2022-01-31 16:00:00 +0200 +0200
As previously reported, we have
successfully completed and tested the switch to a pure
Debian 11 based ARMv8 (arm64, aarch64)
operating system.
Compared to the Raspberry Pi OS, which relies on an
outdated ARMv6 build for compatibility reasons, the
performance has increased by 30% on
average.
Furthermore, we can now use special CPU functions
like
ARM NEON SIMD, which have great performance
advantages especially when processing streams
(compression, encryption). Hardware virtualization
support is now also possible.
By the way, we could not determine a higher RAM
consumption, as often assumed.
The ARMv8 update for the Github projects has not been
released yet, but will follow soon.
In the process of the operating system
change we have also changed the basic file
system to BTRFS.
This change enables full live snapshot
support, this means that you can save, backup
and reset the state of the current system at any
time.
Another interesting BTRFS feature we enabled is
transparent LZO compression.
Since the I/O controller of the Raspberry Pi is
comparatively slow compared to the CPU, using it
increases the sequential R/W speed by up to
400% and the random R/W by up to
200%. The prerequisite for this is that the
data can be compressed, already compressed data and
particularly small files are automatically
optimized.
Furthermore we have started to
adapt and finalize our openHAB addons to the latest
openHAB 3.2 release.
These will be published as soon as we have finalized
our RESTful APIs to avoid unnecessary rework.
Another positive news we can give
regarding our prototypes, with the receipt and
verification of the last mainboard revision, the
hardware development phase is considered
complete.
From now on only minor production relevant corrections
are planned and of course future module extensions.
As soon as the pre-series production is completed,
there will be nothing standing in the way of a
beta.
One of the next steps is the testing of the platform according to the CE/FCC standards. Since the radio components are already certified and we have developed according to EMC guidelines from the beginning, we hope for a smooth process.
Last there is a rather bad news
regarding the expected availability of the
products.
Like all manufacturers in the electronics industry, we
are struggling with major problems in component
availability, especially as a small manufacturer, the
prices, which have increased tenfold in some cases, are
unmanageable.
Unfortunately, the situation has become even worse
since last year and series production (the pre-series
has already been completed) will probably not be
possible until the second half of the year.