It Looks Like Raptor Is Gearing Up To Release A New Open-Source POWER System

[jacob]

Timothy from Raptor here. While many of the details of this new system will be kept under wraps until the reveal at the OpenPOWER Summit in October, I'll try to answer some of the more generic questions below. Also note that this new machine is designed to accept the low-end Sforza parts, if you want more than 4-8 cores you should look at the Talos II / Talos II Lite systems available now.



Actually, we ship full schematics of the product along with every machine / mainboard sold. This is one of our core offerings and is not going anywhere, the new design is no different from an open perspective.



IBM's TDP numbers are a maximum possible power consumption, not an average that can be exceeded like Intel, AMD, and ARM. All I'm permitted to say at this point is that the new design may be interesting from your perspective.



Not for this particular system, but your request will very likely be handled by something that is already on our internal roadmap.



Everything from the schematics through the low level firmware to the kernel itself. These machines require no binary blobs whatsoever to operate.

If you're curious, we have a large Wiki full of documentation at https://wiki.raptorcs.com. In particular, take a look at the Documentation category at https://wiki.raptorcs.com/wiki/Categoryocumentation : you can download a copy of the processor datasheet, look through over 6,000 pages of register documentation, pull source from https://git.raptorcs.com -- these machines are literally more open than the current SiFive development boards and the Lite is at a similar price point. What's not to like?

Thank you for the information! This definitely sounds like an interesting product.

[microcode]

It's not "open hardware" in a strict sense. I don't think they have board and CPU schematics.

With neither of those things, it's not really "open hardware" in a loose sense. Nothing about the hardware is open. Now, it's great that the firmware is open and user-replaceable, but that's not hardware.

[coder]

This is really tempting. The "lite" system had enough compromises that it wasn't hard to tell myself "no", but this iteration is sounding really interesting.

[madscientist159]

With neither of those things, it's not really "open hardware" in a loose sense. Nothing about the hardware is open. Now, it's great that the firmware is open and user-replaceable, but that's not hardware.

As I mentioned above we do provide schematics, etc. with the hardware. Not sure where the rumor that we don't got started, but providing full schematics is something we have done from day 1.

[vegabook]

Isn't POWER is in a pickle now that Globalfoundries has abandoned its 7nm node?

[starshipeleven]

With neither of those things, it's not really "open hardware" in a loose sense. Nothing about the hardware is open. Now, it's great that the firmware is open and user-replaceable, but that's not hardware.

"open hardware" can be used in a loose sense for hardware that is way too complex for most people to study and manufacture, which has full hardware manuals and open firmware (or no firmware at all).

I mean, most ICs or even passive components used in open hardware designs aren't themselves open hardware.

[freespirit]

madscientist159
i have some questions on this new product i hope you could reply
a) will this product be an atx/microatx/miniitx?
b) do we have the option to buy just the motherboard + cpu + ram because for people outside USA your product are more expensive because of taxes
c) the cpu do have an integrated video card or do we need an external one?
d) will be capable to handle virtual machine with virtualization technology and or iommu?
e) what about spectre meltdown and foreshadow do they are mitigated at hardware level or software mitigation are needed
f) is possible to use a custom fan or heatsink for the cpu?
g) ethernet and sata chipset do still need firmware blobs to run or do you freed them?

[curaga]

If it has more PCI-e slots (or even PCI so I don't need a PCIe-to-PCI bridge) and less cost, definitely interested in an 8-core model. ^ On the hsf, when I looked at the Lite board, the only option was IBM's, which was quite expensive compared to modern Epyc/Xeon coolers, but there probably aren't any third parties making those. @Raptor: Commenting on the VAT situation, at least for small companies here in the north, they order from the US like individuals, pay VAT to customs, then claim the VAT back from the kind tax man. Only for very large companies have I heard about orders coming directly without VAT changing hands temporarily.

[WolfpackN64]

As someone who used a lot of PowerPC Mac's (and someone who values his pricavy), the work you guys at Raptor do is awesome. Only problem is that QEMU User Mode looks difficult to set up and I have no idea how it would deal with clients, like Steam, that install more programs, all x86 binaries. If this were easy enough to set up, I would seriously consider an affordable-ish POWER9 system.

[s_j_newbury]

As someone who used a lot of PowerPC Mac's (and someone who values his pricavy), the work you guys at Raptor do is awesome. Only problem is that QEMU User Mode looks difficult to set up and I have no idea how it would deal with clients, like Steam, that install more programs, all x86 binaries. If this were easy enough to set up, I would seriously consider an affordable-ish POWER9 system.

QEMU isn't difficult at all, and there is libvirt to make it even easier. Mind you, if you want to run x86 binaries (ie proprietary games) you really need an x86 CPU. QEMU emulation is excellent, but you only get near metal performance through hardware virtualisation - which means your virtualised hardware is the same architecture as your actual hardware. Emulating x86 on POWER would probably be acceptable for compatibility with the odd legacy application, but totally inadequate for AAA gaming. On the other hand, if POWER actually starts to become popular with Linux users, maybe Valve will begin to compile their binaries for POWER and really make things interesting...