Titanium: Pros and Cons

I am wondering whether to buy a Titanium computer, and what the pros and cons are compared to other ‘high-end’ computers. Elesar offer a dual boot system, RISC OS and Linux, which would be useful to me.

The AM5728 SoC includes a Cortex A15 dual core processor, but also 2 dual core Cortex-M4s. So, why doesn’t that make it a sex-core (2 + 2*2) (?!!) computer? Yes, I know RISC OS can use only one core, but the Linux side can use more.

I have read Elesar’s GoLinux Technical Note, and it seems that the dual boot is done the opposite way round to the ARMbook where the default is Linux and for RISC OS you stick an SD card in the side before powering on. Except, with the Titanium the SD card holding the Linux distribution is internal and you do not need to pull a card out or stick one in to switch from one OS to the other.
I would be particularly interested in folk’s experiences with switching from one OS to the other and how easy it is to update the OSes.

According to one RISC OS dealer, the graphics is not as good (as fast?) as on the ARMX6.

Can the work currently being done on a partition manager be applied to this dual boot system so that both OSes could be in different partitions on the same ‘disc’?

Any other comparisons or comments would be useful.

It is a difficult choice.

The ARMX6 has one fast S-ATA port, a comparatively slow CPU, has only one video output, but that can support 4K resolutions (limited to 30 Hz IIRC).

The Titanium has four fast S-ATA ports, a fast CPU, has two video outputs, but those have a max resolution of 2048×2048 each, which makes it difficult to supply a 4K desktop to a standard screen. In theory, it has USB3, but no drivers are available.

The Raspberry Pi 4(00) has no fast disc I/O, but an even faster CPU, has two video outputs, both of which can do 4K (although, if both are used, limited to 30 Hz IIRC). It also has USB3, but again no drivers are available.

The ARMX6 and Titanium are ARMv7, the RPi 4(00) (and the Pi 3 as well as newer Pi 2 models) are ARMv8. Some older software might have problems running on ARMv8. Some even older software might have problems running on ARMv7, which only leaves the Pi 1 as choice. Apart from Aemulor of course, which runs on all those machines.

So there – your choice. I have all of them, and I sell none of them, so “ask me anything” and I’ll try to answer as impartial as possible.

Thanks very much for that input. I already have an ARMX6 and would like something different. From what you have said about the video output, I am not much bothered about the lower screen resolution of the Titanium as 2048 × 2048 is plenty for me.

What about the Linux side? I need Linux for tasks that RISC OS can’t do, like video conferencing. Is it easy to update the two OSes?

The Titanium… has two video outputs, but those have a max resolution of 2048×2048 each, which makes it difficult to supply a 4K desktop to a standard screen.

I run my Titanium at 3440×1440 using a Picture By Picture monitor. Effectively, it’s two 1720×1440 stuck seamlessly side by side. You can’t actually tell it isn’t just one image though.it’s a palaver and not cheap to do though. My monitor will scale a 4096×2048 image, but it’s not crystal clear.

I’d be gutted with a Titanium if I just had a 2560×1440 monitor…

What about the Linux side? I need Linux for tasks that RISC OS can’t do, like video conferencing. Is it easy to update the two OSes?

I’ve used Linux on the Titanium and it’s slow. Very slow. As is to be expected when it’s running from an SD card. Raik has it running from another hard drive connected to a SATA port on the motherboard, which I imagine is likely to be quite fast, but I have no idea how complicated that is.

If you really want fast, occasional Linux, I’d just buy a separate Pi 4 with an SSD…

Thanks for that information. I might buy the Titanium; but what if another even faster machine running RISC OS is just round the corner, then I would kick myself!

which only leaves the Pi 1 as choice.

Cough. Beagle. The xM is ARMv7, but it is an early and permissive ARMv7, so it was fine that my Pi2 (ARMv7) choked on.

It also comes with twice as much memory as a Pi1, and a newer processor (Cortex-A8) with with dual issue, than the Pi1’s ancient ARM11 (pre-Cortex!).

