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Jack-Benny Persson
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# NetBSD on Sun Blade 1500
Configuration files I've modified or added to get NetBSD to run
well on my Sun Blade 1500 with a Sun XVR-100 graphics card.
## Xorg and securelevel
Most stuff works out of the box, except for X11 with the Sun XVR-100
graphics card. The card is actually a Radeon 7000, and hence the `radeon`
driver could be used. However, this is prevented by the default
`securelevel`.
Here we have two choices. One is to use the `wsfb` driver instead, which works
out of the box. The downside is that it uses the same bit bepth as the
framebuffer console, which is only 8 bits. The other choice is to compile a
new kernel with `options INSECURE`. This lets us set `securelevel` to `-1` in
`/etc/rc.conf`. We can then use 24 bit color depth with the `radeon` driver.
In my case I've named the kernel after myself, JACKBENNY. But you can rename
the kernel config file to whatever you like. For instruction on how to compile
a new kernel in NetBSD, read the following (in this order):
1. [Obtaining the sources](https://www.netbsd.org/docs/guide/en/chap-fetch.html)
2. [Compiling the kernel](https://www.netbsd.org/docs/guide/en/chap-kernel.html)
For more information about securelevels, see [secmodel_securelevel(9)](https://man.netbsd.org/secmodel_securelevel.9)
and [kernel secure levels](https://wiki.netbsd.org/tutorials/kernel_secure_levels/).
## The keyboard
I live in Sweden so I've set the keyboard layout to Swedish in
`/etc/wscons.conf`, and then activated wscons in `/etc/rc.conf`.
To get the **Compose** key to work under Xorg I needed to map the keycode (117)
to `Multi_key` with Xmodmap. I've added this to the system-wide
`.Xmodmap` under `/etc/X11/xinitrc/Xmodmap` so it works for all users.
## Closing thoughts
I really enjoy Sun hardware, but Solaris hasn't aged very well. NetBSD on the
other hand is a really nice system. It's a modern BSD which is both fun and
simple to tinker with, and there's lots and lots of software available for it.
The picture below is my own Sun Blade 1500. I have replaced the mechanical
harddrive with a 128 gigabyte SSD connected with a SATA-to-IDE adapter.
![Jack-Benny's Sun Blade 1500](jackbenny-sunblade1500.jpg)