View Full Version : ASUS Motherboard Ships With Embedded Linux, Web Browser
phoronix
10-06-2007, 05:20 PM
Phoronix: ASUS Motherboard Ships With Embedded Linux, Web Browser
The good folks over at ASUS have sent over the P5E3 Deluxe, which is based upon Intel's new X38 Chipset and continues in the usual ASUS fashion of pushing new (and often unexpected) innovations onto the motherboard. Without spoiling the review of this motherboard that will be published shortly, the ASUS P5E3 Deluxe is one of the most innovative motherboards we have seen to date and it packs one very exciting and unusual feature. Embedded onto the P5E3 Deluxe is a Linux environment that features a Firefox-rebranded web browser and the Skype VoIP client! Within five seconds of turning on this $360 USD gaming/enthusiast motherboard, you can be using Linux and surfing the Internet. On this motherboard the feature is known as ASUS Express Gate, which is powered by something called SplashTop. SplashTop is an instant-on Linux desktop being created by DeviceVM. SplashTop isn't even launching for a few more days (October 10), but in this article we have more details on this embedded Linux environment as well as screenshots and our thoughts with what will hopefully come next for this Linux environment.
http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=11186
tsuru
10-06-2007, 06:53 PM
Reading just the title, I was hoping beyond hope that maybe ASUS has decided to officially support and use LinuxBIOS (http://www.linuxbios.org) like the OLPC project. Alas, after hurriedly reading through, I see it is yet again American Megatrends. Nevertheless, I wonder if the AMIBIOS could be modified to boot into my linux in less than 5 seconds now. Not to put down the Express Gate thing, but like most of us, I've customized my linux to my liking.
And definitely if AMIBIOS or SplashTop are using GPL code, I definitely hope they disclose it.
Get a BIOS editor and extract it. The "only" problem I see that you would need a bigger EEPROM chip, so you could not add it directly to another board. But maybe you could try to start it differently.
I was very excited until I read this sentence:
To update Express Gate though you will need to be running Windows on the hard drive in order to run the ASUS utility.
Now I couldn't be less interested.
Reading just the title, I was hoping beyond hope that maybe ASUS has decided to officially support and use LinuxBIOS (http://www.linuxbios.org) like the OLPC project. Alas, after hurriedly reading through, I see it is yet again American Megatrends. Nevertheless, I wonder if the AMIBIOS could be modified to boot into my linux in less than 5 seconds now. Not to put down the Express Gate thing, but like most of us, I've customized my linux to my liking.
And definitely if AMIBIOS or SplashTop are using GPL code, I definitely hope they disclose it.
Windows depends on a few legacy BIOS functions
which are not yet properly implemented in LinuxBIOS.
A coworker who does BIOS programming told me
that they're contractually forbidden by Phoenix to put any other BIOS on their hardware (I asked him why their linux systems
still come with a legacy BIOS although they have all the docs to implement linuxbios).
I wonder if this is also the case with AMI (If linuxbios were easy to develop and deploy AND bootet windows reliably, AMI's and Phoenix' BIOS implementations would become obselete...)
Put in all the usual filesystem checkers, ability to mount all attached harddisks/USB sticks and my linux rescue cd would become
obsolete. This could be a sysadmins dream feature: build-in rescue system!
Thetargos
10-07-2007, 04:22 AM
Some thoughts about free code...
They are using Linux (the kernel) which is GPLv2 code. However they may be using closed source drivers for their WiFi chips. Users at their option are able to use binary blobs, and even though that taints the kernel it is for the most part "OK". However distributing this "tainted" kernel with proprietary drivers (all conjecture here, I really hope our friends over at Real Tech will open this WiFi) is (last I checked) breaching the GPL.
For other stuff like their GTK configuration tools and what not, well, GTK is LGPL and that means they are somewhat covered about code disclosure.
About LinuxBIOS, I would totally LOVE to see an option to implement it, maybe as an "optional" setup feature, obviously not geared toward Windows customers so maybe on server-grade boards?
Overall, I'd love to see this board myself, and as previously noted, it has much room for improvement... Will ASUS take the chance to improve it? Most likely, though not as we might expect them to... I hope they have an AMD variant of this board in the pipe too, I love healthy competition :D
dotancohen
10-07-2007, 05:03 AM
I wonder why they wrote an update client for Windows only. Obviously this is being marketed to, or would be especially interesting to, the Linux community. I hope that a Linux update utility is in the works (along with the aforwished AMD version).
