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PandaBoard vs Beagleboard |
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CJE (11:05 10/11/2010)
Phlamethrower (11:50 10/11/2010)
CJE (14:52 10/11/2010)
CJE (16:55 10/11/2010)
trevj (19:44 10/11/2010)
trevj (16:22 10/11/2010)
hubersn (19:37 10/11/2010)
Phlamethrower (20:02 10/11/2010)
trevj (13:26 29/12/2010)
JohnB (20:17 10/11/2010)
microbits (22:31 10/11/2010)
microbits (22:34 10/11/2010)
trevj (06:01 11/11/2010)
flibble (13:26 11/11/2010)
nunfetishist (14:00 11/11/2010)
trevj (14:25 11/11/2010)
flibble (15:48 11/11/2010)
trevj (10:06 12/11/2010)
trevj (08:39 24/11/2010)
Stoppers (11:16 25/11/2010)
Phlamethrower (11:52 25/11/2010)
trevj (01:38 15/1/2011)
trevj (08:53 15/2/2011)
Acornut (08:54 17/2/2011)
CJE (09:46 12/11/2010)
trevj (10:01 12/11/2010)
JohnB (20:16 3/12/2010)
trevj (14:55 10/12/2010)
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Chris Evans |
Message #115842, posted by CJE at 11:05, 10/11/2010 |
CJE Micros chap
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Anyone done a comparison regarding a RISC OS port suitability between the PandaBoard & Beagleboard?
At a quick glance:
PandaBoard is omap4430 cortex a9 dual core, 1GB
BeagleBoard is omap3530 cortex a8 single core, 512MB
http://pandaboard.org/content/resources/references
Now if someone did a similar board but also added a PCI Express socket on one dedicated side and two SATA ports and you could build an almost full desktop PC. One or two SODIMM sockets would also be nice.
I'm not talking about a full motherboard, but something in between the BB/PB & a full one.
I'm sure it will come in time. Someone might even retail a complete RISC OS Desktop Computer based on one!
[Edited by CJE at 11:07, 10/11/2010] |
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Jeffrey Lee |
Message #115843, posted by Phlamethrower at 11:50, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115842 |
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Anyone done a comparison regarding a RISC OS port suitability between the PandaBoard & Beagleboard? Well since RISC OS already runs on the Beagleboard, I'd say that it's a suitable machine for a port 
The Pandaboard (assuming you're interested in using more than one core) is a whole different kettle of fish, and would require considerable effort to reach a stage where RISC OS running on a Pandaboard would deliver more performance than RISC OS running on a Beagleboard.
I've heard many wonderful things about how CJE always have everything in stock - do you perchance also have 5 or so experienced C & ARM programmers in stock?
Now if someone did a similar board but also added a PCI Express socket on one dedicated side and two SATA ports and you could build an almost full desktop PC. One or two SODIMM sockets would also be nice.
I'm not talking about a full motherboard, but something in between the BB/PB & a full one. It's not quite what your after, but sticking in OMAP land there's also the Hawkboard, which does have SATA, but a much weaker ARM core than the beagleboard (but a stronger DSP instead).
Of course there are plenty of other SoCs out there that are suitable for a RISC OS port, some of which do feature SATA and PCIe. But finding people who have enough time, skill and interest to spearhead a port is a different matter  |
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Chris Evans |
Message #115844, posted by CJE at 14:52, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115843 |
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Anyone done a comparison regarding a RISC OS port suitability between the PandaBoard & Beagleboard? Well since RISC OS already runs on the Beagleboard, I'd say that it's a suitable machine for a port
And very thankful we are to you for it!
The Pandaboard (assuming you're interested in using more than one core) is a whole different kettle of fish, and would require considerable effort to reach a stage where RISC OS running on a Pandaboard would deliver more performance than RISC OS running on a Beagleboard.
Multicore support would have to be a separate long term project
I've heard many wonderful things about how CJE always have everything in stock - do you perchance also have 5 or so experienced C & ARM programmers in stock?
 If only!
Now if someone did a similar board but also added a PCI Express socket on one dedicated side and two SATA ports and you could build an almost full desktop PC. One or two SODIMM sockets would also be nice.
I'm not talking about a full motherboard, but something in between the BB/PB & a full one. It's not quite what your after, but sticking in OMAP land there's also the Hawkboard, which does have SATA, but a much weaker ARM core than the beagleboard (but a stronger DSP instead).
