accton “Cheetah” EN1207D (MPX 5030/5038; RealTek 8139 clone)

  • Allied Telesyn AT2550

  • Allied Telesyn AT2500TX

  • Belkin F5D5000

  • BUFFALO (Melco INC.) LPC-CB-CLX (CardBus)

  • Compaq HNE-300

  • CompUSA no-name 10/100 PCI Ethernet NIC

  • Corega FEther CB-TXD

  • Corega FEtherII CB-TXD

  • D-Link DFE-528TX

  • D-Link DFE-530TX+

  • D-Link DFE-538TX

  • D-Link DFE-690TXD

  • Edimax EP-4103DL CardBus

  • Encore ENL832-TX 10/100 M PCI

  • Farallon NetLINE 10/100 PCI

  • Genius GF100TXR

  • GigaFast Ethernet EE100-AXP

  • KTX-9130TX 10/100 Fast Ethernet

  • LevelOne FPC-0106TX

  • Longshine LCS-8038TX-R

  • NDC Communications NE100TX-E

  • Netronix Inc. EA-1210 NetEther 10/100

  • Nortel Networks 10/100BaseTX

  • OvisLink LEF-8129TX

  • OvisLink LEF-8139TX

  • Peppercon AG ROL-F

  • Planex FNW-3800-TX

  • SMC EZ Card 10/100 PCI 1211-TX

  • SOHO (PRAGMATIC) UE-1211C

[amd64, i386, pc98] SMC 83c17x (EPIC)-based Ethernet NICs (tx(4) driver)

The xl(4) driver supports the following hardware:

  • 3Com 3c900-TPO

  • 3Com 3c900-COMBO

  • 3Com 3c905-TX

  • 3Com 3c905-T4

  • 3Com 3c900B-TPO

  • 3Com 3c900B-TPC

  • 3Com 3c900B-FL

  • 3Com 3c900B-COMBO

  • 3Com 3c905B-T4

  • 3Com 3c905B-TX

  • 3Com 3c905B-FX

  • 3Com 3c905B-COMBO

  • 3Com 3c905C-TX

  • 3Com 3c980, 3c980B, and 3c980C server adapters

  • 3Com 3cSOHO100-TX OfficeConnect adapters

  • 3Com 3c450 HomeConnect adapters

  • 3Com 3c555, 3c556 and 3c556B mini-PCI adapters

  • 3Com 3C3SH573BT, 3C575TX, 3CCFE575BT, 3CXFE575BT, 3CCFE575CT, 3CXFE575CT, 3CCFEM656, 3CCFEM656B, and 3CCFEM656C, 3CXFEM656, 3CXFEM656B, and 3CXFEM656C CardBus adapters

  • 3Com 3c905-TX, 3c905B-TX 3c905C-TX, 3c920B-EMB, and 3c920B-EMB-WNM embedded adapters

Both the 3C656 family of CardBus cards and the 3C556 family of MiniPCI cards have a built-in proprietary modem. Neither the xl(4) driver nor any other driver supports this modem.


3.4 FDDI Interfaces

[i386, pc98] DEC DEFPA PCI ( fpa(4) driver)

[i386] DEC DEFEA EISA ( fpa(4) driver)


3.5 ATM Interfaces

[i386, pc98] Midway-based ATM interfaces (en(4) driver)

[i386, pc98 sparc64] FORE Systems, Inc. PCA-200E ATM PCI Adapters (hfa and fatm(4) drivers)

[i386, pc98] IDT NICStAR 77201/211-based ATM Adapters ( idt(4) driver)

[i386, pc98 sparc64] FORE Systems, Inc. HE155 and HE622 ATM interfaces ( hatm(4) driver)

[i386, pc98] IDT77252-based ATM cards ( patm(4) driver)


3.6 Wireless Network Interfaces

[i386] NCR / AT&T / Lucent Technologies WaveLan T1-speed ISA/radio LAN cards (wl(4) driver)

