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Re: [ts-7000] Re: About to give up

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Subject: Re: [ts-7000] Re: About to give up
From: "Breton M. Saunders" <>
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 2009 14:34:19 +0100
Dunge2 wrote:
> I agree with you there. TS sell a product, saying that it is amazing for 
> graphical application. You receive it, and stock from the shop it boot into 
> X11 with IceWM and simply pressing the "start" button takes about 5 second to 
> load. This is unacceptable, especially since when you seek a bit further you 
> see that the CPU is capable of much better, and that the OS shipped don't use 
> it.
>   
Actually, the CPU is pretty poor, and I don't think that EABI or crunch 
will help.  Even having the crunch patches installed and running I get 
inconsistent and incorrect FP results on basic test programs.  Busybox 
doesn't work properly when compiled for crunch.  Its a shame that Cirrus 
dropped its 94xx project, as it could have been an excellent replacement 
for the bug filled 93xx series.
> So, being a software developer you think (and not a linux guru), hey, I'll 
> install this EABI os, can't be that hard. Then you fall into a world of 
> cross-compilers, patches, error messages, mismatching versions. After having 
> tried 4-5 different paths unsuccessful, I emailed TS and asked them for help, 
> if they could provide a working developers environment. A few weeks later, 
> still no answer. Being in a "free software" world industry usually mean no 
> support for software, but this is a product they are making money with.
>   
This is a problem with ARM in general.  Unlike x86, one arm is not the 
same as the next: OABI/EABI/ armv4, v5, a8, etc...  they're all 
different in their own special ways.  With a modern x86, you get an 
ubuntu CD - you install on a CF card...done.  piece of cake.
> So I continue, and find out to use GTK+/X11 as announced on the TS website, 
> you would have to cross-compile a whole debian distribution, with a custom 
> patched gcc crosstool, including Xorg which, after searching a bit, you find 
> out probably nobody ever did it since a few years.
>
> So yeah, we are looking for another board. There are a lot of boards out 
> there with much better stats at the same price. Unfortunately, we need 
> extended temperature, a solid touchscreen, multiple serial ports, IO ports, 
> etc and only the TS boards seems to have it all.
>   
I'd strongly suggest that unless power efficiency is a strong 
requirement (e.g. battery powered) that you look to solving your problem 
with an x86 pc (e.g. nano-itx).  If you're still hell bent on making 
your life difficult, I'd suggest an arm board like the beagle board.  
Beagle comes with a distribution, an a 600MHz core - which will do 
decent graphics in x.

    -Brett



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