N1? or N2?

InspecteurGadget · Post by **InspecteurGadget** » Tue Jul 10, 2018 7:10 pm

Why not integer directly Wifi and BT and gps?
Like HiKey970 board =)

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Tue Jul 10, 2018 7:31 pm

InspecteurGadget wrote:Why not integer directly Wifi and BT and gps?

Price and limited performance. Users who don't need them will have to pay for them and disable them

memeka · Post by **memeka** » Tue Jul 10, 2018 7:54 pm

It would be great to have a mpcie port for wifi/bt cards tho

InspecteurGadget · Post by **InspecteurGadget** » Tue Jul 10, 2018 8:15 pm

yes 2 mpcie port is ideal =)

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Wed Jul 11, 2018 9:51 pm

Maybe the N3 can be RISC-V.

rooted · Post by **rooted** » Wed Jul 11, 2018 10:33 pm

elatllat wrote:Maybe the N3 can be RISC-V.

Interesting story on RISC-V and how ARM tried a bit of preemptive sabotage

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/1 ... v_website/

I don't think Hardkernel is at a place (financially) where they could design an entire SoC, would be cool though.

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Wed Jul 11, 2018 11:06 pm

I was thinking they could partner with somebody who is building a new SOC to boost sales / reduce cost, or piggyback off one of the big players involved.

ASword · Post by **ASword** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 5:31 am

elatllat wrote:I was thinking they could partner with somebody who is building a new SOC to boost sales / reduce cost, or piggyback off one of the big players involved.

That's what they are doing, only it is ARM-based. Its not clear that the RISC-V architecture offers any real advantages, and it is a young and immature ecosystem without any industry big backers. I think HK is far better off going with a SoC designed for the Smartphone or TV/console market.

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 5:59 am

ASword wrote:... Its not clear that the RISC-V architecture offers any real advantages...

Open hardware/source has clear advantages as evidant by running all modern computers; from Wikipedia;

All Intel chipsets post-2015 are running MINIX 3 internally

In the long run it wins every time.

ASword wrote:... without any industry big backers...

From Wikipedia;

A partial list of organizations that support the RISC-V Foundation includes: AMD,[13] Andes Technology, BAE Systems, Berkeley Architecture Research, Bluespec, Inc., Cortus, Google, GreenWaves Technologies, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Huawei, IBM, Imperas Software, ICT, IIT Madras, Lattice Semiconductor, Mellanox Technologies, Microsemi, Micron, Nvidia, NXP, Oracle, Qualcomm, Rambus Cryptography Research, Western Digital, and SiFive

I'd call those as big as industry gets.

Apokalypz · Post by **Apokalypz** » Thu Jul 12, 2018 11:42 pm

elatllat wrote: Open hardware/source has clear advantages as evidant by running all modern computers; from Wikipedia;
All Intel chipsets post-2015 are running MINIX 3 internally

Wow, did not know that, thanks for the info. I always assumed they used an in-house brew RTOS or something. Probably easier for the NSA to gain access to than an RTOS anyway.

My opinion on the N1:
I would love to have seen it come out this month, I'm getting ready to replace my XU4 NAS W/ 2 USB3 HDD enclosures for something more streamlined. I was gonna build a mini case for this + the HDDs and the 2 sata connectors were what I was waiting for. But alas, not going to happen. I'll probably go with the rock64pro (same chipset and has a pcie connector for a dual sata card.)...if it ever gets released...probably having the same problems as HK. Though, as much as I'd like to see the N1, at 2GB ram you'd be competing with your own NAS boards you just released. Plus, Odroid-N is a flagship line, 2GB wouldn't really be acceptable for a flagship now a days.

My opinion on the prospective N2:
If I get one, it'll be to replace my NAS, so 2 satas or a pcie slot is a must for me. Otherwise, pack in as much performance and ram as you can muster. Maybe even change the name to Odroid-(omega symbol)1 to imply it's flagship status. Then the N1 can come out if you find another ram chip supplier then respin the board and you will have a mid range (N1) and flagship (omega1). Midrange could be the most affordable ($99-) while the flagship can be as expensive as it needs to be ($100+) because people will pay for performance: https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/03/nvidi ... t-at-1299/

ASword · Post by **ASword** » Fri Jul 13, 2018 2:44 pm

elatllat wrote:
ASword wrote:... Its not clear that the RISC-V architecture offers any real advantages...
Open hardware/source has clear advantages as evidant by running all modern computers; from Wikipedia;
All Intel chipsets post-2015 are running MINIX 3 internally
In the long run it wins every time.

