Howdy, folks! Hope you’re all staying safe and/or warm! 🙂
I still haven’t received my Librem5 smartphone yet, but, this is understandable due to the COVID-19 pandemic that the world is currently dealing with, and the fact that the phone is manufactured in China. >_<
I have also ordered a Pinebook Pro from PINE64, which only costs $199. The website indicates that orders will be shipped out by May. So, once we finally make it there, either I will have a 64 bit ARM laptop, or (hopefully) smartphone to tinker with.
I have also recently purchased a $40 Android tablet that I am looking into root-hacking so that I can get a Linux distribution running upon it as well. However things may pan out, I want to get started with my “Linux mobile” game development series so people can begin to migrate away from x86/x86-64 hardware.
So, why migrate away? Recently, more vulnerabilities have been published (more variations of side-channel attacks) that demonstrate that x86-based processors are not that secure. As a hardware developer, it seems clear to me that Intel’s relatively unchallenged market position made the organization overconfident and complacent when it manufactured the majority of their chips, and now AMD joins them. Note that most ARM-based mobile devices contain an A53 processor which is not vulnerable. However, a list of ARM-based processors that *are* vulnerable can be found here.
So, please bear with me as I try to get a Linux mobile environment set up. I think it’s very important to find a cost-effective, open-source solution for everybody. One I have found that, I will begin this new journey into a world of post-x86 game development. 🙂
Oh, yeah! Once RISC-V becomes more mainstream, I will probably being using RISC-V hardware exclusively. So, I’ll make sure to write articles that educate readers about it as well.
Until next time!
Cheers! 🙂
FLOSS Game Dev 