Re: What ARM hardware should we buy and where should we host it?

[Steve McIntyre <steve@einval.com>]

Hey Vagrant!

On Mon, Sep 03, 2018 at 10:59:38AM -0700, Vagrant Cascadian wrote:
>On 2018-09-03, Ricardo Wurmus wrote:
>> The first question is what ARM hardware to buy; the second is where to
>> host that hardware.  Here are some considerations:
>>
>> - The new systems should be easy to host in a data centre; this might
>>   mean that we need rack-mounted servers, or that we need a co-location
>>   data centre that accepts machines with unusual form factors.
>>
>> - The system should be able to build substitutes for both armhf and
>>   aarch64.  Not all aarch64 CPUs support building for armhf, for
>>   example.
>>
>> - We need to be able to restart the machine remotely.  If members of the
>>   Guix project have no physical access to the hosting site, this can be
>>   done via remote-controlled power supply or similar.
>
>Debian also has similar needs for build machines and is currently
>exploring new hardware. There was a pretty good summary a few months
>back:
>
>  https://lists.debian.org/debian-arm/2018/06/msg00062.html
>
>One of the most promising seems to be the SynQuacer:
>
>  https://www.96boards.org/product/developerbox/
>
>With a 24-core processor, SATA, PCIe, USB 3.0, micro-atx form-factor,
>and 4 ram slots (up to 64GB, in theory, but may be picky about
>ram).
>
>Sounds like they're working with Debian's 4.17.x kernels, so should have
>reasonable mainline linux support.
>
>Steve McIntyre (CCed) has been rebuilding debian with them to test them
>out, and my impression is it's been going pretty well. Might be more
>details in the Debian ARM ports BoF video:
>
>  https://debconf18.debconf.org/talks/93-arm-ports-bof/
>
>
>> One system that looks promising for co-location is the Softiron
>> Overdrive 3000 (a rack-mounted ARM server.)  A system suitable for
>> hosting at home is the Softiron Overdrive 1000.
>
>It does sound like the processors used in the Overdrive systems are
>officially EOL, but maybe there are still enough of them that SoftIron
>will continue to support them for a while. I'll see if I can follow-up
>on that, too.

Other people I've been talking to have been struggling a lot to get
hold of any Overdrive-based systems. I'm honestly surprised there are
any left, to be honest!

-- 
Steve McIntyre, Cambridge, UK.                                steve@einval.com
Dance like no one's watching. Encrypt like everyone is.
 - @torproject