$199 4" x 4" AMD board with Open BIOS and GPIO expandability.

[Giles Orr]

On 25 January 2013 15:42, D. Hugh Redelmeier <hugh-pmF8o41NoarQT0dZR+AlfA at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> | From: Scott Sullivan <scott-lxSQFCZeNF4 at public.gmane.org>
>
> | http://www.gizmosphere.org/
>
> | I've seen a lot of boards come out lately that have had nifty feature sets,
> | but the lack of support usually means the die on the vine (Via APC.... *fume*)
>
> What's up with that?  Replaced by Rock and Paper?  Android instead of
> Linux (closed source drivers)?  Via historically hasn't been a good Linux
> player, at least with regards to video drivers.
>
> | Anyways, would like to see peoples thoughts and comments.
>
> I'm a cheapskate.  I don't think that this is too interesting because
> of the bargains I've found:
>
> - I have an Acer AO522 netbook with a similar "APU" (AMD C-50) for
>   $230 perhaps a year and a half ago.  This netbook came with a lot
>   more than that little board.
>
> - I bought three Foxconn nT-A3500 barebones "nettop" computers with
>   AMD E-350 APU at $100 each over a year ago.  I had to add RAM and
>   disk.  Very cute.
>         <http://www.foxconnchannel.com/ProductDetail.aspx?T=NanoPC&U=en-us0000001>
>   Newegg.ca sells them for $159.99 + $11.49 shipping at the moment.
>   I saw them somewhere for less on boxing day.
>   They are getting a bit long in the tooth.  But AMD's chips are not
>   improving much these days (sad!).
>
> I admit that a bare board can do things that netbooks and nettops
> cannot (and vice versa).  So maybe my reaction is irrelevant.
>
> I don't know what AMD G-Series APU is being used.  Oh, if you dig far
> enough, you find it is a G-Series T40e, one of the 2011 Brazos designs
> (like the C-50 and E-350 in my computers).  Dual core, 1GHz, 6.4W, so a
> lot like my C-50, but with lower power consumption.
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_Fusion>
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_AMD_Fusion_microprocessors#Brazos_.282011.29>
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_AMD_Fusion_microprocessors#Embedded_Processors>
>
> The APUs have decent graphics but there have been annoying problems.
> For example, AMD did not release specs to enable the open-source
> Radeon driver to put audio over HDMI, something necessary for an HTPC.
> That may have been solved by now (by reverse engineering) but it
> wasn't in a timely fashion for my needs.
>
> The proprietary driver didn't work with Ubuntu for a long time (may
> have been fixed by now) but Ubuntu didn't seem to care for over a year.
> <https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/nvidia-common/+bug/873058>

Got to agree with Hugh about prices.  Another thing I don't like is
the wattage required.  I didn't find any mention of the power draw,
but I feel sure these things pull down a LOT more power than the 2-3
watts the Raspberry Pi or mk802 pull down.  All you have to do is look
at those honking enormous heat sinks.  Sure, you probably get some
more computing power (exactly how much is a really interesting
question!) but if I'm going up that much in power, I'll take a nettop
in a case (if I can still find one ...).  It's an interesting idea,
but I think their competitors are the Pi and mk80[28], and it looks to
me like they've already lost.

-- 
Giles
http://www.gilesorr.com/
gilesorr-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org
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