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1. minute (mntmn@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 29-Nov-2023 09:45:51 JST minute

   totally forgot to mention: we recently put up MNT Reform Motherboard 2.5 in our online shop (limited stock): https://shop.mntre.com/products/mnt-reform-motherboard-25

   this is actually the first time we are selling the motherboard as a replacement part, which was long overdue. initially it wasn't possible because i first had to partially redesign the motherboard during the chip crisis and we focused on fulfilling backorders.

   • minute (mntmn@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 29-Nov-2023 09:49:24 JST minute

     in reply to

     combining this with a CPU module and a barrel-jack power supply is enough to use it as a standalone computer. add protected battery boards and you have a USV. the only thing that's missing is a standalone case. maybe someone wants to get creative? i think a semi-open-frame bent steel case would be my favorite, but we have no resources to design something like that at this very moment.

   • James Just James (purpleidea@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 29-Nov-2023 09:54:49 JST James Just James

     in reply to

     @mntmn Neat! Are there some docs about how someone would manage the bios/uefi firmware on such a device?

     My use case is I'm looking into automation of such settings, and it has been near impossible on standard proprietary devices.

     Cheers!

   • minute (mntmn@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 29-Nov-2023 09:57:09 JST minute

     in reply to

     • James Just James

     @purpleidea oh, what do you want to automate? the bootloader/early boot environment is u-boot, which has some EFI compatibility.

   • minute (mntmn@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 29-Nov-2023 09:58:29 JST minute

     in reply to

     • James Just James

     @purpleidea there is no bios per se. u-boot gets loaded from SD card or eMMC by the SoC's ROM and can be customized

   • James Just James (purpleidea@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 29-Nov-2023 10:01:44 JST James Just James

     in reply to

     @mntmn Config settings and provisioning.

     IOW, suppose you take a laptop out of a box, plug it into something (usually over ethernet) and then automatically power it on, set any bios/uefi/whatever settings, and then pxe boot and install an operating system.

     The missing step in hardware today is configuring bios settings. You often have to manually press <del> and then scroll through settings and so on...

     I'm working on https://github.com/purpleidea/mgmt/ and would love to be able to add code for that.

   • James Just James (purpleidea@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 29-Nov-2023 10:03:15 JST James Just James

     in reply to

     @mntmn Okay, so kind of feels like how a RPI does things AIUI. Good to know, thanks! Are there docs on this I can read somewhere?

   • minute (mntmn@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 29-Nov-2023 10:18:55 JST minute

     in reply to

     • James Just James

     @purpleidea the system boot section here a bit further down needs to be updated because there are more options and esp. cpu modules now, and integration with debian's initramfs, but it will give you a general impression https://mntre.com/reform2/handbook/advanced.html

     and of course https://docs.u-boot.org/en/latest/

     our OS build process is here https://source.mnt.re/reform/reform-system-image