Yeah, in the long run. Not in the N2 timeframe. And software is a different ballgame than hardware. Minix3 inside the Intel chipsets isn't as interesting as you seem to think it is.

elatllat wrote:
ASword wrote:... without any industry big backers...
From Wikipedia;
A partial list of organizations that support the RISC-V Foundation includes: AMD,[13] Andes Technology, BAE Systems, Berkeley Architecture Research, Bluespec, Inc., Cortus, Google, GreenWaves Technologies, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Huawei, IBM, Imperas Software, ICT, IIT Madras, Lattice Semiconductor, Mellanox Technologies, Microsemi, Micron, Nvidia, NXP, Oracle, Qualcomm, Rambus Cryptography Research, Western Digital, and SiFive
I'd call those as big as industry gets.

Uh huh. They're supported the research, and often the mentioned "support" is pretty weak. By industry big backers, I mean companies taking the technology to market in realized products. Those don't exist yet, and won't in the near-to-mid-term.

back2future · Post by **back2future** » Fri Jul 13, 2018 4:09 pm

Support for USB OTG and Embedded Host for N2 could be of interest for enhanced connectivity.
http://www.usb.org/developers/onthego
[ Would add up to 5$ depending on SoC abilities. ]

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Fri Jul 13, 2018 4:14 pm

ASword wrote:...near-to-mid-term.

That's why I said N3.

deric.venra · Post by **deric.venra** » Fri Jul 13, 2018 4:41 pm

Interesting news. Can't wait to hear more.

Now just have to have some more patience, which they say is a virtue..

tobetter · Post by **tobetter** » Tue Jul 17, 2018 11:19 am

What if SPI flash memory can be on board, what size would be preferred? My opinion is up to 4~8MB which only contains a super-powered bootloader.

moon.linux · Post by **moon.linux** » Tue Jul 17, 2018 12:19 pm

@tobetter: what about kernel binary image it's growing day by day. u-boot + kernel image on spi flash should be ok.

ASword · Post by **ASword** » Wed Jul 18, 2018 12:41 am

moon.linux wrote:@tobetter: what about kernel binary image it's growing day by day. u-boot + kernel image on spi flash should be ok.

The kernel changes much too often. I would like an SPI flash that is just enough to boot from any attached storage, and then transfer control there. Ideally this flash would be written once and never again in order to ensure its maximum possible lifespan.

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Wed Jul 18, 2018 1:38 am

Just lable the micro sdcard "SPI flash" and all it perfect.

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Wed Jul 18, 2018 1:42 am

If only you could buy really cheap 128M microsd cards...

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Wed Jul 18, 2018 1:58 am

If you are using spi to boot a SSD ($63 to $2000) $8 is not going to bother you,
and if you are not going to boot an external drive you need a SDCard (or eMMC) anyway,
and if you already have an external drive you might already have an SDCard,
and the amount of extra time burned by implementing and using SPI might be more than the cost of the SDCard.
sure some might want it, I just don't see any value in it.

ASword · Post by **ASword** » Thu Jul 19, 2018 12:42 am

I don't care about the cost of the SDcard, I just don't want anyone monkeying with the bootstrap device (i.e. removing/replacing the sd card). How about not using a flash device, but instead an EEPROM or whatever the modern version is?

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Thu Jul 19, 2018 1:09 am

ASword wrote:I don't care about the cost of the SDcard, I just don't want anyone monkeying with the bootstrap device (i.e. removing/replacing the sd card). How about not using a flash device, but instead an EEPROM or whatever the modern version is?

SDcard + potting epoxy ?

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Sat Jul 21, 2018 6:38 am

A new Firefox feature requires 16GB of RAM... guess that's not going to be available on an ARM SBC anytime soon.

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/2 ... _reporter/

ASword · Post by **ASword** » Sat Jul 21, 2018 6:43 am

elatllat wrote:A new Firefox feature requires 16GB of RAM... guess that's not going to be available on an ARM SBC anytime soon.

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/2 ... _reporter/

Hmmm... that's just a dev build, not really a "new feature".

