Octa core Risc V .....sbc

[CentralWare]

Ubuntu Server and Desktop both have odd poweroff/reboot scenarios.
With SERVER, reboot puts it to sleep - without means to wake it. poweroff+poweron hangs at boot loader
With DESKTOP, reboot/poweroff+poweron hang at the boot loader screen.
If I remove power for >40 seconds it works as expected upon reconnecting.
I'm speculating this is either heat related or boot loader related - too soon to tell.
(multiple SD cards used, 2 power supplies with manual adjustment +/- 0.01v detail)
I may have also just received a bad board - will know more in the near future.

Debian - I haven't found a RV2 compatible image yet - but I haven't dug too deeply either.
Armbian is also supposed to have one - I just haven't found it yet.

I have eMMC and M2->SATAx6 boards coming in the next few days to see about pushing this thing to the limits.

@vinceASPECT: Ubuntu Noble images from the OPi website.  (See @gadget42's link above)

[vinceASPECT]

ahh Right

Good to learn about the RISC V board.

You are using THEIR official OS from their website for the RISC V board.....

makes sense.

Do you find it runs APPS ok?....say GIMP 3 from the repo?

Yes, some SBC's come ready to go with the OS already inside onboard memory



thanks
C

[CentralWare]

@vinceASPECT: I wasn't sure if the board was damaged (It IS a rework item - the mounting lugs for both M.2 sockets are missing and the primary capacitor has a chip out of it) but after today I'm reasonably certain it's not the board causing the warm boot hiccups, but more likely u_boot failing.

The eMMC board arrived today - once installed, the installation of Ubuntu from the SD card to the eMMC took only a matter of minutes, rebooted a handful of times on its own and SO FAR it hasn't acted up even once booting from the MMC.  (Mind you, we tried numerous Micro-SD cards from different brands and they all acted in the same manner, so I'm leaning toward a boot loader that's flaky on SD boot.

Ubuntu Noble image comes with Chromium pre-installed, I updated APT and installed a few low-end items, compiler, even Samba - but not much in relation to the desktop breed.  (I don't use a general desktop too often and "startx" when I do need to )

REPO: It's a third party repository I haven't created an image for yet (we're still deciding whether or not to port OPi) but did speak with someone overseas last night hinting "...if you want to lend a hand in the porting process..." so we'll see if OPi's crew joins in the fun!  (The board I received is, in fact, physically damaged but I have a replacement due to arrive tomorrow from a US supplier - once that gets here we'll see if OPiRV2 can handle being turned into a 6-drive RAID NAS   If so, I'll order one or two more for further experimentation and we'll dig further.)

As for onboard memory/storage...  there's a mere 16MB SPI flash onboard for the boot loader and settings - nothing more.  Even the 16MB is broken into five or six partitions making it otherwise useless to the outside world.  There's a 3-pin ICP connection next to the DC-in (I'm assuming serial i/o for low-level editing/programming/flashing) but documentation is limited, so if that specific SPI can be accessed through the operating system - I haven't found it yet.  Not that I've spent a great deal of time at this point!

Overall: Assuming tomorrow's board arrives unscathed, and assuming it has the same warm-boot problems this one had, the board's u_boot and operating system are both flagged as Beta - so issues are bound to surface...  but considering the price tag along with the onboard components, this 8-Core/Thread unit @ 1.6GHz runs circles around RPi2 when it first released at $30ea...  The RPi5 has a faster engine @ 2.4GHz, but half as many pistons.  RPi5 also has dual-head GPU option and an integrated GPU; whereas the OPi is lacking in the GPU arena from what I read - especially support for it.  When you add the M.2 ports and eMMC port, the scales get tipped well toward the OPi.

CPU Cooling...  is a must on the OPi.  At least on the one I have here already.  After installing the MMC chip I watched as the system flashed itself onto it, which brought CPU temp up to 69°C just copying files.  I have copper heat-sinks arriving tomorrow BUT if you use the 2230 M.2 port, you cannot put a sink on the RAM chip - which does tend to get a little toasty.  There are no holes where an active cooler could be mounted, so designing is going to take some time - but thus far it looks as though thermal glue is going to be a necessity.

Once the new board is in place I'll load up a desktop and see about Gimp - maybe edit the boot loader screen to be a little more aesthetic, and get back to you on the results.
HOWEVER, their most recent Gimp is 2.8.16 from the looks of it. https://repo.huaweicloud.com/ubuntu-ports/pool/main/ but again, I haven't dug too deeply yet.

Cheers!

[vinceASPECT]

Sir,

That's great that you got really "into" the RISC V board
and hope to port OS's to it.

GIMP got an update to 3.0 across the board.....i expect they have not yet updated
their repo.

 I just wondered how the board performed with a typical desktop graphics
app....

i expect RISC V sbc's will further improve and you'll eventually  be getting what YOU have
for ten dollars and such....
It will be a good reason to actually make more widespread use of them.
i bet ARM and intel and AMD etc won't like it........

thanks
C

[CentralWare]

i bet ARM and intel and AMD etc won't like it........

LOL!  Intel/AMD don't see ARM/RISC/DRIOD as "too much" competition yet; no, I don't imagine they're "happy" about IoT, but if it bothered them that much, they'd get IN THE GAME!

Okay - last update until this weekend:

1. The bottom M.2 (2280) crashes into the eMMC if it's installed.  (See Pic)  Granted, there are probably paper-thin M.2 devices out there, but that's irrelevant at this point since I'm not using one of those.
    The top M.2 (2230) if installed sits on top of the cap/coil next to the power LED...  both of these ports should have been thought out a little better.
2. I'm watching the demo screen for FreeDoom - it's flawless (and graphics isn't this board's strongest area)
3. I loaded up Gimp - not that I was editing a 50 layer masterpiece, but it operated almost as nicely as my workstation
4. I dumped the GUI and reloaded "Server" - turning it into a two port router/firewall...  iptables+dnsmasq...  almost effortless!
5. I ordered RasPi5 heat-sinks (which include the ~1.5mm copper pad that fits nicely under the top M.2 2230 for the onboard RAM) and with Ambient of ~27° she's running at 67° with all cores loaded down to about 80% - withOUT a fan.  (...that doesn't arrive for a couple more days )
6. I haven't connected drives yet, but there's a 6-port SATA3 M2 adapter underneath just waiting for some exercise - this weekend probably

Take care!

T.J.