7 ms·

Any promising riscv64 computers on the market I should know about? Raspberry pi level or otherwise? What computers could I use this distro on?

snvzz 3y ago
I would look at JH7110, released earlier this year, used in VisionFive 2, Star64, as well as PineTab-V, and with an excellent official effort towards upstreaming software support[0]. I own a VisionFive 2 and can recommend it. There's also the TH1520, a newer chip that's a bit faster and has pre-spec V extension. This is available in the Sipeed Lichee Pi4A, but the support for this chip is very green still. CPU-wise, JH7110 performs between rpi3 and rpi4. TH1520 is faster than rpi4. Else (GPU, I/O, cryptographic acceleration, hardware video codec acceleration and other peripherals), they are both significantly faster than rpi4. 0. https://rvspace.org/en/project/JH7110_Upstream_Plan https://rvspace.org/en/project/JH7110_Upstream_Plan
- FullyFunctional 3y ago
  TH1520 is definitely not faster than a RPi4, not for normal programs compiled with normal compilers or binaries that will come from your distribution. And no, Bruce, vendor benchmarkering doesn't count. ADD: TH1520 is about twice as fast as JH7110, but as best I can tell, StarFive (JH7110) is more proactive about upstreaming support.
  - snvzz 3y ago
    A quick search in Linux git head for "th1520" returned some results. It must mean there is ongoing work. I hope they set up a webpage to track what's going on with upstreaming efforts, similar to JH7110 has. Notably, boards with TH1520 are just starting to ship, whereas boards with JH7110 were shipping in volume in February.
- ekianjo 3y ago
  > CPU-wise, JH7110 performs between rpi3 and rpi4. TH1520 is faster than rpi4. In reality closer to a rpi3 > Else (GPU, I/O, cryptographic acceleration, hardware video codec acceleration and other peripherals), they are both significantly faster than rpi4. if you can the GPU working, right now on Vision2 it's only usable in very few applications
  - snvzz 3y ago
    >In reality closer to a rpi3 Not true even with generic rv64gc code[0]. 0. https://cdn.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Dhrystone-CoreMarks-TH1520-RISC-V-vs-Raspberry-Pi.png https://cdn.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Dhry...
knelmatek 3y ago
[flagged]
MobiusHorizons 3y ago
Anything based on the rk3588 like the radxa rock 5b. Just be careful to note the distinction between the rk3588 variants, as some have pcie 3 and some only have pcie2.
- ac29 3y ago
  RK3588 is an ARM chip
  - Tepix 3y ago
    Right. If you want Rockchip, look for the RK628E (RISC-V), the RV1129 or the RV1126 (both ARM and RISC-V)
retrocryptid 3y ago
I just got a Beagle-V. With luck I'll have time to put the latest Debian on it.
- m_z_s 3y ago
  I think that the TH1520 in the Beagle-V and Lichee Pi 4A only has support for 5.10 kernel (curently) at least for access to most of the features of the SoC. If you do not mind loosing access to most features of the SoC, then you can run any kernel. An example what you would loose access to with any other kernel would be GUI support, and the ability for the VPU to encode/decode video. But there are many many more (For now, hopefully they will upstream support). Plug "site:lore.kernel.org TH1520" into your search engine of choice to see what hardware is in the process of being upstreamed to the bleeding edge Linux kernel-next. Which is probably about a year away from being in a longterm suported Linux kernel. ref: https://github.com/ThomasKaiser/sbc-bench/blob/master/Results.md https://github.com/ThomasKaiser/sbc-bench/blob/master/Result...
Tepix 3y ago
I'm wondering about this as well. In particular, are there any with RAM slots instead of soldered RAM?
- pabs3 3y ago
  https://milkv.io/pioneer https://milkv.io/pioneer
camel-cdr 3y ago
https://milkv.io/pioneer https://milkv.io/pioneer seems to be the most powerful rn, but I'd only recommend it for developers who are working on getting things like gpu drivers ported. For most development smaller SBCs are enough, and I'd recommend waiting for RVA22/23 profile supporting hardware before spending a lot of money, because most current chips use the non standard vector isa and don't support all profile extensions, because they where created before everything was ratified. Here is a list of risc-v SBCs: http://krimsky.net/articles/riscvsbc.html http://krimsky.net/articles/riscvsbc.html
- snvzz 3y ago
  Current chips largely implement what we retroactively call RVA20: RV64GC. This was ratified in 2019 and unmodified since 2017. The next batch we are aware of (Ventana Veyron, Tenstorrent Ascalon, SiFive P470/P670/U84, XuanTie C908) implement RVA22+V. The extensions included were largely ratified in December 2021.
  - camel-cdr 3y ago
    Do you know if Ventana Veyron and Tenstorrent Ascalon will be available to regular consumers? I mentally lumped them in with andes from which I haven't seen any vector cores available anywhere, even though they "released" them a long time ago.
    - snvzz 3y ago
      Ventana announced last year they'd have server boards late current year. Tenstorrent Ascalon's TBA 2024, but it is a chiplet. We do not know in which form it'll be available in. I am hopeful there'll be development boards.
ur-whale 3y ago
I have a starfive visionfive V2 [1] board at home to play with riscv. Can be had fairly quickly from Aliexpress for ~ 100 bucks. Very similar in nature to a raspi, but still a bit rough around the edges: - getting debian up an running is not yet straightforward - this is not exactly a speed demon (it's actually dog slow compared to an rpi 4) - some feature aren't in the kernel yet (eg some USB devices don't work) - support for HDMI is still clunky - [EDIT]: one very nice thing, it has an NVME port and you can choose (via dip switches) to boot from either of NVME, Flash, EMMC or UART (see page 46 of [2]) Mine boots from NVME and it's really sweet, it's one major mission feature for the rpi family. BUT: it's a very usable computer, and great if you want to play with RISCV assembly on actual metal (outside of a qemu box, that is). [1] https://www.starfivetech.com/en/site/boards https://www.starfivetech.com/en/site/boards [2] https://doc-en.rvspace.org/VisionFive2/PDF/VisionFive2_QSG.pdf https://doc-en.rvspace.org/VisionFive2/PDF/VisionFive2_QSG.p...
irusensei 3y ago
Yes there are some SBCs around if you want to experiment. Pine has one line of boards now. I'm hoping for desktop grade stuff instead. I don't mind if the CPU is soldered but it would be nice to have memory and pci-e expansion slots. Something to match the POWER Raptor machines as open source but not as expensive.

