Supported PC Hardware

-as of Fri Jul 4 16:38:07 EDT 2014-

This page lists hardware known to work with Plan 9. Most hardware is listed by chipset, you may need to know what chipset your particular cards use. There is also a list of known broken hardware.

IDE/ATAPI CONTROLLERS

Plan 9 supports almost all motherboard IDE/ATAPI controllers, but DMA transfers are only used on these recognized chipsets (chipsets not listed here will simply run slower; you can try turning on DMA by editing /sys/src/9/pc/sdata.c).

  • ALi M1543, M5288 SATA
  • AMD 755, 756, 766, 768, 3111, CS5536
  • AMD/ATI SB400, 200M, 4379 SATA
  • CMD 640B, 646
  • HighPoint HPT366
  • Intel PIIX, PIIX3, PIIX4, ICH, ICH0, ICH2-7, ICH9, 6300ESB
  • NS PC87415
  • nVidia nForce 1-4, MCP 55, 61, 65, 69, 430
  • PC-Tech RZ1000
  • Promise PDC202xx, Ultra/133 TX2, 20378
  • ServerWorks IB6566
  • SiL 3112 SATA, 3114 SATA/RAID
  • SiS 962
  • VIA 82C686, VT8237 SATA/RAID

SATA CONTROLLERS

Plan 9 supports a few SATA controllers in their native AHCI mode, as opposed to the IDE-compatibility mode that some of them offer.

  • AMD SB600
  • Intel 63xxESB
  • Intel 82801GxM, for x = B or H
  • Intel ICH8, ICH9

The non-AHCI Marvell 88SX series four- and eight-port PCI-X chipsets are also supported.

ATA-OVER-ETHERNET DEVICES

Plan 9 supports access to ATA-over-Ethernet devices.

USB

USB audio, disks, Ethernet, keyboards, mice and printers are supported (see usb(4)) via the UHCI, OHCI and EHCI interfaces. XHCI (USB 3, 5Gb/s) is not yet started.

ETHERNET

Plan 9 will automatically recognize the PCI and PCI-Express Ethernet cards that it can drive. The following chips/cards are supported, in decreasing order of speed:

  • Intel 8259x 10Gb
  • Myricom 10Gb
  • Alteon, DEC, or SGI Acenic fiber Gigabit
  • Intel 8254x PRO/1000 Gigabit
  • Intel 8256x, 8257x Gigabit PCI-Express
  • National Semiconductor DP83820 Gigabit
  • Netgear GA620 Gigabit (discouraged due to large firmware blob)
  • Realtek 8110S/8169S Gigabit
  • Via Velocity Gigabit
  • 3Com 3C562, 3C589, and 3C589E PCMCIA
  • 3Com 3C450, 3C575, 3C59x, 3C90x, 3CSOHO100-TX
  • Accton EtherPair-PCMCIA EN2216
  • AMD 79C970
  • D-Link DFE-538TX, DFE-560TXD
  • Dell TrueMobile 1150 wireless
  • Digital (now Intel) 2114x and clones. (Tulip, PIC, PIC-II, Centaur, Digital DE-500)
  • EtherFast 10/100 PC Card
  • Intel 82562EM/EZ/ET/VE, 8255x PRO/100
  • Intel 82801DB PRO/100 VE
  • Intersil Prism2.5 wireless
  • Linksys EC2T Combo PCMCIA EtherCard, NB10T
  • Linksys WPC-11 wireless
  • Lucent/Agere/Avaya/Orinoco Wavelan wireless
  • NE2000 clones
  • National Semiconductor DP83815, DP8390
  • Netgear FA310, FA311, FA312, FA410TX, FA411 PCMCIA
  • Realtek 8029, 8139 - DL10038(D) (Remark of Realtek 8139)
  • SMC 1211, 8040TX PCMCIA, 91CXX PCMCIA
  • VIA Rhine VT6102 (pxe-bootable)
  • VIA Rhine II VT6103 (pxe-bootable)
  • Western Digital/SMC WD8003, WD8013, WD8216
  • Winbond 89C940

VESA VIDEO CARDS

Plan 9 can attempt to drive video cards using the VESA BIOS extensions instead of using drivers specific to particular chips. To use VESA, choose "vesa" as your monitor type during the CD boot or when making an install floppy.

The following cards are known to work using VESA. (Cards not listed here are still worth trying!)

(Some of the cards in this list have been moved to the main table)

The following cards are known not to work with VESA:

VGA CARDS AND CHIPSETS

For VGA cards it is more precise to describe the chips we support rather than the cards they are based on, since the cards are more ephemeral. Beware: different revisions of a card may use different chip sets.

