From owner-freebsd-arm@freebsd.org Mon Jan 23 20:35:44 2017 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-arm@mailman.ysv.freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) by mailman.ysv.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 2725BCBE099 for ; Mon, 23 Jan 2017 20:35:44 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from hagen@nornagest.de) Received: from euve10633.vserver.de (euve10633.vserver.de [62.75.145.58]) (using TLSv1 with cipher AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (Client did not present a certificate) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id B6B89D75 for ; Mon, 23 Jan 2017 20:35:43 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from hagen@nornagest.de) Received: from [185.44.151.110] (helo=kvoth.localdomain) by euve10633.vserver.de with esmtpsa (TLS1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.72) (envelope-from ) id 1cVkyI-0000e6-Am; Mon, 23 Jan 2017 21:12:25 +0100 Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2017 21:12:01 +0100 From: Hagen =?UTF-8?B?S8O8aGw=?= To: Jim Thompson Cc: "freebsd-arm@freebsd.org" Message-ID: <20170123211201.58eb947e@kvoth.localdomain> In-Reply-To: References: <45d41ec7-3004-ea6c-560e-50bdff9b997a@caliopea.com> Organization: Scientia est potentia! X-Mailer: Claws Mail 3.14.1 (GTK+ 2.24.29; amd64-portbld-freebsd12.0) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-SA-Exim-Connect-IP: 185.44.151.110 X-SA-Exim-Mail-From: hagen@nornagest.de X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.3.1 (2010-03-16) on euve10633.vserver.de X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.0 required=5.0 tests=ALL_TRUSTED,URIBL_BLOCKED autolearn=ham version=3.3.1 Subject: Re: Durable/serious arm hardware ? X-SA-Exim-Version: 4.2.1 (built Mon, 22 Mar 2010 06:26:47 +0000) X-SA-Exim-Scanned: Yes (on euve10633.vserver.de) X-BeenThere: freebsd-arm@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.23 Precedence: list List-Id: "Porting FreeBSD to ARM processors." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2017 20:35:44 -0000 On Mon, 23 Jan 2017 01:07:37 -0600 Jim Thompson wrote: > We have a little two port router based on the same SoC as the BBB. I > selected that platform as one of the better supported platforms on > FreeBSD. It still took a lot of (months of) work to make the freebsd > (and subsequently pfSense) for it into something that could be a > "product". All the FreeBSD work is in the tree. Most vendors don't > do that. That's not a humble brag, it's a statement of truth. > > We're currently in discussions with a vendor to get the Ethernet > driver for our next ARM product, since, ..., it's not in the tree. It's great that you're doing this work, especially committing it back into the tree. What I would also be interested in, is a solution for an ARM based wireless access point running FreeBSD. Right now I have one of my Raspberry Pis set up to do it, but the wireless performance leaves something to be desired. Do you have any tips on what to use for that? > The SoC vendors all have Linux on the brain. They see a much larger > market there. Convincing them to dedicate resources to FreeBSD can be > challenging. One of the things we've been able to do with pfSense is > to show real volume for a FreeBSD based application. I can go to a > SoC vendor (TI, Marvell, etc) and talk about committing to, say, N x > 10K+ unit volumes. That tends to help get their attention. The > Foundation helps a lot here, too, which is why I won't take > "donations" for pfsense and instead direct people to donate to the > FreeBSD Foundation. > > In closing, the board you name are all "developer / hobbyist" boards, > and may not have the level of engineering in them that it takes to > make into a product. At least two of them are price-supported, where > a non-profit gets some portion of the BoM discounted, which makes for > a very low-price board, but also brings some short-cutting (try to > get a warranty claim on a BBB or RPi). > > Jim