Libre Computer Board Launches Another Allwinner/Mali ARM SBC

[chimpy]

Maybe I should revisit the idea of hosting my home server on one of these instead. I used to own a Odroid C1, which served as a home server for a while. Really energy efficient solution. Though the needed software packages wheren't always up-to-date, available, or functioning. I would like to see a SBC for this price with 4gigs of Ram.

I was looking at one of these as a possible NAS for my home:

http://www.hardkernel.com/main/products/prdt_info.php?g_code=G150229074080

Plus it uses an octacore Samsung Exynos, so it has a bit of power 😊

[squash]

mali gpu, may as well have no gpu.

[pal666]

it is not drop-in rpi replacement and it has no "4k video" because it has no video at all. mali has no open driver

[pal666]

i don't understand what do they mean by "Initiatives to develop an open source driver never achieve the critical mass to provide resources to drive adoption by the community"
there are 3 open arm gpu drivers in mesa and none of them is mali

[Kendji]

I was looking at one of these as a possible NAS for my home:

http://www.hardkernel.com/main/products/prdt_info.php?g_code=G150229074080

Plus it uses an octacore Samsung Exynos, so it has a bit of power 😊

Yeah, the XU4 is their most powerful one. Though Udoo x86 could also be an option.

[caligula]

Better choice, if money is no issue: wandboard will come up with a SCB based on NXP i.MX8M-SoC in Q2 2018.

RPi zero competes with the cheapest board. $5 RPi Zero vs $9 + $10 libre board. RPi has full graphics acceleration and free software support, Allwinner does not.

[starshipeleven]

You forget that the other boards include incompatible extensions and useless improvements. Nobody needs more than 4 USB or SATA when USB-SATA bridges and mSATA shields exist.

USB-sata and USB-mSATA are still capped by the SINGLE usb controller onboard that piece of crap, which is running also ethernet among other things.

Only place Raspi is better is for open GPU driver, Allwinner chips have better features.

[mbello]

RPi3 is $35 and you get up and running with it in 5 min. Just choose a distro, touchscreen and camera if you want and you are ready to go.
With most other SBC, it is countless hours of fiddling to get it to work if your patience endures that long.

I have very few free hours in my life outside of work and family. It is either fully open source supported or I am not interested. Speed and features comes afterwards.

Other HUGE benefits of the RPi:
- Most online content for hobby projects target the Pi;
- Most hardware/sensor kits on AliExpress/dx.com/etc are for the RPi;
- The python libraries for the RPi are way superior to everything else;
- No other board has such nice integration with touchscreen and camera, both officially supported.

If you do not want a hobby board and just looking for a small computer than there are a few other options in the market. But in that case I would settle with Intel-based SBC like the UpBoard for the performance, value and oss support.

[Nille]

Allwinner chips have better features

And break the GPL.

[coder]

You forget that the other boards include incompatible extensions and useless improvements. Nobody needs more than 4 USB or SATA when USB-SATA bridges and mSATA shields exist. The mSATA shield actually advertises support for fast SSD drives, which boosts RPi performance nicely. Many use it as a NAS or router. Surprises me why no clone has exactly the same board layout, 100% compatible pins and runs the same Broadcom chips. Shouldn't be too hard.

Are you joking? Cuz it's not funny. The Pi sucks at I/O.

And no clones use the same SoC because what would be the point? It would just be the same only worse (because lower volume and fewer people to beta test it & fix problems). Plenty of clones have the same pinout, and I think a few are even mechanically compatible.