I'm essentially looking for the R7800, but with a 64 bit ArmV8 chip instead of the Qualcom ArmV7 it's currently using.
Here's a list of the current arm arch's, and a good comparison of Wifi chipsets.
Also hoping to avoid anything that's Broadcom based because they are terrible at supporting open source software. Looking for good wireless chipsets that have well supported open source drivers.
I'll be researching this on my own, just thought someone here might have an answer off the top of their head, so it wouldn't hurt to ask. Thanks!
Report back if you find one, i don't think a consumer 64bit router device exists yet. So you either need a mini/board-pc and add switch/wifi via modules or build a x86_64 one.
PS: I was looking for a 64 bit, nas capable device a while ago, so i could run docker on it and build a cheap nas+router+docker host, but could not find any. The best option seemed to grab a cheap zotac media pc and add a switch+ap.
Looks good at 285$ for a 5-bay/4GB NAS, alternative you could buy a offbrand NAS with a x86_64 atom chip or build a itx based yourself.
I just remember that the new Raspberry Pi 4B is a 64bit Cortex-A72 chip with decent support, so maybe this could work as basis. I ignored the Pi's so far because of there terrible usb/sata speeds in the past, maybe the new model is better.
The board is 189$ although no pre-release. Otherwise you might want to look at Pine(64) RockPro64 and SATA controller card, that's most likely the best solution you have as far as arm64 goes without breaking the bank. Support is pretty good and there's a rather large community working on RK3399 support in various ways. Linux distro support seems like a bit of a mess right now but I can report that it runs stable on FreeBSD however some drivers needs work such as NIC (performance is poor), utilizing all cores is unstable possibly due to cache coherency bugs but using only the small 4 ones is rocksolid including cpufreq, PCIe doesn't support bridge functionality (this applies to both Linux and FreeBSD).
I did a bit of testing here: https://projects.pyret.net/files/public/freebsd/ROCKPRO64-PCIe-testing.txt
Personally I'd avoid any SDIO or USB radio options for APs (junk throughput), so this rules out all RK3399 boards without a PCIe slot. You need to specify your use case and the ports you need for us to provide better suggestions.
Most have PCIe in one way or another, the majority of boards requires a HAT however. In many cases it's probably cheaper to get another device and use it as a dumb AP.
OP mentioned this 4x4 device so I think wireless perf might be important for them. If a good wireless NIC is not required, the NanoPi M4 is pretty good as a NAS device when paired with a PCIe 4-port SATA HBA hat and a fan to improve SoC cooling.
Thanks for this! I may even end up getting one, but I'm specifically looking for a commercially widely available modern WiFi Router analogous to the R7800 I mentioned above, not just a network appliance.
Yeah unfortunately, I'm looking for a widely available modern WiFi Router analogous to the R7800 so integrated good quality hardware radio support is top of the list. I'm looking into porting a bunch of stuff, and the more I look into it the less dealing with the ArmV7 arch makes sense.
But I'm finding it may be either too soon in the ArmV8 adoption lifecycle for the cost to be low enough for any wide use in mass produced consumer devices -- or there's some difference between V7 and V8 that I don't understand that makes V8 less ideal/unnecessary for this use case.
Update: looks like there's a version of Espressobin with an enclosure and onboard 2x2 WiFi from globalscale for $159: https://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/p-88-espressobin-ultra.aspx , however they did not specify what chip was used in that module. It looks like an intel card, but using an intel card makes very little sense since AP mode isn't supported by the Linux driver, so it might be QCA or BCM. Consider emailing them about the wifi module if you're interested I guess.
Unfortunately there aren't any suitable commercial AP/router products* that I know have 64-bit armv8 inside, even if you're willing to ditch the eSATA port. The closest thing I could find is the aforementioned Espressobin, which has a dual-core A53 SoC onboard.
* as in:
comes with a good enclosure
has built-in dual band 2x2 or better Qualcomm wireless NIC
Right, i must have missed this last time i checked the new Mox, it uses a Marvell Armada 3720 1,0 GHz dual core ARMv8 Cortex A-53 and this should be aarch64?
So there you go just pick your modules and you are good to go.
I purchased it in version "1". What a rip off! If only you could install OpenWRT! Instead it is practically impossible. I have to use the proprietary operating system Turris OS, which is based on OpenWRT, but it is not the same thing. It is a very particular project. For now it fits well in its box.
I know well. If you want I can give you the links of GitLab with their code. I mean that Turris OS is a company system, invented by them, which is based on OpenWRT, but it is not the same thing. It is a heavily modified OpenWRT. It is difficult to reverse the changes and clean it. Please don't talk about this product anymore. It is a persecution. However, if you like it so much, I sell it
Unfortunately there aren't any suitable commercial AP/router products* that I know have 64-bit armv8 inside, even if you're willing to ditch the eSATA port. The closest thing I could find is the aforementioned Espressobin, which has a dual-core A53 SoC onboard.