wlanboy
Content Contributer
ARM is a nice topic. If you look why Linux is quite well supported: It is all about Intel and AMD. x86, Bios, EFI, and all that North/South-Chipsets, PCI, all that stuff that makes the PC running and booting the OS. Even things like VTx and SEE extensions were made common. Single point of command set.
If you look at the ARM SoCs this is quite ok, but all the other stuff is package by randomness. Not a single group of two boards that are using the same ethernet- or graphic chips. Broadcom, Amlogic, Samsung, Mali, in the mix. And different SoC builders with different branches or mainline support.
So basically you are searching drivers for every single chip on a board and if you really found working versions - then you have to search for the uboot and lowest common multiple Kernel version that is supported by that driver mix.
What makes the Raspberry Pi so successfull? Mainline Kernel support. They commit every single bit to the main Linux Kernel. No branches no "our special version of Kernel 3.14 LT". But companies like Hardkernel and others did their own branch - disconneted from the rest of the world - to quit-fix their driver mix and disabling every single usefull module.
Worst case scenario. Stuck by an old kernel, pissed kernel devs not willing to help afterwards and disables modules - so no tun, no *groups, no xyz. Everything from OpenVPN, LXC, Docker, OpenGL (emulators!), not working at all.
If you look at the ARM SoCs this is quite ok, but all the other stuff is package by randomness. Not a single group of two boards that are using the same ethernet- or graphic chips. Broadcom, Amlogic, Samsung, Mali, in the mix. And different SoC builders with different branches or mainline support.
So basically you are searching drivers for every single chip on a board and if you really found working versions - then you have to search for the uboot and lowest common multiple Kernel version that is supported by that driver mix.
What makes the Raspberry Pi so successfull? Mainline Kernel support. They commit every single bit to the main Linux Kernel. No branches no "our special version of Kernel 3.14 LT". But companies like Hardkernel and others did their own branch - disconneted from the rest of the world - to quit-fix their driver mix and disabling every single usefull module.
Worst case scenario. Stuck by an old kernel, pissed kernel devs not willing to help afterwards and disables modules - so no tun, no *groups, no xyz. Everything from OpenVPN, LXC, Docker, OpenGL (emulators!), not working at all.
