I’m having another try at doing some C and Rust programming on RiscV and it is hard to know what is the most trouble-free path in 2025. Is it still necessary to use the SiFive Freedom SDK or is the Ubuntu version for Unmatched a “lower bar of entry” choice?
I noticed that the P550 seems to push developers to Ubuntu…
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Just ordered a Unmatched Rev B board and wondering the same thing. I will try the Ubuntu 25.04 server image and will install gnome first.
Just grab your favorite Linux distro and run it on unmatched. (ubuntu/debian/opensuse…) Unmatched has the best mainstream distro support, partly due to it’s simplicity and day 1 upstream linux drivers. P550 is a different story. It has the SoC made by ESWIN. They just started sending code reviews to upstream linux, and the code quality is not very good. I’d imagine it’ll probably take them half a year or so to have basic supporting drivers clock/pinctrl/reset/spi/i2c/eth… fully merged, which is already like 1 to 1.5 years after the initial release of the SoC. The GPU/NPU/DSP drivers may never get merged to upstream due to it’s complexity. This is also true for all other RISCV SoCs. Starfive’s JH7110 also has an Imagination PowerVR GPU, and the driver was never upstreamed. I guess the true reason is that nobody is willing to do it as it may also benefit other SoC vendors. Thus, what P550 has right now is a stock Ubuntu + a Sifive/ESWIN maintained package repo for vendor/customized kernel and libraries. You can use other distros such as Fedora/Redhat. However they also need to run non-stock/vendor kernels. Very different situation than the Unmatched.
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Thanks for that info. Now I’m happy that I ordered a Unmatched and not a P550. I really hope SiFive does a P600 or P800 series core on a simple board next. I don’t need onboard audio and GPU/NPU. I rather have another PCIe slot.