Of course there are plenty of other SoCs out there that are suitable for a RISC OS port, some of which do feature SATA and PCIe. But finding people who have enough time, skill and interest to spearhead a port is a different matter
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #115845, posted by trevj at 16:22, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115842 |
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It's also worth noting that the Pandaboard is subsidised by Texas Instruments. Therefore, any product relying on incorporating this board itself would be a risky venture. In the longer term, there do seem to be indications that we'll see more netbooks/mobile computers using Cortex-A8 and on to Cortex-A15. Whether there's a market for a desktop machine based on this technology is another matter. I think there are currently just two suitable candidates: the Genesi Efika MX and the HP t5325. Of course, these devices will require extensive development work in order to produce a polished port (as Jeffrey states, from first hand experience).
Aside from mobile solutions like the Touch Book, while there remains a supply of BeagleBoards, this offers a reasonable upgrade path for existing users. It's also an opportunity to try to attract non-RISC OS users to the platform. When the BeagleBoard supply dries up as people move on to newer devices, we'll be left with the open source design but no fabrication supply chain in place. If beagleboard.org are clever with their supply predictions, I doubt there'll be any excess stock to be sold at discounted prices, after the decision is taken to stop fabrication. (As you may already know, the minimum order for resellers is 250 units, so this is also risky for a 'RISC OS-exclusive' marketplace.)
Regarding a new "complete RISC OS Desktop Computer", this would of course be wonderful. Such a design could possibly use a Touch Book motherboard (which will apparently be available on its own) if this would be cheaper/more suitable than the BeagleBoard. As an alternative to a purely commercial venture, the RISC OS market could perhaps discuss the design and fabrication of its own computer, based on the open source hardware designs available. To see whether this is viable, I think it'd be useful to make contact with beagleboard.org and the board fabrication plant, to enquire about prices and quantities for:- an exact BeagleBoard clone (as previously commissioned and sold by EBV Elektronik)
- a design with some simple amendments, e.g. increased board size, with all ports brought to just one or two edges
a design with further amendments, e.g. including the sockets/ports you mention (although I understand that the memory on the BeagleBoard sits directly on top of the OMAP, so don't know about the feasibility of including SODIMMs)
Edit: And now we learn that there's a desktop computer being worked on!
[Edited by trevj at 16:35, 10/11/2010] |
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Chris Evans |
Message #115846, posted by CJE at 16:55, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115844 |
CJE Micros chap
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I now see that the PandaBoard has been discussed at some length over on the RISCOSOpen site
http://www.riscosopen.org/forum/forums/1/topics/476
Which I now realise I should have checked before making my posting! |
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Steffen Huber |
Message #115848, posted by hubersn at 19:37, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115842 |
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I think the PandaBoard is not really - for RISC OS usage - a big step forward from the BeagleBoard. As Jeffrey said, properly supporting multicore is a long way (or even forever?) off.
TI have recently announced a SoC called C6A816x - this would IMHO be a great base for a next generation RISC OS machine - S-ATA, PCIex, DDR3 RAM interface, up to 1.5 GHz, dual head graphics support up to 1920x1280, Gigabit Ethernet.
There is already a TI DevBoard available, but selling at 1900 US$ might be a bit expensive for your average RISC OS user... |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #115849, posted by trevj at 19:44, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115846 |
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...discussed at some length... I should have checked... No one's ever done something like that before! No, never! |
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Jeffrey Lee |
Message #115851, posted by Phlamethrower at 20:02, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115848 |
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TI have recently announced a SoC called C6A816x - this would IMHO be a great base for a next generation RISC OS machine - S-ATA, PCIex, DDR3 RAM interface, up to 1.5 GHz, dual head graphics support up to 1920x1280, Gigabit Ethernet. Well spotted - that sounds like a good target to aim for. |
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John Albert Bullen |
Message #115852, posted by JohnB at 20:17, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115842 |
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I'm sure it will come in time. Someone might even retail a complete RISC OS Desktop Computer based on one!
[Edited by CJE at 11:07, 10/11/2010]
A4com are already working on a Beagleboard package at the moment - go to http://home.arcor.de/raik_fischer/ and click Bilder. |
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rob andrews |
Message #115853, posted by microbits at 22:31, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115852 |
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There is also a design by Nufront that would make the ideal machine has anyone seen this on yet
http://www.desktopreview.com/default.asp?newsID=1218 |
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rob andrews |
Message #115854, posted by microbits at 22:34, 10/11/2010, in reply to message #115853 |
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checkout the video on utube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gfs5ujSw1Q |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #115856, posted by trevj at 06:01, 11/11/2010, in reply to message #115854 |
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checkout the video on utube I think the guy's got it right when he says, "This is going to be a game changer." |
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Peter Howkins |
Message #115857, posted by flibble at 13:26, 11/11/2010, in reply to message #115856 |
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I think the guy's got it right when he says, "This is going to be a game changer." It's got potential when it's shipping ...
