My APU2 has been super solid for years. Lots of options for OS too because it’s x86_64. The images on the website don’t do it justice, the aluminium case is effective and pretty.
It’s sad to see this go in a world where ARM/etc boards are not standardised enough to allow one OS image to boot all of them.
Do you happen to know whether this is also true of RISC-V boards? I was hoping that some standards analogous to BIOS / UEFI, ACPI, PCI, etc. might emerge in that space. Perhaps driven by the IBM 5150 of RISC-V, if such a thing emerges.
I think it’s far too early to say. Most production usages of RISC-V so far have been microcontrollers, and the boot process / peripherals aren’t remotely comparable to those of a desktop system. Of the SBCs released, I think they’re mostly running u-boot/UEFI (at least the Beagle V prototype I have lying around collecting dust does)
ARM is slowly getting to a similar state as x86 with the adoption of UEFI/SBSA. I’d imagine when RISC-V comes to laptops/desktops, it’ll probably use some form of UEFI as well.
UEFI is far from the worst thing we could end up with, but I really wish the world had standardized years ago on OpenFirmware (It was already an IEEE standard! You could write bootsectors and drivers in FORTH!)|
I have 4 APU2’s running next to me (1 as a router, the rest in various infra roles, like PXE boot server, etc). I can’t remember buying another piece of hardward where everything worked as described and I didn’t have any complaints. Well, maybe validated ECC support would be nice.
Definitely sad to see this end. Better to stock up for another decade.
Definitely sad to see this end. Better to stock up for another decade.
Depending on your needs, letting go and moving with the mainstream might be another option. I used routers running open-source firmware (mostly OpenWrt) for several years, but a couple of years ago, when I moved and switched ISPs, I decided to just use the ISP-provided modem/router. I’ve concluded that what I create for others is more important than what I use myself, and I don’t work in low-level networking, so a stock consumer Internet gateway suits me just fine.
That, and the quality of them has gone up a lot. The plastic router your ISP used to give you sucked, now it’s more than adequate. I don’t really relish wanting more infrastructure, so having to massage pf.conf or an enterprise UBNT installation isn’t too appealing.
As this completely depends on your ISP I am not buying that argument. There will always be people who can’t work with the default ones and there will always be highly technical users who can.
Oh man. After figuring out how to use OpenBSD as a college apartment router on an old PowerMac G4 that I’d picked up for $5, I moved that setup to a PC Engines ALIX to save on power. That ran for many years without any problems, and I only switched to the APU2 for better performance.
I’ve been running that APU2 for over six years now, and it’s never had a problem either. I’m really sad to see this line of passively-cooled small-form-factor PCs go.
I bought one of their WRAP boards many, many years ago. It booted from a 512 MiB Compact Flash card and has a mini-PCI WiFi card. It ran OpenBSD and served as my home router and gateway until Internet and WiFi speeds grew to the point that its CPU couldn’t keep up. There was some weirdness with the BIOS, but otherwise a great machine. Most folks were buying Soekris boards back the, which were similar but much more expensive.
Despite having used considerable quantities of AMD processors and Intel NICs, we don’t get adequate design support for new projects. In addition, the x86 silicon currently offered is not very appealing for our niche of passively cooled boards. After about 20 years of WRAP, ALIX and APU, it is time for me to move on to different things.
This hits me. APU platform is old, ending sales of it isn’t surprising. Lack of a successor is deeply saddening.
If you just want a small low power x86 system to use as a router there are cheap NUC sized machines on Aliexpress that’ll do (servethehome.com has reviews on a bunch). But they aren’t real replacement for the APU with its support for open firmware like coreboot.
There are also other, cheaper alternatives to the APU that uses the same (more or less) CPU, like the Fujitsu Futro S920. Mine is equipped with an AMD GX-415GA, has a PCIe slot and costed me 35 EURO, including a power adapter. I’m using Debian and nftables on it, and it’s routing gigabit without issues.
I read it as the business is a single guy doing everything, maybe two or three at most. Moving on to other things to me means he won’t be doing custom computers like that anymore.
I always liked the idea of PC Engines small fanless computers/motherboards … but one thing always bothered me - they were really pricey.
On the other hand - there are other multiple choices that serve similar role as PC Engines.
For example I recently switched to Dell Wyse 3030 LT boxes which are very cheap (20-30$ for used one) and they draw very little amount of power (3.8-4.2W measured with physical watt-o-meter).
My APU2 has been super solid for years. Lots of options for OS too because it’s x86_64. The images on the website don’t do it justice, the aluminium case is effective and pretty.
