alt Hacker NewsI really wish these lists would talk about software support. If I buy these, do they have mainline Linux support? Will I have security patches in a year? Is there decent distro support, or am I stuck with the vendor's half broken default image?
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Hey! Author of the post someone linked here. Fair comment, though this wasn't really meant to be a review, or "go buy this!" type of post, it was more to highlight what I tested from the boards released in 2025 and share the results to those benchmarks via sbc.compare
Armbian do a great job of handling support for a whole host of boards (including most I included in this list), so you'll usually have Debian/Ubuntu-based flavours. Vendor kernels and vendor supplied images will be hit and miss. Mainline Linux support is a flag you filter by on the benchmark comparison site linked in the article, but it's a difficult one to keep up to date and define exactly. It could have some kind of support, but miss out on display functionality, or WiFi yada yada. What would we then class as having mainline support? All hardware etc functioning? If so, very, very few will meet that definition.
I get the desire for the information, and perhaps I should have envisioned these types of questions, but all I initially meant for the post to be was a recap for people following me to see which boards I'd tested that were released last year :D
Yes, software support is what kills projects for me. I have been burned on boards with terrible support before. No documentation and some Linux kernel patched by someone on crack. Usually the Chinese comments in the patches are a dead giveaway of where the software originated from.
I'm really curious what will happen to this space when Valve releases great open source drivers for the Qualcomm chip they have in the Steam Frame. It might be one of the first, very powerful, GPU accelerated SoC you can buy that has mainline support.
I can image having a very usable ARM linux laptop and tablet as a result of this — maybe even cellphone when the modems get mainlined or used via USB.
I've worked with many boards from many vendors for many years now...
If you need software to be available in 2, 3, 5 years, get a raspberry pi.
Some might have some software available, some might have patches, some may need manual compiling, some only support debian with 2.4 kernel, some have binary blobs that only work on that 2.4 kernel, some have working usb ports on 2.4 and no gpio, but working gpio with 2.6 kernel but no usb ports, etc.
Just get a raspberry pi.
Let me answer that for you: No, no, and yes (to the second part). Anything else?
I frequently come across comments from people who think raspberry pis are overpriced and you are better off buying from one of the numerous Chinese SBCs with better bang for the buck. Your comment is why these people are often wrong.
Most of those SBCs have very poor software support. You will often need to go on GitHub or the manufactuer's support website to hunt down an OS image that hopefully works. If you want to stay up to date, tough luck. You will be lucky if your board is still receiving updates two years after release.
In the meanwhile in raspberry pi land, you can just go to download a reasonably new OS image from their website anytime you want and it will run on all their models. Even the Pi 1 model B+ which is over ten years old still receives updates, and will continue to do so until at least 2030.
Unless reviewing and playing with random boards is your hobby or job, in which case more power to you and thank you for providing valuable information to the community, you are likely better off buying a boring raspi so you can just get things done.