I’m really surprised that the only way to get a consumer ARM chip is to buy an SBC or else a fully assembled computer (e.g., Mac Mini). I really want to build my own low-power server, but it seems like the only way to go is to buy a Raspberry Pi compute module and a carrier board (I’m not even sure where to find one of decent quality), and even then I’m either stuck with the SBC memory/gpu or maybe I can supplement with some PCIe stuff (although it seems like a complete gamble as to whether or not the Pi will support a given device).
Why isn’t there a market for standalone ARM chips and motherboards like there is for x86?
The answer to this is essentially that CPUs are only cheap if you make them in huge volume, and "I want something that's like a PC but not actually PC compatible" is a pretty small market, so an SoC designed and manufactured for that niche would just be too expensive for anybody to buy. So if you try to target that niche you are going to be doing it with an SoC designed for some other market, and accepting the tradeoffs that come with it. The traditional high-volume Arm CPU market is mobile, which is what almost all these SBCs are borrowing parts from, and you don't have PCIe on a mobile phone, so no PCIe on an SBC using a mobile part. Possibly as more Arm server chips appear something usable in a desktop form factor will appear, but I suspect that you'll end up just seeing a different set of tradeoffs instead (e.g. much higher price per part).
Unless I'm missing something, an ARM CPU is a PC in every interesting respect. I doubt a SATA, PCIe, USB, etc device cares whether the chip is ARM or x86. So compatibility with the CPU ecosystem doesn't seem like a very compelling reason for low demand. And I would think the M1 proves that there is demand for ARM CPUs (or at least fast, low-power chips).
Even if there is some constraint that prohibits scaling up ARM CPUs (e.g., fab capacity shortage) and thus we need to stick with mobile components, what's stopping someone from selling mobos for mobile chips? If the answer is "mobile chips have to be industrially attached to a board" then why aren't there SBCs that are a drop-in replacement for a PC mobo+x86-chip (or if these exist, why are they so niche)?
It's not a PC in the very important "just boots Windows and runs my existing software" respect. That is what the overwhelming majority of purchasers in the "desktop PC box" market have as an absolute non-negotiable requirement. If you are not an x86 PC compatible, then you're in the really small niche.
You could in theory, yes, do a PC-mobo form factor SBC. But no PCI, no SATA, no external DRAM: it doesn't look very much like a PC even if you've stuck it in a PC case...
Windows runs fine on at least a few ARM SoCs and I'm sure most have no SATA. Maybe some have PCIe or at least NVMe. BTW, they were available commercially prior to M1 Macbooks.
The vast, vast majority of software written for Windows doesn't care about those buses. And emulation allows for the x86 programs to run without being rebuilt.
Windows' biggest drawback in this regard is that hobbyist/enthusiasts generally can't add support for any-old-board. You've got to be a vendor who is willing to get in touch with Microsoft to make it happen.
Eh, that's a transient concern. Seems like M1 is going to force the entire ecosystem to support ARM sooner or later (laptop manufacturers are going to start supporting ARM to keep up with Apple, and the software will have to follow suit). Windows and Office already support ARM.
> But no PCI, no SATA, no external DRAM
Why not? Do mobile ARM chips not support those things? I know the RPI compute modules have PCIe.
Whether or not it's a transient concern, manufacturers operate in the market that currently exists, not the one that may exist in the future, and the market that currently exists doesn't include a lot of demand for non-Apple ARM PCs.
The best way to get a standalone ARM chip is to pretend to be a company making a sprinkler controller [historical reference there] when you e-mail the sales rep for your region and ask them to send you a half-dozen samples, for free. Your story is that you have, like everybody in your position, laid out a circuit board and are ready to solder some on and try it out, for a low-to-mid volume (100,000 to 200,000 units) product, with more products in the planning pipeline.
Right now i'd recommend getting in on the turing pi 2 kickstarter as far as wanting a good carrier board. There's some others out there, and I'd recommend Jeff Geerling's reviews of them for how well they work but I don't know a lot about any specific ones right now.
Direct consumer sales of CPUs is pretty niche even on x86, and on ARM side this whole SBC business afaik is pretty niche compared to the commercial (embedded) use. I can easily understand why no-one bothers to invest in that small sliver of a market
I don’t get this. x86 CPU sales isn’t niche. Last I checked, the thousands of PCs at my university alone were all x86.
Demand exists, supply does not. Why? Idk. Maybe it’s a consequence of bad business decisions at ARM.
Apple has recently shown that ARM chips can be competitive with x86. However, I don’t see why we couldn’t have had that a decade ago. Why did we have to wait for a licensee to take this matter into their own hands? It’s like the business execs at ARM are asleep at the wheel. If I were a shareholder, I’d be wanting some different leadership.
You might be interested in this recent Register opinion article, which (in passing) makes the point that Arm and x86 have thus far succeeded largely by concentrating on things the other is not doing rather than by directly trying to take the same path:
https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/16/riscv_world_dominatio...
If you were a shareholder are you sure you'd rather have Arm focused on trying to sell desktop chips rather than those 30 billion largely embedded and mobile cores they apparently shifted last year?
The key was “direct” sales of CPU - most x86 systems you see are fully integrated and ship with a CPU already loaded from Dell, etc. Few people “build their own”.
Just making desktop-class chips is useless without software. Apple can force both sides of that equation, other vendors can't. You can buy laptops with Windows and ARM, but nobody does for good reason.
The consumer PC building market is a remnant and kept alive by gamer culture, it's an anomaly tied closely to x86 by software and other network effects of compatibility.
Why isn’t there a market for standalone ARM chips and motherboards like there is for x86?