[egberts1]

As a veteran embedded engineer, I was shock to see that another variant of boot loader is being recommended.

I’m quite sure that the bootloop is more than fixable but have my doubts that SPI is not that option.

Tow-wut? Sounds something like “extoll-embrace-engulf” and Balkanization to me. Not to stand in the way, but if that fixes the low-charge/bootloop problem then so be it but it doesn’t.

Still have the PinePhone Classic, still works, on my anti-static pad, but it may not serve us much longer.

[NoahKAndrews]

Tow-Boot is actually a really exciting project that wants to make it so that distributions don't have to manage device-specific u-boot packages for ARM devices, and can instead provide generic images like they do on x86.

[NoahKAndrews]

Also, Tow-Boot is just a u-boot distribution that sticks pretty close to upstream.

[candiddevmike]

What is the current state of bootloaders for ARM?

[Avamander]

Abysmal. If these devices were UEFI, this discussion wouldn't exist.

[robotnikman]

This right here. As much as I would love to see more faster and powerful ARM processors come to laptops and desktops in the future, I dread the current ARM bootloader situation coming along with it.

[yjftsjthsd-h]

It's my understanding that Tow-Boot implements UEFI

[preisschild]

Depends which device tbh.

If the device has the "ARM System Ready" certification it will run most linux distros just by using an arm build, similar to amd64.

Tianocore/EDK2 also supports many devices and adds a BIOS/UEFI that is similar to the BIOS you'd see on your typical amd64 mainboard.

[MartijnBraam]

Messy