When it comes to the term ‘Raspberry Pi clones’, the most that they really clone is the form factor, as nobody is creating clones of Broadcom VideoCore-based SoCs. At least not if they want to stay safe from Broadcom’s vicious legal team. That said, the Walnut Pi 1B single-board computer (SBC) that [Silly Workshop] recently took a gander at seems to be taking a fairly typical approach to a Raspberry Pi 4 form factor compatible board.
Part of Walnut Pi’s line-up, the Allwinner H616/H168-equipped 1B feels like it takes hints from both the RPi 4B and the Asus Tinkerboard, especially with its nicely colored GPIO pins. There’s also a beefier Walnut Pi 2B with an Allwinner T527 SoC that’s not being reviewed here. Translating the Chinese-language documentation for the board suggests that either the H616 or H618 may be installed, with both featuring a quad-core Cortex-A53, so in the ballpark of the Raspberry Pi 3.
There are also multiple RAM configurations, ranging from 1 GB of DDR3 to 4 GB of LPDDR4, with the 1 GB version being fun to try and run benchmarks like GeekBench on. Ultimately the impression was that it’s just another Allwinner SoC-based board, with a half-hearted ‘custom’ Linux image, no hardware acceleration due to missing (proprietary) Allwinner IP block drivers, etc.
While cheaper than a Raspberry Pi SBC, if you need anything more than the basic Allwinner H61* support and Ethernet/WiFi, there clearly are better options, some of which may even involve repurposing an e-waste Android TV box.
Form factor alone is useful in opening all the boxes up for use. If it copies the rest then there are HATs now available.
The problems start, I’m told, when you want to run an up to date version of Linux and not just whatever came with the board.
Does the video even mention OpenGL support for this board? I don’t believe it does.
The state of software support for its hardware features is the difference between the Raspberry Pi and these toys.
The video shows that the image provided by the manufacturer uses software rendering (llvmpipe). Mainline Linux supports using the GPU in this SoC since version 6.15 (see https://linux-sunxi.org/Linux_mainlining_effort).
But HDMI is still not supported, so this must be the kernel provided by Allwinner.
not only that, you need to download it from a shady file sharing service…
Oh come now. You don’t trust a Chinese semi-conductor and smart devices manufacturer that apparently has been promoting open-source and at the same time putting backdoors within your tech? The NERVE, sir.
Nope – H616 is mostly mainline – https://linux-sunxi.org/H616
mostly
With a name like Walnut, I would expect nothing less than a fine wooden case suitable for display.
Turned wooden pens would like a word with you.
it’s too bad there isn’t an economic way anymore to ship with less (but not orders of magnitude less) RAM; would help a lot on these prices and make it more reasonable to switch to these lesser SBCs. my private servers all have no less than 1GB, but none use more than 400MB. my complicated public web/email/radio server on bloated Ubuntu uses ~2GB of 32GB (1.37GB rn with a couple people remotely playing with the SDRs). Unless you need to run a desktop on it, or transcode video, or load LLMs in, I don’t have use of so much RAM on SBCs.
The RAM is almost certainly part of the SoC, which is probably a multichip package with a RAM die sitting next to the CPU die in the main package; different memory options are only provided as different SKUs of the main chip. Those packages typically don’t have enough pins to support any meaningful external RAM interface.
The BGA chips next to the MCU is RAM.
Yeah. I agree. The 1GB RPI-5 boards is overkill for a lot of headless projects and even simple GUI projects. Glad they at least released 1GB boards to keep the cost down for those of us that don’t need much memory.
Oh, I’ll just stick with RPI SBCs over the Walnut SBCs. No need/want to go there.
That’s kind of where I am. I don’t know how things are nowadays but I surveyed rpi competitors a while back. Almost all of them had no longevity, community making patches, or real plans for support.
Most of my use cases are simple but there’s nothing sadder than functional hardware bricked due to software. Or spending hundred hours on an unfun project to save 5 bucks.
Speaking of that, I just got a RG353V. This is neat because it is a hand held device that has two joysticks and a bunch of buttons to interface too in a nice compact space. Supports Wifi and Bluetooth. Plus a nice screen…. and it runs on Linux. So far so good! But when I went to download a copy of the Linux it is using, the site says the ArkOS is no longer being maintained, but can still download the last good version…. There is that ‘longevity’ you are talking about…. There is a dArkOS taking it over. Note, reason for all this, is I will be developing stuff for it, so don’t want to be writing to the original SD card. Use my own… However last night, I tried to load the Trixie dArkOS image and it wouldn’t boot. Today, I tried the last good image from ArkOS and that does boot. So, I am good for what I want to use this device for (a robotic controller, not games)… but no OS ‘upgrade’ path (that works) available to me now. I am able to connect via ssh, change default password, add user, upload files via sftp, and tested all the buttons, joy sticks. Really cool. It will be useful, but with the one caveat of OS not being maintained.
To me it seems like a 1GB Pi 5 is actually pushing rather too small a RAM capacity already – if you really don’t need even 1GB or RAM I really doubt you need the Pi 5 computing horsepower. So something cheaper and less powerful entirely like a Pi Zero might well be a better fit for the task.
I’m sure there are reasons out there you will need the compute but not the RAM, but it seems rather niche.
It is not necessarily the horsepower. Part of it is connectivity. RPI-5 has two ethernet interfaces out of the box (Wifi and Hardwire). I have two networks here, one for the home devices and one for the internet. An RPI-5 Has 2 USB 3.0 ports, and 2 USB 2.0 Ports. All independent. Useful for external USB devices like GPS, or SSD drives, sound adapter, microphones, or powering/interfacing to other micro-controllers … Don’t get that with a Zero 2. You don’t need a lot of RAM for a data server, or a PiDP system simulator, Pi-Hole, etc. Yet, you do want connectivity and a little horsepower. Of course all support the GPIO which goes without saying is a necessary for a lot of projects.
To me, ‘needing’ RAM is niche :) . Only if you are browsing the current bloated web, or playing around with the bloated, so called, AI stuff. Otherwise …what do you need all the RAM for? My RPIs are for projects, not desktops. Mostly run headless. BTW I do use Pico, Pico 2, Fruit Jam, and other rp2350/rp2040 boards as sufficient for little robotic projects. It’s a great time to be hacking.
Respect! I’m coming from the other side. I want to build dedicated process (transcode video, load LLMs, etc.) boxes: more RAM (16GB, 32GB, etc.) and 10G ethernet.
how many cents do you think removing 500MB would save?
Recently bought a walnut pi compute module in a fit of curiousity and madness. I assumed it would work on a raspberry pi compute module 4 carrier board. So far all I have managed is to get a little red light to shine.
if you want something that works effortlessly with the pi ecosystem, that’s what pi is really good at :)