On Dec 1, 2020, at 2:18 PM, austin <[email protected]> wrote: > https://erik-engheim.medium.com/why-is-apples-m1-chip-so-fast-3262b158cba2 > > I wonder what this means to the future of independent operating systems.
I wouldn’t despair too much. Marcan is already working on a Linux port: https://www.macrumors.com/2020/11/30/linux-apple-silicon-port-patreon/ Anybody who has an extra $700 laying around (certainly not me in the COVID-19 era, and I’m sure many fewer others than before — but hopefully not all of us) can donate an M1 mini to OpenBSD. Apparently the GPU is expected to be the toughest nut to crack, with a bare-bones bootable port using existing ARM code probably comparable to the introduction of any new platform. I’ll bet a cup of coffee — but certainly no more than that — that, if hardware donations are made in a timely manner, somebody will have the OpenBSD kernel running on an M1 before the end of 2021. How long for it to be officially supported by OpenBSD/arm64 I won’t pretend to speculate. Nor do I care to speculate on how long it’ll be after it’s officially supported before all the SoC “extras” (neural engine, etc.) that make the M1 so fast are also supported. One step at a time. First step: a generous and fortunate soul to get a machine into the hands of a developer.... Cheers, b&