Of course, it costs a billion Happy Meals more. Some you win, some you lose.

I’d keep an eye on what R-Comp is doing with a Pi4 compute module, as that should have all the advantages of the Pi4, bit with USB 3 (unused on RISC OS) swapped for a PCIe interfaced fast SATA disc interface.

but what if another even faster machine running RISC OS is just round the corner,

That is the sort of procrastination that leads to nothing being done.

Let’s put it like this, I am sticking with my Pi2 for now, as for the sorts of things I use it for, it’s plenty fast enough and has more than enough memory (while I’d like to try Iris, I would use my phone or tablet for websites due to the extremely active blocking that I have set up with Firefox).

So if you get yourself a decently specced RISC OS machine now, so what if something a little faster comes along next month? We’re already at the stage of the OS itself underutilising the hardware we do have, so there’s almost always room for improvement there, and unless there is a huge bump in processor oomph, your primary speed gains are likely to be found elsewhere (like SATA vs USB vs SD). À pitfall worth noting is the number of machines (all of the Pi family prior to the Pi 4, the Beagle, etc) that only have one USB port connecting to the main chip, and all USB ports and networking are pushed through that, which is basically a big bottleneck.

So choose a nice machine today, and tomorrow…. you can worry about something else. ;-)

I’d keep an eye on what R-Comp is doing

That the 4té? Yup, could be a contender.
http://www.armini.co.uk/4te.shtml

Oh, and 👍 for the Damn Fine Cherry Pie reference.

Indeed, the solution R-Comp hinted at at the Wakefield Show – base board for a RPi 4 compute module, using the PCIex channel to attach a PCIex switch to and provide some fast I/O like multiple S-ATA ports – looks like a good idea. Mainly because the Pi 4 is quite a bit faster than the competition wrt RAM speed and CPU speed and “just” lacks the S-ATA I/O speed compared to the Titanium and the AMX6.

We’ll have to wait for availability and price of course for the final verdict.

which only leaves the Pi 1 as choice.

Cough. Beagle. The xM is ARMv7, but it is an early and permissive ARMv7, so it was fine that my Pi2 (ARMv7) choked on.

I don’t consider the Beagle (xM or not) as a serious contender because of its lack of proper video. Full HD at 24Hz is NOT fun, and finding a monitor that works with it is not that easy. It even cannot do 1280×1024@60Hz. It’s a joke.

It also comes with twice as much memory as a Pi1

As the first-generation Pi 1 (256 MiB), but not as the second current generation Pi 1 and all Pi Zero (512 MiB). Unless there was a later gen Beagle xM with 1 GiB?

and a newer processor (Cortex-A8) with with dual issue, than the Pi1’s ancient ARM11 (pre-Cortex!).

The Beagle xM is certainly a bit faster than the Pi 1 (or Pi Zero), but not much. At least not for RISC OS things.

But the Pi 1 has the ultimate advantage of having the Pre-ARMv6 rotated load behaviour configurable, so it is more compatible than any ARMv7 CPU with the old IYONIX-compatible stuff that turned out to be not-really-as-much-32bit-clean-as-previously-thought.

From what you have said about the video output, I am not much bothered about the lower screen resolution of the Titanium as 2048 × 2048 is plenty for me.

Try a 32" 4K monitor and you won’t want to go back. I switched from two-monitors to one-big-monitor a while ago, it makes everything easier, especially when having many machines and a KVM switch. Multi-monitor with KVM switch is a nightmare.

I’d keep an eye on what R-Comp is doing

That the 4té?

No Rick, R-Comp has a new board design (made in collaboration with another company), that should use the Raspberry Pi CM4 module (which exposes the PCI bus).

The new board is extremely exciting, because it not only offers Sata at native performance, it also exposes a PCIe slot for future expansions. The PCIe slot won’t be used yet with RISC OS, but it surely will with Linux.

Given that the CM4 module has the exact same CPU specs as a Raspberry Pi 4 and might be slightly overclocked, the new R-Comp board represent a very interesting approach to have a new RISC OS mini desktop system.

