Building an ARM64 laptop [LWN.net]

Building an ARM64 laptop

Posted Sep 18, 2017 2:40 UTC (Mon) by pabs (subscriber, #43278)
In reply to: Building an ARM64 laptop by ardbiesheuvel
Parent article: Building an ARM64 laptop

Is the firmware open source?

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Building an ARM64 laptop

Posted Sep 29, 2017 13:55 UTC (Fri) by StefanBr (guest, #110916) [Link]

It can hardly be more closed than the abysmal clusterfuck of Qualcomm bootloaders/firmware.

Depending on the used processor, necessary firmware files are either not distributable at all (older processors), distributable under problematic terms, or "not yet" distributable [1].

Even if you have everything needed to start the board, you have to load some persistent binary blobs which are totally out of your control. Access privileges of e.g. the RPM are not documented.

The graphics are actually the *only* IP block which has a free driver. The audio DSP
can not even be used with the undistributable binary blobs, not even to speak of a free driver.

So if the reason for *not Intel* is freedom, then you should also say *not Qualcomm*.

[1] https://github.com/96boards/documentation/wiki/DragonBoar...