[Skywatch]

New pi3 is announced (and no doubt why there is a shtorage of Pi zeros' out there).

64bit proc, 1.2GHz + onboard wifi and bluetooth.

S.

[Nachteule]

Not really the hit

No GBit LAN, no SATA, no H.265, no USB3, no 2GB RAM, and still the ridiculous bottleneck USB2 bridge - it's only a little bit better RPi2

Very disappointing ...

[Skywatch]

Yes I agree. It is obviously aimed at a different 'educational' market to us here!

No MCLK for the highest end dac boards either, bummer!

That said, porting of some decent 64bit apps should be interesting (and many games too for those not interested in education)!

You have to wonder how they come up with the specs they do when we all want a real game changer like the original pi was a few years ago!

I would rather have 6 Pi Zeros than one of these, but I can't because there aren't any for sale! I bet the production line has been making these instead. Humph!


Skywatch...

[IriDium]

I would imagine, that an awful lot of work would be required to convert Xbian to utilise 64 bit? So apart from the extra CPU I can't see any real benefit over the RPi2

[Nachteule]

Yes, agree - it would be a lot or work

But i'm sure we have go go this way sooner or later ...

[Exnor]

Is it really necessary to convert any part of the code? I mean if you don't need to use ARMv8 instructions this new SoC provides full backward support for v7l (at least that is what the foundation is stating)...

Yes its not perfect but c'mon guys... really? It's the same price as the Model 2 and comes with onboard WLAN + BT chipset plus new Cortex A53. What is the downside here? Can anyone explain it to me?
If this one was more expensive, yes i would agree with the fact it still uses the same GPU, plus USB2, plus no SATA, etc etc etc ...

[Nachteule]

It is not necessary. It has been done on x86 system for years (running 32bit software/os on 64bit cpu)

But my understanding is that you will get more speed if you'll run native 64bit software

And you're right - getting more hardware and more power for the same price - why not. But its is not a RPi3, it is only a RPi2+
(but of course - RPi3 sounds much better)

[f1vefour]

It's a nice bump.

They will be hard to come by for some time. Who is doing the ordering for the XBian crew

I have been using another yet to be released board that made the jump to A53 and there will be some growing pains to utilize 64bit. Particularly GCC.

Using a 64bit kernel on the current 32bit software isn't an issue at least.

[Nachteule]

Surprise, surprise

Already available and on stock at different german resellers

[f1vefour]

(1st Mar, 2016 09:03 AM)Nachteule Wrote:  Surprise, surprise

Already available and on stock at different german resellers

Lucky European's

I don't understand why the US can never get stock.

[Nachteule]

Yeah, DE is closer to GB than US

And it's really unbelievable - has the same price, only RPI2 is becoming cheaper now

[menakite]

Pi Foundation doesn't provide any 64 bit kernel for Pi 3. You can't have 64 bit userland on a 32 bit kernel.
A Pi 2 image with a recent firmware works as it understands ARMv7 instructions.

[Nachteule]

IMO a new kernel has to be built (already did it locally) because a new .dtb file is needed in /boot

[Exnor]

(3rd Mar, 2016 02:52 AM)Nachteule Wrote:  IMO a new kernel has to be built (already did it locally) because a new .dtb file is needed in /boot

Well to use the new ARMv8 of course... but it should work with the ARMv7 image of the Pi2 no?

Yes i know it will not use 64 bit mode/advantages... but it's still a Cortex A53 vs a A7 .

[Nachteule]

Quote:Well to use the new ARMv8 of course... but it should work with the ARMv7 image of the Pi2 no?

I really don't know what happens if this .dtb file is missing (it is needed for the firmware boot loader to enable hardware devices)
I t may work but I would expect strange things ...

Quote:Yes i know it will not use 64 bit mode/advantages... but it's still a Cortex A53 vs a A7 .

Exactly