Qualcomm Hardware Support Increasingly In Good Shape On The Mainline Linux Kernel

[edwaleni]

I don't trust Qualcomm. They prefer to keep the rose garden pretty close to their vest.

Can anyone list any maker boards that use a Qualcomm SOC? Any that will use the Nuvia IP?

They embrace Windows/Linux for their OEM's because that is the only space they want to play in.

Broadcom came pretty dang close to upending them and it caused Centriq to die. (Now Broadcom is screwing up VMWare instead.)

Qualcomm wants to move from one IP protected space (cellular) and now move to one less threatened by Apple.

[wifi-developer]

Can anyone list any maker boards that use a Qualcomm SOC?

https://www.96boards.org/

[PCJohn]

The "work in progress" items don't jive with "generally great support" to me. USB-C power delivery, video acceleration, EC, camera, etc.

Sharing my personal experience (I am owner of ThinkPad X13s): Overall, very good state. Everything seemed to work after installing Ubuntu with KDE desktop. Even GPU acceleration. Even USB-C power delivery to feed the laptop with energy. Even dock with USB and HDMI ports worked. I did not test camera and HDMI audio. But build-in speakers work as expected.

I noticed just two problems: Bluetooth seems to not work on higher distances - I cannot walk my room and listen music from the laptop using bluetooth ear-buds. Probably power saving issue (?). And powering off lid-closed laptop does not switch it off. Seems some power management issue. Overall: I was surprised about maturity of the support while I look forward to have few minor issues resolved in the future.

[edwaleni]

https://www.96boards.org/

Thank you, yes these are maker boards for robotics.

They are made by Qualcomm themselves and don't expose all of the I/O available.

I am talking about a general purpose board with exposed I/O ports, slot etc.

I had signed up for Qualcomm's Linux Development Community and all I get is promo-emails about how great Qualcomm is.

Nothing on Linux development.

This is what I mean when they dance around the edge of the market, only making what suits them and fits in the garden.

Technically, you should boot any mainline ARM Linux on a Qualcomm CPU, no different than any RaspPi or an Ampere Altra.

But like a cell phone, they don't want you doing things unless they approve it first.