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by wittrock 5040 days ago
It looks like the GPU on the RasPi is still more powerful, so the cheaper board might still be better for things like a media center application. I'm very curious though about what appears to be a SATA port on the Cubieboard.

Also, the RasPi has a huge initial advantage in that it was in the space first. They have a leg-up in publicity, marketing, and simply an initial user-base. If the Cubieboard benchmarks don't absolutely trounce the Raspberry Pi for almost every type of computation, I don't see the Cubieboard overtaking the Pi anytime soon.

Still, a cool board nonetheless.
2 comments
zokier 5040 days ago
> It looks like the GPU on the RasPi is still more powerful, so the cheaper board might still be better for things like a media center application.

Has either of them actually good (foss) drivers? At least Mali400 has "limadriver" project going on, quick googling didn't find anything for raspi.

Overall I'd love that Allwinner A10 got more attention, it seems fairly popular chip in cheapo chinese tablets. Getting GNU/Linux instead of Android for those would be neat.

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protospork 5040 days ago
>Has either of them actually good (foss) drivers?

I have to ask, what is the preoccupation with FOSS GPU drivers? Not just with boards like this, but even standard desktop hardware. Does anyone seriously think a firm like NVidia is going to illicitly slip spyware or something into their binaries?

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krzyk 5039 days ago
I can compare fglrx (used it for 2 years) and radeon (used for 2 months). And besides worse performance in 3D and smaller power consumption, fglrx is much worse and causes some problems with my laptop. Not to mention that when I used fglrx I was afraid to upgrade the kernel because it forces me to recompile fglrx module (with all the strange DKMS thingy which is very strange to me - I just want to "make install")
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pronoiac 5040 days ago
Open drivers are good for debugging and avoiding crashes, and for flexibility, re: Linux kernel versions and API changes over the lifetime of the device.
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zokier 5040 days ago
Actually you are right. The problem (from user point of view) is not licensing. The real issue is the drivers being out of tree, making them much more fragile. I'd like to be able to update kernel and/or xorg without having to worry if binary blobs explode on my face.
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ImprovedSilence 5040 days ago
In this space, I wouldn't be too worried about publicity/marketing just yet. Also, if the cubbie has less demand/quicker manufacture lead time, it will sell VERY well. Especially because of the huge backorder on the pi. At that price point, if I can order and get the cubbie now, or get a pi in 6 months, I'd get both. Also, in the hacker/hobbiest world, having one (or more) of each isn't infeasible.
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