Epoxy the SD card: I didn't say I didn't also want to be able to use the SD card slot...

MobileJAD · Post by **MobileJAD** » Tue Jul 24, 2018 10:03 am

elatllat wrote:A new Firefox feature requires 16GB of RAM... guess that's not going to be available on an ARM SBC anytime soon.

Firefox needs 16GB to enable a feature, I was about to say what would you need 16GB for? Running the internet out of ram?
But I guess it's just a dev feature...

voidmoth · Post by **voidmoth** » Tue Jul 31, 2018 1:03 am

Im gonna make a potencially retarded/genious recommendation. the macchiatobin uses this powerhouse of a cpu and it looks really charming

Marvel Armada 8040:
- quad core A72 at 2GHz
- DDR4 ram support
- cpu and io virtualization
- 4x sata 3.0
- 2x 10Gbit eth, 4x 1/2.5Gbit eth
- 3x usb3.0
- 1port PCIe 4x, 2port PCIe 2x, 4port PCIe 1x (you can stick in a desktop gpu. well to the macchiatobin at least, idk how the odroid guys would use PCIe)
- 28nm

marvel vendor page
macchiatobin page

to me it seems like a nice SoC candidate for the N2. the only feature some people would probably miss is a gpu.

rooted · Post by **rooted** » Tue Jul 31, 2018 1:22 am

Got to have a GPU mate

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Tue Jul 31, 2018 2:08 am

Even as a server/router, I think (for now) 10Gbps is more expense than most want from hardware outside a data center. (I want it, but I would never use it, and I want it cheaper.)

ASword · Post by **ASword** » Tue Jul 31, 2018 6:16 am

Yeah, the Marvel Armada is aimed at the wrong market. No GPU and don't want 10Gbit/sec Ethernet. Plus other consumer oriented features. Might as well suggest using a Cavium ThunderX (https://www.cavium.com/product-thunderx ... ssors.html).

zupet · Post by **zupet** » Tue Jul 31, 2018 11:17 am

https://www.nxp.com/products/processors ... deo:i.MX8M

How about NXP i.MX 8M SOC ?

SoC has GPU with video acceleration and dual PCIe and USB 3.0. I never heard of GC7000 serise but it support ES 3.1, Vulkan and OpenCL 1.2.

https://aiyprojects.withgoogle.com/edge-tpu

Google's AIY Projects is using this SoC But the SBC is made for TensorFlow acceleration.

elatllat · Post by **elatllat** » Tue Jul 31, 2018 11:23 am

Would rather have RAM than a TPU

ASword · Post by **ASword** » Wed Aug 01, 2018 12:50 am

No NDA is required for the NXP 8M series, so its unlikely that is who HK is working with. And its not really that impressive a chip from a performance perspective (it is aimed at a lower power part of the market, I think). If you want one, it looks like Wandboard has them available now. But yeah, only 2GB RAM.

Thanks for the TPU link though... I really like that TPU-on-a-USB-stick, as that means any SBC can benefit from Google's TPU work, given a USB-C port! That's awesome! I will definitely be keeping an eye on that one, and hoping that whatever the ODROID N-x ends up being, it has 2 or more USB-C ports.

superstructor · Post by **superstructor** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 2:35 pm

Understandable, but could you at least write a blog post about this please so that those of us who don't regularly visit the forums are not left waiting for a N1 that will never come ?

While waiting for a more powerful ODROID I'll continue to enjoy the performance of NVIDIA's Jetson TX2 and upcoming Xavier, although the price for those is expensive compared to the ODROID's awesome value.

tkaiser · Post by **tkaiser** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 5:14 pm

https://www.cnx-software.com/2018/08/03 ... ent-555207

memeka · Post by **memeka** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 5:22 pm

tkaiser wrote:https://www.cnx-software.com/2018/08/03 ... ent-555207

yes we've seen that, could be a good candidate for N2

+ better CPU
+ better GPU
+ (LP)DDR3/4 RAM, pick your own

- amlogic kernel (RK mainline support is vast superior)
unknown for I/O comparison - possible better pcie, usb3 there but 1 or 2? (N1 had 2 host)

tkaiser · Post by **tkaiser** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 5:38 pm

memeka wrote:- amlogic kernel

Oh, there's also Amlogic cheating AKA Amlogic firmware. So far still Hardkernel is the only vendor around who got BLOBs from them where the firmware doesn't lie to the cpufreq driver (see the 'Checking cpufreq OPP:' section)

