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system76 / laptop-suggestions

Repo to collect laptop design suggestions and feedback as issues.
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ARM #47

Open ParaplegicRacehorse opened 4 years ago

ParaplegicRacehorse commented 4 years ago

If Microsoft (!) and Apple (!) are pushing it, then ARM is the future. Go all-in for ARM.

(But, in the next 3-8 years, keep an eye on RISC-V!)

mattwhiteside commented 4 years ago

+1 to RISC-V.

Dmole commented 4 years ago

AFAIK there is only 1 ARM laptop with >=8GB RAM. Drivers for ARM are historically slow to emerge so that may be another issue. But yes I do want that 32 core non-speculative RISC-V open driver Laptop, or POWER9 on 7nm lithography because it's already developed, open, available, and endorsed by the FSF.

ghost commented 4 years ago

Looks like there is currently attempt going for a PowerPC Linux laptop: https://www.powerpc-notebook.org/en/ (not sure if it adheres to POWER9 or not). Currently, it seems like most non-x86 architectures are more open on the software end with RISC-V, of course, being the most open. ARM would probably be the fastest performing, best supported, and most affordable non-x86 option. Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of RISC-V.

phma commented 4 years ago

I'd prefer POWER9 to ARM. It has four threads per core and a 128-bit long double type. The ARM has no float longer than 64 bits AFAIK (I've run code on a Raspberry Pi and it had nothing longer than 64).

I'm planning to get a Talos II running Adélie for big-endian portability testing.

ParaplegicRacehorse commented 4 years ago

AFAIK there is only 1 ARM laptop with >=8GB RAM.

At the moment, yes. Apple already announced that their Macbook Air line is switching to ARM in Q1 2020, with possibly the other Macbooks soon to follow. And MS has already released (September) an ARM-powered Surface. HP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer are already in also; and all planning to release bigger-badder models.

Drivers for ARM are historically slow to emerge so that may be another issue.

I think Google's announced plan to push their Android kernel customizations up to Mainline will make a huge difference. Also, there's lots of ARM coming in 5.4 and 5.5. Probably the biggest hurdle will be GPU drivers, though; especially the proprietary blobs (for those of us who want them.)

I'm also digging on the Power9 thing, but the amount of user-space software already available in ARM repositories makes it more attractive to me. YMMV.

Dmole commented 4 years ago

missing VPU drivers is more of an issue than gpu.

... Power9 ... user-space software...

is not be an issue; https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=power9-linux-distros&num=1

https://distrowatch.com/search-mobile.php?ostype=Linux&category=All&origin=All&basedon=All&notbasedon=None&desktop=All&architecture=ppc64el&package=All&rolling=All&isosize=All&netinstall=All&language=All&defaultinit=All&status=Active#simple