> Prices for those in the US (like me) just tripled due to import tariffs (ordering the 32 GB model went from $400 to $1500).
This was the biggest takeaway for me in this post. In the past, to experiment with a particular piece of new hardware, we had to a) obtain the hardware, and b) obtain or create software for it. With a) fast becoming out-of-reach for most people, this puts a dampener on b).
I bought one of these, with the full 64GB of RAM. So far it's been a fun machine to play with. In UEFI mode I can install Fedora 42 with essentially zero issues (it tells you that the bootloader didn't install but actually it did and works fine), which is quite smooth for ARM. It will be nice to see the CPU clusters, GPU/NPU drivers, and various PCIe snags worked out, but I really like what it has at this price point (assuming you're not in the US).
The whole tariff situation will probably dry out a significant amount from the incentives for such boards and it seems the only good options for a powerful ARM personal computer or home server are basically Macs or Ampere.
Radxa has been notoriously bad at supporting their hardware from the software side.
Their hardware is great, but they launch a product and then won't offer a proper distribution for it, hoping that some developers will take care of this for them, for free.
This is why I love Raspberry Pi so much: they care about the software just as much as about the hardware, if not even more. And that is great. Because the hardware, once you have it, that's it, it won't change.
I don't know about Raspberry OS, but when I installed Raspbian 12 Bookworm on my first-gen Raspi with 500MB RAM, it worked. It's now working as a VPN server.
See this, for example: The Zero 3e is a really great board, but this is the software they offer for it https://github.com/radxa-build/radxa-zero3/releases
3 weeks ago: internal test build
Apr 8: internal test build
Jan 10, 2024: beta 6: Currently there is an issue preventing the Debian CLI image from booting, and we suggest users to use the Desktop variant instead for now. Ubuntu CLI: This flavor is provided as-is except for critical issues. Users should look at Debian CLI as an alternative.
There are now community maintained Armbian variants, but it took a long time for them to appear. There was also a distibution by some other volunteer, but Radxa did nothing.
Is this so they can say they are "Orion Arm", which is where we are in the Milky Way galaxy?
ARM China, and CIX, Cix CD8180 SoC, Armv9.2 Architecture.
I was under the impression that ARM China doesn't have the latest license to Armv9 and stops at Armv8. While ARM HQ opened a separate ARM Unit in Shanghai under a different name ARM Something ( Some Chinese Phonetics ). But CIX has had this SOC with Armv9 announced a while ago. So I assume ARM China is now officially back under ARM HQ / Softbank control?
By Control I dont mean just swapping a new CEO but the actual power structure of the company.
I agree with Mr. Geerling here. I very much wish to see an "open" ARM system, and I want it to be competitive with at least the Apple M1. Unfortunately, due to poor driver support, this ain't that. ARM has had a bad fragmentation problem, and I fear that this will be even worse with RISC-V. For those wanting really open systems with decent drivers, it would appear that x86 or the RPi are really the only options.
> If you're just doing AI stuff or GPU compute, this board might actually be a decent option, all things considered.
Looking at the benchmark [0]
When I first saw the board I thought this might be the RPi of the "AI age" since it is IMHO the most affordable option with 64Gb of RAM.
But I am always cautious if we can really make the most of the so called "30 TOPS NPU"
- [0] https://github.com/geerlingguy/ollama-benchmark/issues/13
> once I installed the Nvidia proprietary driver with sudo ubuntu-drivers install nvidia:570, it was quite stable
Didn’t expect this to just be available for ARM. It really is making its way out of „weird niche platform“ territory to „it’s just a PC“! Especially together with the SystemReady firmware.
This sounds like a cool board. Does anyone know if the APU works with llama.cpp?
Can anyone explain me the economics of why a novelty hardware supplier would Not invest in drivers / software in parallel? There must be a good reason for this to happen, it even happens at the other end of the scale, but I would think the very basis (just any drivers, not even good ones) are an affordable investment? What use is your product if every review will say “good product, alas Windows and Linux won’t run”?
A reason I can imagine that drivers are (I don’t know!) somewhat interchangeable, so invest in drivers for your product and you are stimulating all current and future competitors as well.