> I have to admit, it's a bit shocking that VOLTAGE REGULATORS have to be > exposed to the software in the first place. > Just imagine a bug in some OS or firmware causing the voltages to spike > up and fry the hell out of a device. > > I guess that's modern-day hardware design for you.
No, that is the arm ecosystem. There are three choices: 1. A vendor-locked stable platform that has only one, ok maybe two, ok maybe a couple of slow-moving shifts, over a 20 year sequence of time, because the market is gigantic: a. i386 b. macppc, for a while c. vax, but then time moved on. c. sparc64 but then time moved on, and uhm oracle and $$$. 2. A stable hardware platform where operating systems don't need to change because the investment is big but market is narrow: a. sparc b. sgi c. loongson 3. An unstable platform with a description / machine-dependent handling a. non-mainstream arm platforms b. non-mainstrain mips platform c. vendor-de-jour die-next-year Pick a place you spend your money, and understand the consequences. It really is that simple. If you don't like the shock, don't spend the money. Or spend the money, and understand the shock. Below the covers it is all the same hardware. The long-term vendor-locked platforms do a better job of investing in abstracting it away (ACPI or OpenFirmware), because exposing something too strictly causes them harm because they have to expose it forever. Which might cause them to lose their position, and they didn't become tier 1 by being sloppy. You -- by buying an arm platform de-jour -- on the other hand are doing a great job being a tier 3 customer. Not that it will ever become a tier 2 or tier 3 platform, because you will eagerly buy the next board of theirs when it hits the market... which is probably before you finish reading this mail...