[amd64, i386, pc98] Lucent Technologies WaveLAN/IEEE 802.11b wireless network adapters and workalikes using the Lucent Hermes, Intersil PRISM-II, Intersil PRISM-2.5, Intersil Prism-3, and Symbol Spectrum24 chipsets (wi(4) driver)

[amd64, i386, pc98] Cisco/Aironet 802.11b wireless adapters (an(4) driver)

[i386, pc98] Raytheon Raylink 2.4GHz wireless adapters ( ray(4) driver)


3.7 Miscellaneous Networks

[i386] Granch SBNI12 point-to-point communications adapters ( sbni(4) driver)

[i386] Granch SBNI16 SHDSL modems ( sbsh(4) driver)


3.8 ISDN Interfaces

[i386] AcerISDN P10 ISA PnP (experimental)

[i386] Asuscom ISDNlink 128K ISA

[i386] ASUSCOM P-IN100-ST-D (and other Winbond W6692-based cards)

[i386] AVM

  • A1

  • B1 ISA (tested with V2.0)

  • B1 PCI (tested with V4.0)

  • Fritz!Card classic

  • Fritz!Card PnP

  • Fritz!Card PCI

  • Fritz!Card PCI, Version 2

  • T1



[i386] Creatix

  • ISDN-S0

  • ISDN-S0 P&P



[i386] Compaq Microcom 610 ISDN (Compaq series PSB2222I) ISA PnP

[i386] Dr. Neuhaus Niccy Go@ and compatibles

[i386] Dynalink IS64PPH and IS64PPH+

[i386] Eicon Diehl DIVA 2.0 and 2.02

[i386] ELSA

  • ELSA PCC-16

  • QuickStep 1000pro ISA

  • MicroLink ISDN/PCI

  • QuickStep 1000pro PCI



[i386] ITK ix1 Micro ( < V.3, non-PnP version )

[i386] Sedlbauer Win Speed

[i386] Siemens I-Surf 2.0

[i386] TELEINT ISDN SPEED No.1 (experimental)

[i386] Teles

  • S0/8

  • S0/16

  • S0/16.3

  • S0/16.3 PnP

  • 16.3c ISA PnP (experimental)

  • Teles PCI-TJ



[i386] Traverse Technologies NETjet-S PCI

[i386] USRobotics Sportster ISDN TA intern

[i386] Winbond W6692 based PCI cards


3.9 Serial Interfaces

[amd64 i386] “PC standard” 8250, 16450, and 16550-based serial ports ( sio(4) driver)

The uart(4) driver supports the following classes of UARTs:

  • NS8250: standard hardware based on the 8250, 16450, 16550, 16650, 16750 or the 16950 UARTs.

  • SCC: serial communications controllers supported by the scc(4) device driver.

The scc(4) driver supports the following classes of SCCs:

  • SAB82532: Siemens SAB 82532 based serial communications controllers.

  • Z8530: Zilog 8530 based serial communications controllers.

[amd64 i386] AST 4 port serial card using shared IRQ

[i386] ARNET serial cards (ar(4) driver)

  • ARNET 8 port serial card using shared IRQ

  • ARNET (now Digiboard) Sync 570/i high-speed serial



[i386] Boca multi-port serial cards

  • Boca BB1004 4-Port serial card (Modems not supported)

  • Boca IOAT66 6-Port serial card (Modems supported)

  • Boca BB1008 8-Port serial card (Modems not supported)

  • Boca BB2016 16-Port serial card (Modems supported)



[i386] Comtrol Rocketport card (rp(4) driver)

[i386] Cyclades Cyclom-Y serial board (cy(4) driver)

[i386] STB 4 port card using shared IRQ

[i386] DigiBoard intelligent serial cards (digi driver)

[amd64, i386, ia64] PCI-Based multi-port serial boards ( puc(4) driver)