The board was presented at the last WROCC 2021 and should be Mini-ITX format which also makes it suitable for a nice case. More details on the WROCC presentation.

Raik has it running from another hard drive connected to a SATA port on the motherboard, which I imagine is likely to be quite fast, but I have no idea how complicated that is.

Take same time but is not really complicated. Elesar has a good todo but my way was a bit different. ;-) I setup the card (e.g. grafical environment) and install the tools I need e.g. gparted, prepare the ssd and copy the content of the card to ssd. Any small changes in fstab…
I load only the kernel from SD and switch rootfs to sata ssd.
Is faster than SD only and fast enough for the things I can not do in RISC OS.
The ssd p1 is ext4 for rootfs and p2 FAT32 for datatransfer between the OS.
Skype is working, play DVD also, BlueRay is to slow. Libre Office, Firefox, Chrome, FreeCad, Slicer… are working, Kodi not…

You could also consider the FOURtress from RISCOSbits: http://www.riscosbits.co.uk/fourtress.htm

It’s an overclocked Pi4 so about as fast as you can get processor wise, although the SSD speed will be limited by the USB connection. Andy has demonstrated switching between RO and Linux by simply clicking on an icon in each OS.

The Titanium is excellent and is one of the few hardware platforms that has been specifically designed for RISC OS. It is fast (1.5GHz) and can do 1920×1200 which is plenty for me. I also have an ARMX6 which does 3440×1440. My Titanium has a removable second SATA SSD drive so that I can plug in a drive and do a backup. Its power supply is completely silent (not even a fan) with a toroidal transformer for efficiency. I put it in a polycarbonate case and it also has a SATA-connected DVD writer.

The Titanium can drive two monitors side by side or there are some monitors with two inputs. So a wider desktop than 1920 is feasible with some jiggery pokery.

There is always another, better machine that is not yet available.

The unnamed Pi 4 CM-based machine from R-Comp.

Andrew said at the show:

Project Pi-TX addresses the disc I/O limitation of the Pi USB 2 and is based on a motherboard supporting a Pi 4 Compute Module (with availability until 2028) which provides a PCI Express bus (in place of the USB 3 controller on the Pi 4). This is designed to deliver multiple connections to PCI such as a PCI Express expansion slot, a native SATA controller with four SATA sockets, and and M2 slot. NVME would be limited to SATA speeds (500 Mb/s) by the PCI Express bus and would require a more expensive chip and is not offered. USB 2 and USB 3 sockets are provided (limited to USB 2 speeds by RISC OS).

Designing a motherboard is an expensive process. The motherboard is designed but component and production procurement (there are currently shortages) is now the limiting factor. It is therefore several months away despite design being complete.

Pure Pi-4-based machines such as the 4te and the Fourtress can offer SSD storage but will be limited to a USB2 speed connection.

Thanks Chris for this – very interesting.

What do the two dual core Cortex-M4 processors do, or are they just there for show? :-)
As far as I can make out, Elesar’s Titanium case (not the motherboard) has dimensions 11.2cm x 26.4cm x 23cm according to another website. Is that right?

What do the two dual core Cortex-M4 processors do, or are they just there for show? :-)

Cortex-M is ARMs way of saying “they are very slow, and they are useless for any computing needs beyond simple microcontrollers”. IIRC, they will only ever execute Thumb or Thumb2 code, and very slowly. I am fairly sure that even Linux won’t touch them when running on any OMAP5 platform like the Titanium. Presumably because they cannot run the same application code, and if they could, the overhead of thread switching would probably be higher than the possible gain.

In current ARM SoCs, we have the big.LITTLE concept where fast, power-hungry cores are combined with slower, power-saving cores, and depending on the workload, one or the other is used. A Cortex-M4 core is much much much slower than those LITTLE cores.

Of course, for specific applications, those cores might have specific advantages. Or else TI wouldn’t have integrated them. But running RISC OS is not one of those applications.

Think of the Cortex-M’s as a couple of free Raspberry Pi Pico’s chucked in for free.

