After our earlier announcement on the provision of Ubuntu working on RISC-V processors and {hardware}, we’re proud to announce the Ubuntu launch for added RISC-V {hardware} – Allwinner’s Nezha board.
RISC-V, a brand new paradigm for open supply {hardware}
Within the final decade, open supply and open requirements have reshaped our world. Such applied sciences have produced long-lasting outcomes and the RISC-V consortium has prolonged open supply to develop an ordinary open-source processor structure. The discharge of RISC-V to the open neighborhood marked the primary time the {hardware} neighborhood embraced open-source requirements and collaboration at this stage.
This free and open Instruction Set Structure (ISA) can allow a brand new period of processor innovation by means of open normal collaboration with speedy industry-wide adoption. The RISC-V ISA delivers a brand new stage of free, extensible software program and {hardware} freedom on structure. The structure may be utilized to a broad vary of processors, from low-end microcontrollers to high-end server-grade processors.
Allwinner and Alibaba enhance RISC-V options and efficiency
D1 is Allwinner’s first SoC based mostly on the RISC-V ISA designed for multimedia decoding platforms. Working on Linux, RTOS and different methods, D1 integrates Alibaba T-Head’s 64-bit core and helps RVV and 1GHz frequency. On the similar time, it helps as much as 4K H.265/H.264 decoding, a built-in HiFi4 DSP, and an exterior connection of as much as 2GB DDR3, which can be utilized in lots of fields corresponding to sensible vehicles, HMI, Sensible dwelling and training.
Nezha is an AIoT improvement board based mostly on Allwinner’s D1 chip. It’s the world’s first mass-produced improvement board that helps the 64-bit RISC-V instruction set and a Linux system.
Open supply initiatives are backed by Canonical
Whereas RISC-V permits secure reference architectures and {hardware}, working secure software program on new boards can nonetheless be difficult. The cornerstone of the required software program is the underlying Working System (OS), which offers reliability and stability. This demand makes improvement on Linux much more engaging, since Linux is the most well-liked OS for builders and hobbyists, throughout kernel, drivers, and distributions.
At Canonical, we imagine that open supply is one of the simplest ways to speed up innovation. It motivates us to allow a variety of open supply communities beneath the Ubuntu umbrella. Nevertheless, open supply software program comes with its personal set of challenges. Canonical goals to place Ubuntu as not simply the reference OS for innovators and builders, but additionally because the automobile to allow them to take their merchandise to market sooner by letting them give attention to their core software with out having to fret in regards to the stability of the underlying frameworks.
RISC-V has quite a lot of potential and is changing into a aggressive ISA in a number of markets. With this premise in thoughts, porting Ubuntu to RISC-V to develop into the reference OS for early adopters was the pure alternative.
Allwinner, Alibaba and Canonical carry Ubuntu to the Nezha board
“It’s nice to see that Canonical has ported the Ubuntu working system onto Allwinner’s RISC-V structure chip. That is thrilling information and shall be a brand new milestone for RISC-V structure and the Ubuntu working system,” stated Shaorui Huang, Common Supervisor of Product R&D Middle of Know-how at Allwinner. “RISC-V has develop into increasingly more in style lately because of its architectural benefits, however there are nonetheless some shortcomings. For instance, there’s a lack of improvement platforms supporting Linux methods, and the software program ecosystem will not be excellent. Canonical’s improvement group ported Ubuntu to the Nezha improvement board, which is predicted to additional develop RISC-V purposes and supply extra comfort for builders and enterprises. We’re very glad to carry this high-power RISC-V computing platform to Ubuntu. Sooner or later, Allwinner will proceed to put money into the high-performance area of RISC-V structure and proceed to inject impetus into the event of the Ubuntu ecosystem.”
The provision of Ubuntu working on the Nezha board comes as the results of the joint work between Canonical, Alibaba and Allwinner. Canonical’s engineering group is within the means of porting Ubuntu to the Nezha board, backed by the Alibaba and Allwinner engineering group, as a part of a long-term collaboration between the three firms.
Ubuntu, backed by Canonical, offers a commercial-grade Linux distribution free to make use of by innovators and builders. “We’re thrilled that, by means of our collaboration with Alibaba and Allwinner we’re bringing the good expertise offered by Ubuntu to the Nezha improvement platform. Our open supply working system will present a novel entry level to a variety of purposes, and allow the ecosystem to create progressive options on our accomplice’s RISC-V platforms.”, stated Cindy Goldberg, Vice President of Silicon Alliance at Canonical.
Ubuntu on Nezha boards is on the market now
Ubuntu picture is now accessible for Allwinner’s Nezha board, and extra work is predicted to incorporate new options and a port to the most recent Ubuntu releases.
Allwinner’s Nezha board is supported by Ubuntu 22.04.1. Obtain the most recent Ubuntu photos for Allwinner’s Nezha board right here.
For steering and dialogue on the photographs and the perfect methods to put in them, please use the Ubuntu discourse beneath the documentation itself so everybody can profit out of your expertise.
About Canonical
Canonical is the writer of Ubuntu, the main OS for container, cloud, and hyperscale computing. Ubuntu is the OS for many public cloud workloads in addition to the rising classes of sensible gateways, self-driving vehicles and superior robots. Canonical offers enterprise safety, assist, and providers to industrial customers of Ubuntu. Established in 2004, Canonical is a privately held firm.
About Allwinner
Allwinner Know-how, based in 2007, is an excellent designer devoted to clever software SoC, excessive efficiency analog elements and wi-fi connectivity IC. It’s headquartered in Zhuhai China, with different R&D facilities and workplaces in Shenzhen, HongKong, Xi’an, Beijing and Shanghai.
About Alibaba T-head
Based on September 19, 2018, T-Head Semiconductor Co., Ltd. is a wholly-owned semiconductor chip enterprise entity of Alibaba Group. T-Head possesses the terminal-cloud built-in full stack product collection corresponding to AI chip, CPU Processor IP, and so on., overlaying end-to-end chip design course of.