  • [amd64 i386] Actiontech 56K PCI

  • [amd64 i386] Avlab Technology, PCI IO 2S and PCI IO 4S

  • [amd64 i386] Comtrol RocketPort 550

  • [amd64 i386] Decision Computers PCCOM 4-port serial and dual port RS232/422/485

  • [ia64] Diva Serial (GSP) Multiport UART

  • [amd64 i386] Dolphin Peripherals 4025/4035/4036

  • [amd64 i386] IC Book Labs Dreadnought 16x Lite and Pro

  • [amd64 i386] Lava Computers 2SP-PCI/DSerial-PCI/Quattro-PCI/Octopus-550

  • [amd64 i386] Middle Digital, Weasle serial port

  • [amd64 i386] Moxa Industio CP-114, Smartio C104H-PCI and C168H/PCI

  • [amd64 i386] NEC PK-UG-X001 and PK-UG-X008

  • [amd64 i386] Netmos NM9835 PCI-2S-550

  • [amd64 i386] Oxford Semiconductor OX16PCI954 PCI UART

  • [amd64 i386] Syba Tech SD-LAB PCI-4S2P-550-ECP

  • [amd64 i386] SIIG Cyber I/O PCI 16C550/16C650/16C850

  • [amd64 i386] SIIG Cyber 2P1S PCI 16C550/16C650/16C850

  • [amd64 i386] SIIG Cyber 2S1P PCI 16C550/16C650/16C850

  • [amd64 i386] SIIG Cyber 4S PCI 16C550/16C650/16C850

  • [amd64 i386] SIIG Cyber Serial (Single and Dual) PCI 16C550/16C650/16C850

  • [amd64 i386] Syba Tech Ltd. PCI-4S2P-550-ECP

  • [amd64 i386] Titan PCI-200H and PCI-800H

  • [amd64 i386] US Robotics (3Com) 3CP5609 modem

  • [amd64 i386] VScom PCI-400 and PCI-800



[i386, amd64] Specialix SI/XIO/SX multiport serial cards, with both the older SIHOST2.x and the “enhanced” (transputer based, aka JET) host cards (ISA, EISA and PCI) are supported. Note that the newer SX+ PCI cards are not currently supported. (si(4) driver)

[pc98] Internel serial interfaces ( sio(4) driver)

  • PC-9801 on-board

  • PC-9821 2'nd CCU (flags 0x12000000)



[pc98] NEC PC-9861K, PC-9801-101 and Midori-Denshi MDC-926Rs ( sio(4) driver)

  • COM2 (flags 0x01000000)

  • COM3 (flags 0x02000000)



[pc98] NEC PC-9801-120 ( sio(4) driver)

Note: "flags 0x11000000" is necessary in kernel configuration.

[pc98] Microcore MC-16550, MC-16550II, MC-RS98 ( sio(4) driver)

Note: "flags 0x14000?01" is necessary in kernel configuration.

[pc98] Media Intelligent RSB-2000, RSB-3000 and AIWA B98-02 ( sio(4) driver)

Note: "flags 0x15000?01" is necessary in kernel configuration.

[pc98] Media Intelligent RSB-384 ( sio(4) driver)

Note: "flags 0x16000001" is necessary in kernel configuration.

[pc98] I-O DATA RSA-98III ( sio(4) driver)

Note: "flags 0x18000?01" is necessary in kernel configuration.

[pc98] Hayes ESP98 ( sio(4) driver)

Note: "options COM_ESP" and "flags 0x19000000" are necessary in kernel configuration.


3.10 Sound Devices

[pc98] NEC PC-9801-73, 86 and compatibles (nss driver)

  • NEC A-MATE internal sound

  • Q-Vision WaveStar, WaveMaster



[pc98] NEC X-MATE, CanBe, ValueStar internal (mss driver)

[pc98] Creative Technologies SoundBlaster(98) (sb(4) driver)

[pc98] I-O DATA CD-BOX (sb(4) driver)

[pc98] MPU-401 and compatible interfaces (mpu driver)

  • Q-Vision WaveStar




3.11 Camera and Video Capture Devices

[i386] Connectix QuickCam


3.12 USB Devices

[amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] A range of USB peripherals are supported; devices known to work are listed in this section. Owing to the generic nature of most USB devices, with some exceptions any device of a given class will be supported, even if not explicitly listed here.