Plan 9 can use some basic acceleration features such as filling and scrolling rectangles.

NOTE: If your chipset is not listed or listed as not supported, try the VESA driver by entering "vesa" as your monitor type. 

	Chip					| Native	| VESA	| Notes
	-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
	#9 Ticket to Ride IV		| Yes		| ?	| 	for SGI 1600SW
	3Dfx Voodoo Banshee	| Yes?	| ?	| 	Works perfectly with Elpin Banshee(Rev 1.1) 3Dfx 55-0013-04
	3Dfx Voodoo 3
	    1000				| Yes		| ?	|
	    2000				| Yes		| ?	|
	    3000				| Yes		| ?	|
	AMD Geode GX2		| No		| No	|
	ARK 2000pv			| Yes(2)	| ?	|
	ATI Mach
	    Mach 32			| Yes(2)| ?	|	|
	    Mach64xx			| Yes?	| ?	| 	Some newer Mach64 don't work(eg, later ATI Xpert)
	ATI Rage - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATI_Rage
	    Rage IIc			| Yes		| ?	| 	Needs hwaccel off
	    Rage 3D II+			| Broken	| Yes	| 	Garbled display
	    Rage 128			| No		| ?	| 	Too different from the Mach 64
	    Rage XL				| Yes		| Yes	|
	ATI Radeon
	    (789)xxx			| (1)		| Yes	| 	Works well with VESA
	    Mobility M7 LW		| No		| Yes	| 	Max: 1024x768x24
	    X1600 Pro			| No		| No	|
	CHIPS hiQVideo
	    65550				| Yes		| ?	|
	    65554				| Yes		| ?	|
	    69000				| Yes		| ?	|
	Cirrus Logic
	    CL-GD542x			| Yes		| ?	|
	    CL-GD543x			| Yes		| No	|
	    CL-GD544x			| Yes		| Yes	| 	Used by qemu
	    CL-GD546x Laguna	| Yes		| ?	|
	Intel i81x				| Yes		| ?	|
	Intel i740				| No		| ?	|
	Intel i950				| No		| Yes	|
	Intel 82845G			| No		| Yes |
	Intel GMA3100			| No		| Yes |
	Matrox (Note: GXXX series only support 8bit and 32bit depths)
	    G200				| Yes		| ?	|
	    G400				| Yes		| ?	|
	    G450				| Yes		| Yes	|
	    G550				| Yes		| Yes	|
	    P650				| No		| Yes	|
	Matrox Millennium II	| Yes		| ?	|
	Neomagic
	    MagicGraph			| Yes		| ?	|
	    MagicMedia			| Yes		| No	|
	NVIDIA
	    TNT				| Yes		| ?	|
	    TNT2				| Yes		| Yes	|
	    GeForce			| Yes?	| ?	|
	    GeForce 2			| Yes		| ?	|
	    GeForce 2 DVI		| Yes		| ?	|
	    GeForce 2 MX/MX 400  | Yes		| Yes	|
	    GeForce 3			| Yes		| ?	|
	    GeForce 4			| Yes		| ?	|
	    GeForce 4 MX		| Yes		| Yes	|
	    GeForce FX 5200		| Yes		| Yes	| 	Native: Some people have reported problems with DVI.
	    GeForce 6200		| No		| Yes	|
	    GeForce 6800 XT		| Yes		| ?	|
	S3 801, 805, 864, 928	| Yes(2)	| ?	|
	S3 968				| Yes		| ?	|
	S3 Savage
	    Savage 4			| Yes		| ?	|
	    Savage IX/MV		| Yes		| ?	|
	    SuperSavage IXC/16	| Yes		| ?	|
	    SavagePro8/DDR		| Yes		| ?	|
	    Savage 2000			| No		| ?	|
	S3 ViRGE DX,GX,GX2,MX,VX	|Yes	| ?	|
	S3 Trio64V+			| Yes		| No	|	dbvesa: invalid vesa signature 
	S3 Elsa 1000Trio/V		| Yes		| No	| 	Works fine with 1024x768x8, supports max. 8 bit depth.
	S3 Trio3D				| No		| Yes	|
	Tseng ET4000			| Yes(2)	| ?	|
	Trident Cyber938x		| Yes		| ?	|
	VIA UniChrome (EPIA-MS) | No		| Yes	|
	VMware virtual chipset (vmware won't release documentation, please use qemu instead)
	    4.5				| Yes		| ?	|
	    5.0				| Yes		| ?	| 	Needs hwaccel off

(1) See the radeon drivers page.

