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I think the Raspberry PI is awesome, but it is a big pile of closed source processing units that no-one completely understands. For example it boots from the GP

by ozten 6y ago

I think the Raspberry PI is awesome, but it is a big pile of closed source processing units that no-one completely understands. For example it boots from the GPU, not the CPU. Wow... I would use an "open as possible" hardware platform like those from Bunnie https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?cat=28 https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?cat=28 for example. Novena Laptop https://www.crowdsupply.com/sutajio-kosagi/novena https://www.crowdsupply.com/sutajio-kosagi/novena

metahost 6y ago
> For example it boots from the GPU, not the CPU. Could you kindly point out a reference to this, I would love to read up on it.
- ozten 6y ago
  Not a definitive source, but https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/14862/why-does-the-raspberry-pis-gpu-control-the-first-stages-of-the-boot-process https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/14862/why-do...
  - georgeecollins 6y ago
    Based on this, it looks like Broadcom open sourced the drivers. Does that make the Raspberry Pi potentially secure?
    - jamesgeck0 6y ago
      No. If I understand correctly, we now know that the Raspberry Pi 3 can never be fully secured due to corners cut by Broadcom. https://github.com/christinaa/rpi-open-firmware/issues/37#issuecomment-388551489 https://github.com/christinaa/rpi-open-firmware/issues/37#is...
      - voltagex_ 6y ago
        I understand why they stopped working on the Pi, but I don't necessarily agree with the reasons. I've got several arm64 boards, and only one of them comes close to a "libre" boot. The Marvell Espressobin runs a fork of the Arm Trusted Firmware that diverged so far from mainline that after Marvell stopped working on it in 2018, it hasn't been touched, CVEs and all. The Pi actually has a chance of having a reimplemented bootloader and being used by a lot of people.
georgeecollins 6y ago
That Novena is cool. Thank you for that tip.

by ozten 6y ago

metahost 6y ago

> For example it boots from the GPU, not the CPU. Could you kindly point out a reference to this, I would love to read up on it.

ozten 6y ago
Not a definitive source, but https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/14862/why-does-the-raspberry-pis-gpu-control-the-first-stages-of-the-boot-process https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/14862/why-do...
- georgeecollins 6y ago
  Based on this, it looks like Broadcom open sourced the drivers. Does that make the Raspberry Pi potentially secure?
  - jamesgeck0 6y ago
    No. If I understand correctly, we now know that the Raspberry Pi 3 can never be fully secured due to corners cut by Broadcom. https://github.com/christinaa/rpi-open-firmware/issues/37#issuecomment-388551489 https://github.com/christinaa/rpi-open-firmware/issues/37#is...
    - voltagex_ 6y ago
      I understand why they stopped working on the Pi, but I don't necessarily agree with the reasons. I've got several arm64 boards, and only one of them comes close to a "libre" boot. The Marvell Espressobin runs a fork of the Arm Trusted Firmware that diverged so far from mainline that after Marvell stopped working on it in 2018, it hasn't been touched, CVEs and all. The Pi actually has a chance of having a reimplemented bootloader and being used by a lot of people.

georgeecollins 6y ago

That Novena is cool. Thank you for that tip.