There is also an open source driver for the NPU somewhere (Zhouyi NPU) and some documentation, but nothing in an upstream kernel yet. https://zhouyi-npu-tutorial.readthedocs.io/en/latest/0_radxa...
This was the biggest takeaway for me in this post. In the past, to experiment with a particular piece of new hardware, we had to a) obtain the hardware, and b) obtain or create software for it. With a) fast becoming out-of-reach for most people, this puts a dampener on b).
I would have purchased this board in a heartbeat otherwise. Ugh.
I was under the impression that ARM China doesn't have the latest license to Armv9 and stops at Armv8. While ARM HQ opened a separate ARM Unit in Shanghai under a different name ARM Something ( Some Chinese Phonetics ). But CIX has had this SOC with Armv9 announced a while ago. So I assume ARM China is now officially back under ARM HQ / Softbank control?
By Control I dont mean just swapping a new CEO but the actual power structure of the company.
wjnc•2h ago
A reason I can imagine that drivers are (I don’t know!) somewhat interchangeable, so invest in drivers for your product and you are stimulating all current and future competitors as well.
mschuster91•2h ago
There is no single company from Asia that deals in mass produced consumer goods that's capable of doing decent hardware and decent software at the same time. As soon as you take a peek below the surface, no matter what, it begins to reek.
Let's just go through the stuff I personally own or have experience in peeking... Samsung does decent hardware, but their modifications to Android, or their "hacks" for powersaving that keep messing up apps, or their "smart" TVs that are buggy and slow as fuck (not to mention riddled with ads!)... Sony makes excellent cameras hardware-wise but the software/firmware side sucks ass - the fact that they require a dedicated software to be used as a webcam instead of just exposing UVC is already braindead enough, but even more so given that they run on Linux and the Linux kernel already ships with UVC gadgets. Nintendo makes excellent games but even the new Switch 2 ships with a chipset that's years old. Mediatek's leaks for BSPs / Android are frightening in terms of code quality.
Unfortunately, the competition just isn't there. Chinese companies are even worse penny-pinchers than Korean or Taiwanese, and Western companies outside of Apple and Raspberry Pi just don't give a shit because they can't compete with Asian price dumpers or because, like many things in the ham radio scene, get cloned in a matter of months.
digisocialnet•2h ago
mschuster91•2h ago
cgio•1h ago
wjnc•1h ago
mschuster91•1h ago
For the "big ticket" brand items, honestly I don't know. If anything I wouldn't blame it on culture (partially because I lack enough knowledge of Asian cultures, partially because blaming systemic issue on culture can quickly devolve into outright racism), but on capitalist incentives once again - the common standard seems to be "as low in terms of quality as you can get away with", there is no market force pushing for better products, and no legal/regulatory pressure either.
betterThanTexas•1h ago
Doesn't apple do most of their manufacturing in asia? I don't get your point. We certainly can't match this quality in the west.
mschuster91•1h ago
Yes, but on the back of every MacBook there is the line "Designed by Apple in California" and the software is made in California as well.
Asia is just chosen for manufacturing because of the close proximity of supply chain vendors and cheap but reliable labor cost.
betterThanTexas•1h ago
Apple is famously sitting on a mountain of cash. How easily do you think they could replicate the supply chain of even one of their products without outsourcing it?
drob518•1m ago
mbreese•1h ago
The exceptions I see include Apple and Raspberry Pi. And even then, there are missteps.
It’s not intentional… it’s just that companies rarely have integration as one of their core strengths. If you’re a hardware company, you are good at making hardware. The skills necessary for that are very different than the skills needed for software. To get both, you need management that values both and can build the separate teams. Especially true when you can argue that you’re working with the “community” to build out software and fix bugs. If you’re still selling enough hardware, how can you say these companies are wrong?
That’s honestly a hard thing to do unless that is your competitive advantage. And for Apple and Raspberry Pi, I’d argue that is their competitive advantage in their markets. For a long time they were the small fish in big ponds. So they needed to have some trait that allowed them to command higher margins. Integration of hardware and software was it.
bgnn•35m ago
ZiiS•1h ago
jrmg•1h ago
Palomides•1h ago
dijit•1h ago
kanwisher•1h ago
notpushkin•55m ago
arghwhat•1h ago
Sometimes the original suppliers will have drivers, sometimes they just ship documentation and let it be up to the customers to write it, sometimes someone else contributed upstream support. When you get "drivers" from e.g. Lenovo, they didn't write them - they're just sending what they got along.
Nothing would work if there weren't drivers in general, the issue is that hardware can be configured in multiple ways and it's not all going to have have proper support or be well tested. In Linux land, this stuff sorts itself out as people get their hands on the hardware, pretty similar to how e.g. laptop support comes to be.
rjsw•59m ago
buyucu•56m ago
My guess is that they wanted the board to be available to devs early to get feedback. I might buy this board in a few months, when it will likely work out of the mainline kernel.