I found a great comment made by a bloke on The Register when talking about ARM chip releases that I think bares quoting here,
"What we really need is... #
Posted Tuesday 9th November 2010 16:41 GMT
1) Some motherboards sporting this or similar chips
2) Those motherboards to be in *TX (ideally mini-ITX or micro-ATX) format so that we can use standard chassies
3) Those motherboards to have DIMM sockets for memory rather than have the memory soldered on so that we can use cheaply available memory in them rather than be stuck with whatever the manufacturer decides to do
4) Most importantly, we need such motherboards to be available in single-figure quantities at prices at least in the similar ball-park to comparable Atom boards", Gordon.
The board in the video linked seems to hit 1), 2) and 3) but from the discussion it sounds like it's a reference design for netbooks/nettops/tablets rather than a shipping motherboard in bulk.
To give you some idea about 4), an Atom board is really not an expensive thing, link. |
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Rob Kendrick |
Message #115858, posted by nunfetishist at 14:00, 11/11/2010, in reply to message #115857 |
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The issue with the RAM is that hardly any SoCs accept memory that's compatible with SO-DIMMs that either exist, or are now cheaply available. |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #115859, posted by trevj at 14:25, 11/11/2010, in reply to message #115857 |
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...I found a great comment made by a bloke on The Register when talking about ARM chip releases... Thanks... and I found the article itself, in case anyone fancies a read.
To give you some idea about 4), an Atom board is really not an expensive thing, link. Being relatively ignorant in these matters, who designs such Atom boards? Are they reference designs? Couldn't some ARM Connected Community Partner companies be collaboratively designing equivalent boards? ...or perhaps they already are... and I also wonder if this was discussed by Linaro members at the recent Ubuntu Developer Summit... |
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Peter Howkins |
Message #115860, posted by flibble at 15:48, 11/11/2010, in reply to message #115859 |
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To give you some idea about 4), an Atom board is really not an expensive thing, link. Being relatively ignorant in these matters, who designs such Atom boards?
Intel, Asus, Asrock, Zotac, Gigabyte. Common motherboard manufacturers of PC boards.
The Psuedo-Phoebe you saw at the London show had a Gigabyte Atom board in.
Are they reference designs? No, they're production boards and in full production and sale to the public (in units of 1+).
Just for fun, here's a link to an actual Intel reference design for the older atom chip N270 from 2008 that ended up in 101 netbooks designs. Incidentally Intel are sane and even the reference designs for their stuff fits *TX.
Couldn't some ARM Connected Community Partner companies be collaboratively designing equivalent boards? Sure they can design them, but the point is, "let me know where I can buy them". Given the huge number of ARM licenses and the alleged cheapness of ARM cores you'd expect at least one company to be trying to sell something along these lines to people. And yet the closest you can get is the beagleboard/xm/igep/pandaboard etc, which have stupid format motherboards with connectors slapped on every edge and therefore expensive custom cases
Actually, thinking about it, the Iyonix is a nice sane micro-ATX board, and Simtec do an ARM9 based Mini-ITX. Of course both are at laughable prices and now quite quite old So yeah, an update of them and at 50 quid a pop, then I'd think that ARM (and/or it's licenses) were actually competing in the desktop market.
[Edited by flibble at 15:49, 11/11/2010] |
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Chris Evans |
Message #115864, posted by CJE at 09:46, 12/11/2010, in reply to message #115852 |
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A4com are already working on a Beagleboard package at the moment - go to http://home.arcor.de/raik_fischer/ and click Bilder.
That link is broken:-( |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #115865, posted by trevj at 10:01, 12/11/2010, in reply to message #115864 |
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That link is broken:-( Seems OK here (noframes). |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #115866, posted by trevj at 10:06, 12/11/2010, in reply to message #115853 |
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There is also a design by Nufront that would make the ideal machine has anyone seen this on yet
http://www.desktopreview.com/default.asp?newsID=1218 And this thinq.co.uk article even mentions the RISC-PC (sic). |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #115917, posted by trevj at 08:39, 24/11/2010, in reply to message #115853 |
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Here's the NuSmart 2816 spec. |
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Simon Willcocks |
Message #115918, posted by Stoppers at 11:16, 25/11/2010, in reply to message #115917 |
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Here's the NuSmart 2816 spec. Yay! Integrated DRM!