S905 on ODROID-C2 with Hardkernel's BLOB: http://ix.io/1iSh
Same S905 on NanoPi K2 with 'upstream' BLOB: http://ix.io/1iT1

Results collected with sbc-bench: https://github.com/ThomasKaiser/sbc-ben ... Results.md

Same story with S905X (1512 MHz are 1408 in reality) and with S912 the 1512 is 1414 in reality. At least it's easy to spot these days when vendors do such things (as expected on the RPi it's worst situation and it took the most efforts to document the cheating there)

tkaiser · Post by **tkaiser** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 5:49 pm

memeka wrote:unknown for I/O comparison - possible better pcie, usb3 there but 1 or 2? (N1 had 2 host)

The RK3399 on N1 has 4 PCIe lanes with Gen2 speeds (while this vendor community here still believes only a single lane would be usable) and 2 USB3 host ports that have to share bandwidth.

No idea which PCIe link speed the Amlogic SoC supports but it looks like a single lane implementation (so suitable to attach again an ASM1061 to provide two somewhat bottlenecked SATA ports). Wrt USB3 this looks like a single host port on the Amlogic and all that's known yet is 'USB read/write speed still need improve'.

Advantage for Hardkernel: they would be the only ones with such an Amlogic Soc for now compared to the N1 being just one of many RK3399 boards (most of them priced lower):

* https://forum.armbian.com/topic/7310-rockpro64
* https://forum.armbian.com/topic/7498-nanopc-t4/
* https://forum.armbian.com/topic/7552-ro ... ade-elite/
* https://forum.armbian.com/topic/7511-nanopi-m4/
* https://forum.armbian.com/topic/7750-nanopi-neo4/
* And the older Firefly which I always considered a weird choice since way too overpriced and 'special' PCIe setup: https://forum.armbian.com/topic/7600-fi ... ment-57240

Still useless speculation since Hardkernel is already busy with evaluating a specific SoC and they chose an NDA vendor.

OverSun · Post by **OverSun** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 6:11 pm

tkaiser wrote:https://www.cnx-software.com/2018/08/03 ... ent-555207

I also had the same impression this morning from the news feed until the very last sentence of the article: "...we’ll probably only find out the full details in 2019, once products and boards get released".
Not really plausible N2 details, to have a first glimpse in 2019 min. maybe. probably.

I'd bet on S922 for the new board.

tkaiser · Post by **tkaiser** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 6:36 pm

OverSun wrote:I'd bet on S922 for the new board.

Good luck:

Code: Select all

root@tux:/tmp/buildroot_openlinux_kernel_4.9_fbdev_20180706/kernel/aml-4.9/arch/arm64/boot/dts/amlogic# grep CPU5 *
mesong12b.dtsi:					cpu = <&CPU5>;
mesong12b.dtsi:		CPU5:cpu@103 {
mesongxm.dtsi:					cpu = <&CPU5>;
mesongxm.dtsi:		CPU5:cpu@101 {

root@tux:/tmp/buildroot_openlinux_kernel_4.9_fbdev_20180706/kernel/aml-4.9/arch/arm64/boot/dts/amlogic# grep CPU7 *
mesongxm.dtsi:					cpu = <&CPU7>;
mesongxm.dtsi:		CPU7:cpu@103 {

root@tux:/tmp/buildroot_openlinux_kernel_4.9_fbdev_20180706/kernel/aml-4.9/arch/arm64/boot/dts/amlogic# grep CPU3 * | cut -d':' -f1 | sort | uniq | while read ; do grep -q dvalin ${REPLY} && echo ${REPLY}; done
mesong12a.dtsi
mesong12b.dtsi

Translated: in the code drop from 4 weeks ago there's one octa-core covered (S912) and another hexa-core (A311D). Two times 'next gen GPU' but mesong12a is a boring quad-core A53 while S922 is said to rely on 'next gen CPU'. So I would assume this will take a little bit longer until Amlogic is ready (on the latest slide we've seen -- which is all publicly available 'information' anyway -- S922 was in 'definition' state).

