Re: FreeBSD on Star64 from Pine64

On 5/27/25 11:21, Rich Dunkle wrote:
>  From that attached log file.  This board claims it is a StarFive 
> VisionFive V2.
> The u-boot date is very old.  You might have to update that as well.
> 
> Maybe the standard --> jh7110-starfive-visionfive-2-v1.3b.dtb
> will work.
> 
> Sometimes, using a dtb file from a Linux distribution will work.
> Easier to get somebody to email a working dtb.
> 

It may be helpful to say that "DTB" is a Device Tree Blob thing which
has a pile of closed source proprietary device stuff. RISC-V may be a
very cool "open" platform but dealing with PCIE interfaces and such is
a whole other matter.

I have both the SiFive UnMatched RevB and also the new P550 board. The
UnMatched is running FreeBSD 15.0-CURRENT neatly and slowly. Even runs
as a poudriere build process for itself. You need that. The UnMatched
RevB board needs over 4 days to build RUST and a modified kernel with
compatibility back to FreeBSD 11. With regards to lang/rust :

     "... a triply-niche platform: an alternative programming
      language, on an alternative operating system, on an emerging CPU
      architecture."

     See https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=281600#c25

The P550 is a nightmare to deal with. Sadly polluted with Ubuntu but it
ships with a very up to date DTB stuff and OpenSBI and U-Boot and even
GRUB. I did ask on this mail list if anyone had taken a kick at it but
there was only silence. RISC-V is still a prototype at best but at least
the SiFive P550 is about 75% the performance of Raspberry Pi5. Mostly.


-- 
--
Dennis Clarke
RISC-V/SPARC/PPC/ARM/CISC
UNIX and Linux spoken