Re: Is an ARM computer a good choice? Which one?
Well, I said barely qualified. I retired in 2009 from an IT job
(using and installing Windows) at a local college. With very few
exceptions I've run only Linux on my Pi 3bs since. When I can get a
Pi4 I'll be glad of the extra RAM and buy a few but I do everything on
these Pis. They won't compile something like Firefox, even with much
fiddling with swap.
I had a Pinebook Pro https://www.pine64.org/pinebook-pro/ until it had
a hinge failure and the spare parts situation is dubious but mine is
apart in a box. It would compile Firefox (rock64 also), a couple
other machines would too. I have a rock64
https://www.pine64.org/devices/single-board-computers/rock64/ These
are both Chinese, no Ampere Computing involved. But the RAM size on
every ARM machine I've had is limited to what's built into the SOC,
maybe some use an SODIMM or something now.
None of my computers have a fan, the Pis (and Zeros) will run on a
single 186500 lithium cell. Learning to program the GPU was goal of
mine but that's not portable. I don't have a 400 watt computer
anymore, my latest project is streaming MLB baseball games (on a Pi
3B).
On 3/20/23, Lionel Élie Mamane <lionel@mamane.lu> wrote:
> The Raspberrys have to me a reputation of being small cheap "slower"
> hackable mini-computers, not "workhorses". Have they scaled up that
> much since they were introduced?
>
> Is even the Raspberry Pi 4 even close to 'a beefy but quiet desktop
> that won't shy away from compiling e.g. LibreOffice'? I don't know
> what hardware it runs, but the buildd for arm64 took 17 hours to build
> LibreOffice
> https://buildd.debian.org/status/logs.php?pkg=libreoffice&ver=4%3A7.4.5-2&arch=arm64
> and from https://db.debian.org/machines.cgi
> the hardware seems to be sponsored by Ampere Computing, so maybe it
> uses one of their CPUs?
>
>
> Also, I'm worried about the memory. My current desktop has as 8.7GB to
> 10GB memory used when running "nothing in particular", no compilation,
> just Exim4 (+ bayesian spam filtering software when an email comes
> in), XFCE, Firefox, Emacs, terminal emulator / shell windows, mutt and
> a few instant messaging clients. And a Raspberry Pi 4 tops at 8GB?
>
>
> Or are you saying I should run that as a silent "terminal" to SSH into
> my real work machine? Which begs the question of what the work machine
> would be :)
>
>
> And any idea for a laptop?
>
> On Mon, Mar 20, 2023 at 08:16:26PM -0400, Alan Corey wrote:
>> This is a non-technical barely qualified opinion but yes. An easy
>> start is a Raspberry Pi, about a 3B ($35), it's what I'm typing on.
>> I've got 4 of them. And this one is running Debian, not Raspbian AKA
>> Raspberry Pi OS. The differences are tiny. Just get a monitor and
>> keyboard, a couple of SD cards about 32 GB or larger and a Pi. It's
>> easy to download your first image and get it booted, from there you
>> can experiment. Install Synaptic the package manager, after that you
>> search for applications and click on them to install.
>>
>> There is a Raspberry Pi 4 which is considerably better but relatively
>> rare due to the infamous chip shortage. I have other ARM machines too
>> but the Pi 3B is super reliable and straight forward. Try a $10 Zero
>> for a single core version, but have fun.
>>
>> On 3/20/23, Lionel Élie Mamane <lionel@mamane.lu> wrote:
>> > Would an ARM-based machine be a good freedom-respecting computer to
>> > run Debian on? I read the Raptor/Power guys saying modern ARM has
>> > freedom problems in a, but I haven't seen them go into specifics. Is
>> > it at least "not as bad" as amd64, with Intel's Management Engine and
>> > AMD's equivalent? Or is something like a System76 or Puri.sm
>> > amd64-based machine better / just as good?
>> >
>> > Do you have specific "ready to buy" (even if lead times are months,
>> > not year+) computers to recommend for that? For a laptop? For a
>> > "beefy" but quiet desktop that won't shy away from compiling
>> > e.g. LibreOffice?
>> >
>> > Will popular Debian software "generally work" or will I run into
>> > "many" situations like e.g. Firefox WebRTC doesn't work on Power and
>> > QT 5 doesn't work on Sparc64 (!!!)?
>> >
>> > I don't particularly want to get deep into being a porter, but I want
>> > a good desktop to run XFCE, emacs, mutt, gdal, Firefox ESR, etc,
>> > developing my pet software, maybe get back into LibreOffice (a beast
>> > to compile...) development and/or become active as Debian package
>> > maintainer again, flashing LineageOS to my Android pocket computers
>> > (smartphones) until a better alternative becomes usable, ...
>> >
>> > Thanks in advance for your advice,
>> >
>> >
>> >
>>
>>
>
>
--
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Education is contagious.
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