It’s sad to see this go in a world where ARM/etc boards are not standardised enough to allow one OS image to boot all of them.
Do you happen to know whether this is also true of RISC-V boards? I was hoping that some standards analogous to BIOS / UEFI, ACPI, PCI, etc. might emerge in that space. Perhaps driven by the IBM 5150 of RISC-V, if such a thing emerges.
U-boot is pretty much the universal bootloader. You get a kernel, device tree, and united for a board and you can boot pretty much any userspace.
The thing that will always be missing without x86_64 is the decades of backward compatibility.
Still, once Debian runs on anything, it’s pretty much all that I will ever want or need.
I think it’s far too early to say. Most production usages of RISC-V so far have been microcontrollers, and the boot process / peripherals aren’t remotely comparable to those of a desktop system. Of the SBCs released, I think they’re mostly running u-boot/UEFI (at least the Beagle V prototype I have lying around collecting dust does)
ARM is slowly getting to a similar state as x86 with the adoption of UEFI/SBSA. I’d imagine when RISC-V comes to laptops/desktops, it’ll probably use some form of UEFI as well.
UEFI is far from the worst thing we could end up with, but I really wish the world had standardized years ago on OpenFirmware (It was already an IEEE standard! You could write bootsectors and drivers in FORTH!)|
No sorry, I have not bought any Linux capable RISC hardware yet. I only have experience with ARM boards.
I have 4 APU2’s running next to me (1 as a router, the rest in various infra roles, like PXE boot server, etc). I can’t remember buying another piece of hardward where everything worked as described and I didn’t have any complaints. Well, maybe validated ECC support would be nice.
Definitely sad to see this end. Better to stock up for another decade.
Depending on your needs, letting go and moving with the mainstream might be another option. I used routers running open-source firmware (mostly OpenWrt) for several years, but a couple of years ago, when I moved and switched ISPs, I decided to just use the ISP-provided modem/router. I’ve concluded that what I create for others is more important than what I use myself, and I don’t work in low-level networking, so a stock consumer Internet gateway suits me just fine.
That, and the quality of them has gone up a lot. The plastic router your ISP used to give you sucked, now it’s more than adequate. I don’t really relish wanting more infrastructure, so having to massage pf.conf or an enterprise UBNT installation isn’t too appealing.
As this completely depends on your ISP I am not buying that argument. There will always be people who can’t work with the default ones and there will always be highly technical users who can.
Oh man. After figuring out how to use OpenBSD as a college apartment router on an old PowerMac G4 that I’d picked up for $5, I moved that setup to a PC Engines ALIX to save on power. That ran for many years without any problems, and I only switched to the APU2 for better performance.
I’ve been running that APU2 for over six years now, and it’s never had a problem either. I’m really sad to see this line of passively-cooled small-form-factor PCs go.
I bought one of their WRAP boards many, many years ago. It booted from a 512 MiB Compact Flash card and has a mini-PCI WiFi card. It ran OpenBSD and served as my home router and gateway until Internet and WiFi speeds grew to the point that its CPU couldn’t keep up. There was some weirdness with the BIOS, but otherwise a great machine. Most folks were buying Soekris boards back the, which were similar but much more expensive.
Sad to see them go.
Mine ran M0n0wall! It was a great platform until I got GbE at home… then it was woefully underpowered.
Is there any news on whether they will produce another board like this using different SoCs? Or is the company closing up shop entirely?
From the link
This hits me. APU platform is old, ending sales of it isn’t surprising. Lack of a successor is deeply saddening.
If you just want a small low power x86 system to use as a router there are cheap NUC sized machines on Aliexpress that’ll do (servethehome.com has reviews on a bunch). But they aren’t real replacement for the APU with its support for open firmware like coreboot.
There are also other, cheaper alternatives to the APU that uses the same (more or less) CPU, like the Fujitsu Futro S920. Mine is equipped with an AMD GX-415GA, has a PCIe slot and costed me 35 EURO, including a power adapter. I’m using Debian and nftables on it, and it’s routing gigabit without issues.
Yes, I can read. Does “moving on to different things” mean different SoCs / architectures, or a completely different business?
I read it as the business is a single guy doing everything, maybe two or three at most. Moving on to other things to me means he won’t be doing custom computers like that anymore.
I always liked the idea of PC Engines small fanless computers/motherboards … but one thing always bothered me - they were really pricey.
On the other hand - there are other multiple choices that serve similar role as PC Engines.
For example I recently switched to Dell Wyse 3030 LT boxes which are very cheap (20-30$ for used one) and they draw very little amount of power (3.8-4.2W measured with physical watt-o-meter).
Some details here:
Regards.