"TrustZone security management"
http://www.arm.com/products/processors/technologies/trustzone.php
Does anyone know if this can this just be ignored? |
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Jeffrey Lee |
Message #115919, posted by Phlamethrower at 11:52, 25/11/2010, in reply to message #115918 |
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Does anyone know if this can this just be ignored? Depends on how the hardware is set up, and what operating system you're planning on using.
I don't know much about TrustZone, but I believe it just uses the new (ish) concept of the processor being in either a "secure state" or "nonsecure state". The SMC instruction allows nonsecure code to make system calls to the secure world. The secure world has its own page tables, so all the secure code/data can be fully seperated from the nonsecure world.
The fact that the secure/nonsecure flag is exposed on the memory bus means that hardware peripherals can refuse to respond to any requests except those that come from secure mode programs - so depending on the setup they've used you might find that using secure mode is unavoidable.
I think secure mode offers all the same features as nonsecure mode, so in theory an OS could just switch into secure mode and stay there for all eternity, thus providing full access to any secured hardware. However in order to run arbitrary secure-mode code in the first place, it would need the cooperation of the initial SMC handler. E.g. it might be that NuFront's SMC handler will only allow upload of code that's been digitally signed by some algorithm, and if they are marketing the NuSmart as a secure system then I doubt they're going to give out the signing algorithm to just anyone. |
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John Albert Bullen |
Message #115986, posted by JohnB at 20:16, 3/12/2010, in reply to message #115842 |
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http://www.a4com.de/riscos/ac_hw-preise.htm A4com have released a commercial RISC OS system based around the Beagleboard priced from 390E |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #116042, posted by trevj at 14:55, 10/12/2010, in reply to message #115842 |
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Just for the record, beagleboard.org wanted to produce a revised board with the newer OMAP4 chip... but the internal TI group refused. The following is from the LinkedIn group 'BeagleBoard.org' discussion 'Any plans for a new Beagleboard with OMAP4440 chip?':
Any plans for a new Beagleboard with OMAP4440 chip? Is the PandaBoard close enough? (OMAP4430)
http://www.omappedia.com/wiki/PandaBoard
And what about an economy version of the original Beagleboard? What is the lowest cost Cortex A8 processor? OMAP3505? And how much would be the saving?
(Gerald Coley) The short answer is no. The longer answer is that we tried to do one early this year, but he group inside TI that owns the device refused to let us do it. Instead they did their own board.
So politics are alive and kicking outside the RISC OS community too! (And no answer yet to the "economy version" question...) |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #116107, posted by trevj at 13:26, 29/12/2010, in reply to message #115851 |
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...SoC called C6A816x... Well spotted - that sounds like a good target to aim for.
...There is already a TI DevBoard available, but selling at 1900 US$ might be a bit expensive for your average RISC OS user...
The good news is that they're also planning a cheaper development board (this info should already have been published some time ago in Archive, but as we're still waiting for it to pop through our letter boxes, here you go). |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #116217, posted by trevj at 01:38, 15/1/2011, in reply to message #115853 |
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There's an article about Nufront laptops linked to from Liam Proven's c.s.a.misc "New ARM laptops" thread. We've already seen the first video but the laptop in the second one is promising... if only RISC OS can be persuaded to work on the Cortex-A9 (even single core). |
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Trevor Johnson |
Message #116626, posted by trevj at 08:53, 15/2/2011, in reply to message #116217 |
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Regarding the C6A8x, I received the following by email:
Thank you for your enquiry. Although the processing modules below have been
announced, I am still waiting for final prices from Z3. I am expecting them to be
around £400 each for 100 off.
We can however offer and quote for development (starter) kits and details of the
Z3-DM8168-RPS are attached. This costs £4000. Please let me know if you want a
formal quote. I have been told:
The AM389x, C6A8x Starter Kit's[sic] are the same as DM8168 Starter Kit and they
will become one part number Z3-DM8168-RPS. Form your own judgments on the price!
Meanwhile, TI have updated a couple of their forum replies: [1], [2]. |
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Blind Moose |
Message #116635, posted by Acornut at 08:54, 17/2/2011, in reply to message #116626 |
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Erroneous entry 
[Edited by Acornut at 08:58, 17/2/2011] |
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