snvzz 3y ago

I would look at JH7110, released earlier this year, used in VisionFive 2, Star64, as well as PineTab-V, and with an excellent official effort towards upstreaming software support[0]. I own a VisionFive 2 and can recommend it. There's also the TH1520, a newer chip that's a bit faster and has pre-spec V extension. This is available in the Sipeed Lichee Pi4A, but the support for this chip is very green still. CPU-wise, JH7110 performs between rpi3 and rpi4. TH1520 is faster than rpi4. Else (GPU, I/O, cryptographic acceleration, hardware video codec acceleration and other peripherals), they are both significantly faster than rpi4. 0. https://rvspace.org/en/project/JH7110_Upstream_Plan https://rvspace.org/en/project/JH7110_Upstream_Plan

FullyFunctional 3y ago
TH1520 is definitely not faster than a RPi4, not for normal programs compiled with normal compilers or binaries that will come from your distribution. And no, Bruce, vendor benchmarkering doesn't count. ADD: TH1520 is about twice as fast as JH7110, but as best I can tell, StarFive (JH7110) is more proactive about upstreaming support.
- snvzz 3y ago
  A quick search in Linux git head for "th1520" returned some results. It must mean there is ongoing work. I hope they set up a webpage to track what's going on with upstreaming efforts, similar to JH7110 has. Notably, boards with TH1520 are just starting to ship, whereas boards with JH7110 were shipping in volume in February.
ekianjo 3y ago
> CPU-wise, JH7110 performs between rpi3 and rpi4. TH1520 is faster than rpi4. In reality closer to a rpi3 > Else (GPU, I/O, cryptographic acceleration, hardware video codec acceleration and other peripherals), they are both significantly faster than rpi4. if you can the GPU working, right now on Vision2 it's only usable in very few applications
- snvzz 3y ago
  >In reality closer to a rpi3 Not true even with generic rv64gc code[0]. 0. https://cdn.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Dhrystone-CoreMarks-TH1520-RISC-V-vs-Raspberry-Pi.png https://cdn.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Dhry...