(2) Only tested with old editions of Plan 9.

Cards supported in the third edition but not tested in current system:

Cards supported in the first and second editions but not tested in the current system:

SCSI CONTROLLERS

KEYBOARDS

Any PS/2 or USB keyboard should work. The bootstraps require PS/2 "emulation" in your BIOS to make USB keyboards work.

MICE

Plan 9 supports PS/2, PS/2 Intellimouse, and serial mice. USB mice are supported via a user-space driver. See usb(4), usbd(4), and usb(3).

You will want a 3 button mouse for plan9, using the scroll wheel as the middle button is not really satisfactory. The IBM 40K9201 and HP DY651A are both good quality USB optical mice with three real buttons.

There is preliminary support for the scroll wheel and extra buttons as on the Toshiba Portege 3440CT.

Most laptops present their built-in pointing devices as PS/2 mice.

The middle mouse button on the virtual VMware mouse appears not to work when running Plan 9 under Windows 2000 on certain laptops, notably IBM Thinkpads. To the extent that fault can be assigned, it is a hardware bug. The mouse controllers do not follow the same protocol that all other 3-button mice do for reporting the button count. See http://lists.cse.psu.edu/archives/9fans/2002-May/017472.html for a Windows workaround.

LAPTOPS

Laptops are often the hardest systems to get Plan 9 running on, because you can't choose the hardware piece by piece.

The following laptops are known to work in the current release:

The following laptops worked in previous releases and may work in the current one:

The following laptops are known not to work with Plan 9:

CARDBUS AND PCMCIA CONTROLLERS

The following cardbus controllers are supported:

  • Ricoh 476 PCI/Cardbus bridge
  • Ricoh 478 PCI/Cardbus bridge
  • TI PCI-1131 Cardbus controller
  • TI PCI-1250 Cardbus controller
  • TI PCI-1450 Cardbus controller
  • TI PCI-AC51 Cardbus controller

If the cardbus chipset is not supported, Plan 9 falls back to the PCMCIA driver, which handles the Intel i82365, Cirrus Logic CL-PD6710, Cirrus Logic CL-PD6720, Vadem VG-46x, and compatibles. This covers most laptops.

AUDIO

Supported audio devices:

  • Sound Blaster 16 or later, ISA card
  • ESS 1688 running in 8-bit SBPro mode
  • most USB audio devices
  • Intel 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) AC'97 Audio Controller (with code addition from http://kamalatta.ddnss.de/config/ac97k.tar

Supported but not as well tested:

  • Any Sound Blaster 16 clones (NOT Sound Blaster Pro clones)

USB audio devices that have been reported to work:

FLOPPY DISKS

Plan 9 supports generic floppy drives, although some people have had trouble accessing them. If you have trouble accessing your 3.5" floppy drive and also have a 5.25" floppy drive, try disabling the latter in the BIOS.

USB floppy drives are not supported.

MAGNETO-OPTICAL DISK JUKEBOXES

Virtually any modern SCSI jukebox will work. The key thing to look for (probably on the manufacturer's web site) is that the jukebox must implement the SCSI SMC (SCSI Media Changer) command set. Media (M-O disks) and jukeboxes can be had cheaply on ebay.com. We have had good experience with these models on Plan 9 file servers:

  • HP 330FX (choline)
  • HP 160FX (original emelie)
  • HP 1200EX (emelie)

We've had limited experience with these models (bought used), and they failed within a few months, one mechanically and the other electronically:

  • HP 40FX
  • HP 80EX

The 160FX and up seem to be built much more sturdily than the smaller jukeboxes, which are the size of large tower PCs.

MOTHERBOARDS

  • ASUS A8R32-MVP (onboard NIC not supported, use a PCI NIC instead)

THIN CLIENT (terminal/CPU/Auth-server)

  • IGEL LX 3210 (Via C3 Esther 400Mhz, 256MB RAM, network, graphics(VGA+DVI), usb, PS/2,) - Sound (Via AC97) doesn't work)
  • IGEL LX 4210 (Via C3 Esther 800Mhz, 128MB RAM, network, graphics(VGA), usb, PS/2,) - Sound (Via AC97) doesn't work)
  • HP Compaq T5000 (Via C3 Samuel 400Mhz - BIOS says Via Eden - , 128MB RAM, network vt6102, graphics(VGA), usb, PS/2) - Sound (Via AC97) doesn't work)
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