@ David R. Lane

What do the two dual core Cortex-M4 processors do, or are they just there for show? :-)

With RISC OS running on the Big cores the M4 could be programmed and used as a DSP (Digital Signal Processing) unit and so have a really really cool audio processor on the Titanium. The fact that there are 2 of them could even open possibilities to professional audio production.

However in reality when using low-level “Asynchronous” resources with RISC OS it can be a bit tricky to code. But they are accessible and can be programmed. If you have ever heard of the really famous Atari last machine the Atari Falcon, it came with a similar approach having an onboard external DSP interconnected to the Motorola 68030.

The M4 can also be used for industrial applications and automotive, if only RISC OS had secure design and a bit more resilience to applications miss-behaviours.

IIRC, they will only ever execute Thumb or Thumb2 code, and very slowly.

Are you sure about the speed? My phone has four A55 cores that can run at up to 1794MHz, and four Exynos M3 cores that can crank up to 2704MHz.

useless for any computing needs beyond simple microcontrollers

They can respond to touchscreen, they can play MP3s, they can maintain an on-screen clock and…
…basically they are not really intended to be an application processor, they are there to have simpler tasks handed off to them for times when the device is “active but not in use”, an example here would be when listening to music while mowing the lawn, where battery life is important. Slow the main cores right down (or stall them) and let the low power Thumb cores do the job.

In terms of RISC OS… Yeah. Other cores? :-p

My phone has four A55 cores that can run at up to 1794MHz, and four Exynos M3 cores that can crank up to 2704MHz.

Those are both ARMv8-A architecture. Not everyone follows ARM’s naming convention of “M” meaning ARMv#-M.

As far as I can make out, Elesar’s Titanium case (not the motherboard) has dimensions 11.2cm x 26.4cm x 23cm according to another website. Is that right?

When cased Titanium comes in a CiT S003B which measures approx 11 × 32 × 40cm. There’s a plastic foot so can either be stood upright or flat.

The AM5728 SoC includes a Cortex A15 dual core processor, but also 2 dual core Cortex-M4s. So, why doesn’t that make it a sex-core (2 + 2*2) (?!!) computer?

There are actually 8 cores (2x C6000 DSP’s, 2x 2xM4’s, 2x A15’s) though the DSP and M4’s really only find uses in embedded systems, for example if the A15’s are busy doing application work the M4’s can be chewing images in the background. Each of the M4’s can run up to 212.8MHz so would be roughly StrongARM performance.

According to one RISC OS dealer, the graphics is not as good (as fast?) as on the ARMX6.

Perhaps the full sentence was describing how much faster the Titanium’s graphics are compared with the ARMX6? There are some benchmarks here (the yellow block is graphics). As others have noted, each head is limited to 2k x 2k pixels, but there are 2 heads so a very wide desktop can be achieved with 2 monitors (or a special PbP monitor).

What about the Linux side? I need Linux for tasks that RISC OS can’t do, like video conferencing. Is it easy to update the two OSes?

Titanium Linux is based on Debian Buster with the latest LTS version of FireFox. Linux can use both cores, but as it thrashes swap memory more than RISC OS ever would it is best when run off a spare SSD (not a problem; there are 4 SATA ports). Currently Zoom don’t provide an ARM Linux version of their client, so it’s not going to usefully do video conferencing.

RISC OS resides in flash ROM, and Linux is loaded on top in RAM (via the GoLinux application). This ends your RISC OS session so any unsaved work will be lost, the only way back to RISC OS is by shutting down and restarting which will boot from the RISC OS ROM again. Linux-only versions of Titanium ship with uBoot in the flash ROM instead.

Not everyone follows ARM’s naming convention of “M” meaning ARMv#-M.

🤦 As 🤦 if 🤦 ARM’s 🤦 naming 🤦 scheme 🤦 isn’t 🤦 complicated 🤦 enough 🤦 ! 🤦

I have gone for Elesar’s Titanium and hope for delivery next week. Do purchasers get a discount if they can work out what Elesar means?

LSR – logical shift right?

Edit. Or Rob Sprowson Ltd reversed?