I've uploaded the whole DT stuff (see CNX) so to speculate slightly better informed simply download the stuff and dig through DT definitions yourself

Listing CPU cores:

Code: Select all

grep CPU3 * | cut -d':' -f1 | sort | uniq | while read ; do echo -e "\n${REPLY}" ; grep cortex ${REPLY} | grep -v gic ; done

tkaiser · Post by **tkaiser** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 7:31 pm

Maybe A311D and S922 are simply the same...

Edit: but then HK wouldn't be alone since at least Libre Computer is also already working on S922: https://forum.armbian.com/topic/7552-ro ... ment=56835

Tom · Post by **Tom** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 8:48 pm

Please consider dual or quad lan ports for the device, two or more sata ports with a bonus of USB boot!

ASword · Post by **ASword** » Sat Aug 04, 2018 12:11 am

Those look like pretty good specs for my needs (4 big cores + 2 small cores, GPU w/ ML capabilities, PCIe, USB3, Gb Ethernet)... as long as it can have 4GB, I'll put my cash on the table. Don't really want to wait until well into 2019 though.

back2future · Post by **back2future** » Sat Aug 04, 2018 1:12 am

Meanwhile security reasons are a bigger concern for a SoC or board decision than performance - above rk3399 ability levels.
Pcie (RAM disks, Intel® Optane™?) is more suitable for data exchange guys, while Usb will suit more universal needs. Sufficient power or current supply preconditioned.
Variety and complexity will increase with open source software and ai and other assisting integrated-circuits and their data flow.
Not having control over one's own hardware (e.g. cpu speeds, gpu cores enabled or speeds, ...) is just on top of these developments _ against trustable common community efforts?
We'd appreciate OTG abilities until sbc's reach sever connectivity standards.

[ Starting at Usb 3.1 we'll have to take care for DMA through unordinary/non-standard driver configuration. ]
[ Just want to keep that in mynd in combination with monitored low cpu demand/activity, no translation or cypto, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_ ... ent_threat, netspect®e ]

m4f2g · Post by **m4f2g** » Mon Aug 06, 2018 9:04 pm

mad_ady wrote:Thanks for that, @odroid. I expect some members will still release some patches for the N1 - at least until N2 comes along...

how the hell did they got their sample?
How many of those N1s are out there?

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Mon Aug 06, 2018 9:10 pm

About 20 development units were generously donated by Hardkernel to contributing forum members so that custom software/distros/patches could be tried out and released before the bulk of the devices were sold/shipped. This is to provide best software support "out of the box".

MobileJAD · Post by **MobileJAD** » Tue Aug 07, 2018 7:56 am

Those N1 samples are going to be pretty valuable to hold onto!

rooted · Post by **rooted** » Tue Aug 07, 2018 8:57 am

MobileJAD wrote:Those N1 samples are going to be pretty valuable to hold onto!

I don't know about valuable as in monetary, they are pretty great though.

m4f2g · Post by **m4f2g** » Tue Aug 07, 2018 9:53 am

mad_ady wrote:About 20 development units were generously donated by Hardkernel to contributing forum members so that custom software/distros/patches could be tried out and released before the bulk of the devices were sold/shipped. This is to provide best software support "out of the box".

This is exemmplary how they handle that.

meveric · Post by **meveric** » Tue Aug 07, 2018 5:07 pm

I put my N1 in good use. It replaced my C2 for building arm64 packages.
It has a 512GB SSD connected via SATA and it's so damn fast compared to the C2.
The SSD is so awesome when it comes to linking binaries or packaging

2ndSeb · Post by **2ndSeb** » Wed Aug 08, 2018 12:42 am

Devil on the Left shoulder: NanoPC-T4... buy it, you want it.
Me: Hold on, RK3399, 4GB ram, M.2/PCIe, nice that's actually good enough.. maybe I should just...
Angel on the Right shoulder: Keep calm... it's almost over. It's almost September...
Me: *sigh* ok ok. I'll wait. The C2 was awesome, the N2 will probably be the best thing since sliced bread. I can wait.
Me 2 minutes later: www.friendlyarm... dammit.. be like a monk. Wait.
Me 5 minutes later: Maybe J3455, wonder how they....

Jokes aside... we won't get an N1, because hardkernel didn't have a source for the memory. How do the NanoPC-T4 and the RockPro64 people do that? Is DDR vs LPDDR the big difference? (Probs a stupid question)