knelmatek 3y ago

[flagged]

MobiusHorizons 3y ago

Anything based on the rk3588 like the radxa rock 5b. Just be careful to note the distinction between the rk3588 variants, as some have pcie 3 and some only have pcie2.

ac29 3y ago
RK3588 is an ARM chip
- Tepix 3y ago
  Right. If you want Rockchip, look for the RK628E (RISC-V), the RV1129 or the RV1126 (both ARM and RISC-V)

retrocryptid 3y ago

I just got a Beagle-V. With luck I'll have time to put the latest Debian on it.

m_z_s 3y ago
I think that the TH1520 in the Beagle-V and Lichee Pi 4A only has support for 5.10 kernel (curently) at least for access to most of the features of the SoC. If you do not mind loosing access to most features of the SoC, then you can run any kernel. An example what you would loose access to with any other kernel would be GUI support, and the ability for the VPU to encode/decode video. But there are many many more (For now, hopefully they will upstream support). Plug "site:lore.kernel.org TH1520" into your search engine of choice to see what hardware is in the process of being upstreamed to the bleeding edge Linux kernel-next. Which is probably about a year away from being in a longterm suported Linux kernel. ref: https://github.com/ThomasKaiser/sbc-bench/blob/master/Results.md https://github.com/ThomasKaiser/sbc-bench/blob/master/Result...

Tepix 3y ago

I'm wondering about this as well. In particular, are there any with RAM slots instead of soldered RAM?

pabs3 3y ago
https://milkv.io/pioneer https://milkv.io/pioneer

camel-cdr 3y ago

https://milkv.io/pioneer https://milkv.io/pioneer seems to be the most powerful rn, but I'd only recommend it for developers who are working on getting things like gpu drivers ported. For most development smaller SBCs are enough, and I'd recommend waiting for RVA22/23 profile supporting hardware before spending a lot of money, because most current chips use the non standard vector isa and don't support all profile extensions, because they where created before everything was ratified. Here is a list of risc-v SBCs: http://krimsky.net/articles/riscvsbc.html http://krimsky.net/articles/riscvsbc.html

snvzz 3y ago
Current chips largely implement what we retroactively call RVA20: RV64GC. This was ratified in 2019 and unmodified since 2017. The next batch we are aware of (Ventana Veyron, Tenstorrent Ascalon, SiFive P470/P670/U84, XuanTie C908) implement RVA22+V. The extensions included were largely ratified in December 2021.
- camel-cdr 3y ago
  Do you know if Ventana Veyron and Tenstorrent Ascalon will be available to regular consumers? I mentally lumped them in with andes from which I haven't seen any vector cores available anywhere, even though they "released" them a long time ago.
  - snvzz 3y ago
    Ventana announced last year they'd have server boards late current year. Tenstorrent Ascalon's TBA 2024, but it is a chiplet. We do not know in which form it'll be available in. I am hopeful there'll be development boards.

ur-whale 3y ago

I have a starfive visionfive V2 [1] board at home to play with riscv. Can be had fairly quickly from Aliexpress for ~ 100 bucks. Very similar in nature to a raspi, but still a bit rough around the edges: - getting debian up an running is not yet straightforward - this is not exactly a speed demon (it's actually dog slow compared to an rpi 4) - some feature aren't in the kernel yet (eg some USB devices don't work) - support for HDMI is still clunky - [EDIT]: one very nice thing, it has an NVME port and you can choose (via dip switches) to boot from either of NVME, Flash, EMMC or UART (see page 46 of [2]) Mine boots from NVME and it's really sweet, it's one major mission feature for the rpi family. BUT: it's a very usable computer, and great if you want to play with RISCV assembly on actual metal (outside of a qemu box, that is). [1] https://www.starfivetech.com/en/site/boards https://www.starfivetech.com/en/site/boards [2] https://doc-en.rvspace.org/VisionFive2/PDF/VisionFive2_QSG.pdf https://doc-en.rvspace.org/VisionFive2/PDF/VisionFive2_QSG.p...

irusensei 3y ago

Yes there are some SBCs around if you want to experiment. Pine has one line of boards now. I'm hoping for desktop grade stuff instead. I don't mind if the CPU is soldered but it would be nice to have memory and pci-e expansion slots. Something to match the POWER Raptor machines as open source but not as expensive.