Note: [amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] USB Ethernet adapters can be found in the section listing Ethernet interfaces.

Note: [amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] USB Bluetooth adapters can be found in Bluetooth section.

[amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] USB 2.0 controllers using the EHCI interface ( ehci(4) driver)

[amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] Hubs

[amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] Keyboards ( ukbd(4) driver)

[amd64, i386, pc98] Miscellaneous

  • Assist Computer Systems PC Camera C-M1

  • ActiveWire I/O Board

  • Creative Technology Video Blaster WebCam Plus

  • D-Link DSB-R100 USB Radio ( ufm(4) driver)

  • Mirunet AlphaCam Plus



[amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] Mice ( ums(4) driver)

The umct(4) driver supports the following adapters:

  • Belkin F5U109

  • Belkin F5U409

  • D-Link DU-H3SP USB BAY Hub

  • Magic Control Technology USB-232

  • Sitecom USB-232

[amd64, i386, pc98] Audio Devices ( uaudio(4) driver)


3.13 IEEE 1394 (Firewire) Devices

[amd64, i386, sparc64] Serial Bus Protocol 2 (SBP-2) storage devices ( sbp(4) driver)


3.16 Miscellaneous

[amd64, i386, pc98] FAX-Modem/PCCARD

  • MELCO IGM-PCM56K/IGM-PCM56KH

  • Nokia Card Phone 2.0 (gsm900/dcs1800 HSCSD terminal)



[amd64, i386, pc98] Floppy drives ( fdc(4) driver)

[amd64 i386] VGA-compatible video cards ( vga(4) driver)

Note: Information regarding specific video cards and compatibility with Xorg can be found at http://www.x.org/.



[amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] Keyboards including:

  • [i386] AT-style keyboards ( atkbd(4) driver)

  • [amd64, i386] PS/2 keyboards ( atkbd(4) driver)

  • [pc98] Standard keyboards

  • [amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] USB keyboards ( ukbd(4) driver)



[amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] Pointing devices including:

  • [amd64, i386, pc98] Bus mice and compatible devices ( mse(4) driver)

  • [amd64, i386] PS/2 mice and compatible devices, including many laptop pointing devices ( psm(4) driver)

  • Serial mice and compatible devices

  • [amd64, i386, ia64, pc98] USB mice ( ums(4) driver)

Note: moused(8) has more information on using pointing devices with FreeBSD. Information on using pointing devices with Xorg can be found at http://www.x.org/.



[amd64, i386] “PC standard” parallel ports ( ppc(4) driver)

[pc98] “PC-9821 standard” parallel ports ( ppc(4) driver)

[i386, amd64] PC-compatible joysticks ( joy(4) driver)

[pc98] Joystick port of SoundBlaster(98) ( joy(4) driver)

[i386, pc98] PHS Data Communication Card/PCCARD

  • NTT DoCoMo P-in Comp@ct

  • Panasonic KX-PH405

  • SII MC-P200



[i386] Xilinx XC6200-based reconfigurable hardware cards compatible with the HOT1 from Virtual Computers (xrpu driver).

[pc98] Power Management Controller of NEC PC-98 Note (pmc driver)

[sparc64] OpenFirmware console (ofwcons driver)


This file, and other release-related documents, can be downloaded from http://www.FreeBSD.org/snapshots/.

For questions about FreeBSD, read the documentation before contacting <questions@FreeBSD.org>.

All users of FreeBSD 7-CURRENT should subscribe to the <current@FreeBSD.org> mailing list.

For questions about this documentation, e-mail <doc@FreeBSD.org>.