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Jeff powered up the board, no HDMI output. Same vendor, same SoC (Milk-V Mars) OS image: same result. Support forum: non-existant. Finally he got if working ove

Jeff powered up the board, no HDMI output. Same vendor, same SoC (Milk-V Mars) OS image: same result. Support forum: non-existant. Finally he got if working over a serial connection - with tweaks. Sorry... I'm kinda RISC-V fanboy, but this is no way to launch a product. To put it bluntly: Milk-V, this CM as-is is useless. Get the docs, OS images, default configurations, quick start guides, user forum etc sorted out. Then launch product.

snvzz 3y ago
>Jeff powered up the board, no HDMI output. >(..) this is no way to launch a product. I disagree. This is a Compute Module, not a SBC. If you can't even connect an UART to get it up and running, then you're not the target audience. Hell, if you expect HDMI output from a CM out of factory, you definitely are not the target audience. Get a SBC next time. >Get the docs, OS images, default configurations, quick start guides, user forum etc sorted out. Then launch product. Agree. Minus the user forum part, as trying to capture the community into a forum that you control is entirely optional. (and any effort used maintaining a forum could be put elsewhere, such as customer support or improving documentation)
- geerlingguy 3y ago
  Raspberry Pi really reset expectations there, though—even when I had access to their alpha version of the CM4, it was booting with a full GUI, all interfaces working, and there were just a few tweaks to IO interfaces they needed to make for better speed and stability. With many non-Pi boards, bringup via UART is typical, but the vast majority of SBC users wouldn't know what to do if you tossed them a USB to UART adapter.
  - snvzz 3y ago
    >Raspberry Pi really reset expectations there, though—even when I had access to their alpha version of the CM4, it was booting with a full GUI, all interfaces working, and there were just a few tweaks to IO interfaces they needed to make for better speed and stability. I understand these use same software throughout, and they make both the Pi and the CM board version, so you'd get the same results. Conversely, both Mars CM and Mars seem to be under the same china-style "we shipped it but it barely boots" confusion :/ But it shouldn't take long to sort out. VisionFive 2 uses the same SoC after all, and the experience got to a pretty good point on that SBC (I own one). >the vast majority of SBC users wouldn't know what to do if you tossed them a USB to UART adapter. Pi specifically. Other ARM SBCs use u-boot. There documentation helps. VisionFive 2 has such documentation in place. Rpi is unique in that it uses a bespoke boot process that doesn't even present an UART prompt on its bootloader. So the only way to get anywhere is with a ready-to-use sd image (AFAIK they now do USB too). It can fortunately be brought back into sanity by setting up an alternative (and less supported, although definitely better and less bespoke) u-boot or uefi boot flow. OpenBSD (which I use) requires it. If Raspberry Pi had any sense, they'd adopted UEFI for Raspberry Pi 5 (and made it compliant with ARM server platform specs), and maybe they have. I don't own one nor have I looked into it on detail; it's still using legacy ISA (i.e. ARM, IMHO a dead end), making it very uninteresting to me.

snvzz 3y ago

>Jeff powered up the board, no HDMI output. >(..) this is no way to launch a product. I disagree. This is a Compute Module, not a SBC. If you can't even connect an UART to get it up and running, then you're not the target audience. Hell, if you expect HDMI output from a CM out of factory, you definitely are not the target audience. Get a SBC next time. >Get the docs, OS images, default configurations, quick start guides, user forum etc sorted out. Then launch product. Agree. Minus the user forum part, as trying to capture the community into a forum that you control is entirely optional. (and any effort used maintaining a forum could be put elsewhere, such as customer support or improving documentation)

geerlingguy 3y ago
Raspberry Pi really reset expectations there, though—even when I had access to their alpha version of the CM4, it was booting with a full GUI, all interfaces working, and there were just a few tweaks to IO interfaces they needed to make for better speed and stability. With many non-Pi boards, bringup via UART is typical, but the vast majority of SBC users wouldn't know what to do if you tossed them a USB to UART adapter.
- snvzz 3y ago
  >Raspberry Pi really reset expectations there, though—even when I had access to their alpha version of the CM4, it was booting with a full GUI, all interfaces working, and there were just a few tweaks to IO interfaces they needed to make for better speed and stability. I understand these use same software throughout, and they make both the Pi and the CM board version, so you'd get the same results. Conversely, both Mars CM and Mars seem to be under the same china-style "we shipped it but it barely boots" confusion :/ But it shouldn't take long to sort out. VisionFive 2 uses the same SoC after all, and the experience got to a pretty good point on that SBC (I own one). >the vast majority of SBC users wouldn't know what to do if you tossed them a USB to UART adapter. Pi specifically. Other ARM SBCs use u-boot. There documentation helps. VisionFive 2 has such documentation in place. Rpi is unique in that it uses a bespoke boot process that doesn't even present an UART prompt on its bootloader. So the only way to get anywhere is with a ready-to-use sd image (AFAIK they now do USB too). It can fortunately be brought back into sanity by setting up an alternative (and less supported, although definitely better and less bespoke) u-boot or uefi boot flow. OpenBSD (which I use) requires it. If Raspberry Pi had any sense, they'd adopted UEFI for Raspberry Pi 5 (and made it compliant with ARM server platform specs), and maybe they have. I don't own one nor have I looked into it on detail; it's still using legacy ISA (i.e. ARM, IMHO a dead end), making it very uninteresting to me.