Ubuntu will not support RISC-V CPUs without RVA23 support going further, so this is stuck on 24.04 forever. There is no official Debian image either, and the Ubuntu version uses fixed kernel 6.6.47 with no further updates (it is not even installed from a repo).

I own one since a couple months ago but I already regret the purchase.

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haunter 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

>I own one since a couple months ago but I already regret the purchase.

This is me with every single SBC

	▲	antonkochubey 4 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I owned every generation of Raspberry Pi and I still use the 5, 4, 3, and even a 2 Model B. Their software/ecosystem support is unmatched by any other SBC line.
	▲	irusensei 4 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		My pair of RockPro64s refuse to go to the drawer. Every time they are about to retire something comes up that is the perfect job for those machines. One is currently running Scripted to integrate my unifi cameras to HomeKit. Zero fans. I've equipped the other one with 2 beefy 22TB HDDs, Tailscale and Minio. I'll send to my parent's house to act as remote backups.

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sidewndr46 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It's actually worse than that, even getting updates kills the image. I did manage to work around it. but overall I don't consider it a platform for anything I would depend on. It's fun for experimentation, that is about it

My notes from that little project are here -

https://www.hydrogen18.com/blog/orange-pi-rv2-first-look-ker...

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magicalhippo 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> this is stuck on 24.04 forever

But as a basis for IoT projects that's perfectly fine. They're meant to be install and forget.

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dotdi 4 days ago | parent [-]

only if you find it acceptable to have your IoT projects participate in botnets down the line, I guess.

	▲	magicalhippo 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		Distributed computing is a perfect fit for IoT devices which mostly sit idle. Put those cycles to use!

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dlcarrier 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Ubuntu is the worst of the Debian based Linux distributions. Give MX Linux a try. It's rarely evangelized, unlike other Linux distributions, but it has a surprisingly high user base, and for good reason. Everything it has added to Debian enhances it, and it doesn't try to promote any services, like Ubuntu does with Canonical's services.

Regardless of the Linux distribution, it's still way to early to get good support for RISC-V. Current products are good enough for general development, but RVA23 was ratified less than a year ago, and I don't know of any designs started after the ratification that have hit the market yet. Once that's the case, it should be easier to get universal support, but until then, every RISC-V SBC is a one-off development board.

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RainyDayTmrw 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Kinda tricky. Last time this came up, the consensus was that approximately nothing commercially available supported RVA23 at the time.

	▲	brucehoult 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		No. EXACTLY nothing. The RVA23 spec was ratified 11 months ago, today. There is zero reason to expect commercially available hardware in that time. However there should be next year, and quite likely a couple of different choices by the time Ubuntu 26.04 LTS is officially released. Waiting until 28.04 for RVA23-optimised code would be far too late.

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proxysna 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Building Debian for this board is pretty easy nowadays. You can also find prebuilt images.

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mwcampbell 4 days ago | parent [-]

Want to share any links, particularly about building one's own Debian image? I'm especially curious about the bootloader.

	▲	proxysna 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		https://romanrm.net/rv-debian A good example. There is also a link to builscripts.

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ge96 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Funny how software matters I bought a specific eink tablet and the lag and choppiness in drawing made me immediately sell it for something more well known.

Sucked too as I lost $300 but hopefully helps open source community anyway