I was a fan of FreeBSD over NetBSD; far more driver compatibility in the 1990s. It was nice to play with. Way too hard to use for much (well, online) now, due to the shrinking number of software packages (eg browsers) these days. I still remember how good it used to feel installing NetBSD on (now long long dead) laptop in the early/mid-90s.
replyI would have gone for FreeBSD myself but alas it didn’t run on the SPARC stuff I lifted out of the company skip :)
replyI think the thing with the BSDs in general was the fact I didn’t always even need any extra software packages on them. The base install was that useful.
Yeah, NetBSD definitely had Sparc compatibility. I wonder how many OpenSolaris and NetBSD machines on old Sparc hardware are still on the internet (like ones that aren't doing it just to say they are).
replyThe base install _was_ useful. Can still do stuff like write, and those sorts of old packages still work, but browsers.... not so much.