Michael
10-07-2007, 07:30 AM
I wonder why they wrote an update client for Windows only. Obviously this is being marketed to, or would be especially interesting to, the Linux community. I hope that a Linux update utility is in the works (along with the aforwished AMD version).
This is an ASUS gaming motherboard and most of them are running Windows. So ASUS has all of their utilities written for Windows. Hopefully they will write a Linux one or that they develop an OS-independent one similar to flashing the BIOS from a CD.
This needs additional development, obviously, but this is a very interesting capability. Probably not expensive to add, so it might well become a standard feature in motherboards.
dotancohen
10-07-2007, 10:24 AM
Of course the software is not expensive, but I assume that the development is.
I don't see how they include Skype with the GPLed Linux kernel. Sounds like a GPL violation to me.
It is allowed to use binary software, at max it is a gray area with precompiled binary kernel modules. Therefore Ubuntu does not link em in the package (no .ko files) but does the last step with the linux restricted modules manager - .ko files are in a ramdisk. For me that's hairsplitting.
Rambo Tribble
10-07-2007, 11:45 AM
I don't care how you slice it, updating a system with embedded Linux using Windows is like getting parts for your Lexus at a Yugo dealership.
Source Of Radiance
10-07-2007, 12:16 PM
Skype and Intel.Axis of tech evil. Joking...
With so much RAM on PCs these days why can't it update itself while running?
Michael
10-07-2007, 12:43 PM
Skype and Intel.Axis of tech evil. Joking...
With so much RAM on PCs these days why can't it update itself while running?
We will be publishing more information Wednesday morning, until then I cannot provide anymore comments now.
The only thing that I do not understand is that this Linux embedded feature is not mentioned at all in the manual. Also I have highly doubts that it will run WITHOUT hd, a BIOS image is 2 MB, but how huge should be the chip? Maybe the installer sets a marker in the mbr where to find the image on hd. Could you verify this by testing it WITHOUT hd? Also I would like to know what files the Windows tool does create...
Michael
10-07-2007, 01:17 PM
The only thing that I do not understand is that this Linux embedded feature is not mentioned at all in the manual. Also I have highly doubts that it will run WITHOUT hd, a BIOS image is 2 MB, but how huge should be the chip? Maybe the installer sets a marker in the mbr where to find the image on hd. Could you verify this by testing it WITHOUT hd? Also I would like to know what files the Windows tool does create...
It's mentioned in the printed manual under ASUS Express Gate. Perhaps for the online version they are removing it since this technology isn't being announced until Wednesday.
SplashTop doesn't depend upon a hard drive.
Look, the Phoronix folks just told us they cannot give any additional details until Wednesday ;)
What BIOS chip is used?
Maybe it's in an extra nand chip. They're a lot cheaper
than NORs/EEPROMs of similar sizes, and you can fit a
lot of software in 64MB flash.
Would be cool to break out (if there is no console option) with things like CTRL-ALT-Fx and check:
cat /proc/mounts
and some other things...
lewis
10-08-2007, 05:45 AM
How long until this gets hacked to load your main system?
Michael
10-08-2007, 07:47 AM
I was passed along some confidential slides on how Express Gate/SplashTop works... waiting for permission to post them.
Michael
10-08-2007, 09:46 AM
See: http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=NjEwNw
immudium
10-08-2007, 06:03 PM
This motherboard sounds amazing. I'd buy this board just for the express gate feature even if the rest of the board sucked (which luckily does not appear to be the case if you can judge a board from it's outward appearance).
Having an updated Express Gate that allows updating of the BIOS through Express Gate out of the box is critical though. There is no way I'm going to buy and install a copy of windows just to update the bios/express gate so I'm glad to hear that's high on their todo list.
Anyway, thanks for the excellent and exciting preview.
Michael
10-08-2007, 06:05 PM
Once I get clearance from DeviceVM, I will be releasing new details including what type of devices SplashTop will be on next and some hints of the future.
The real question is, can you install extensions to the included Firefox? There are now two webs, one is what you get with all the ad crap filtered out with Adblock+ and Flashblock. The other web is the one full of blinking junk. So which web does Asus offer?
Michael
10-09-2007, 07:37 AM
The real question is, can you install extensions to the included Firefox? There are now two webs, one is what you get with all the ad crap filtered out with Adblock+ and Flashblock. The other web is the one full of blinking junk. So which web does Asus offer?
ASUS offers the web that doesn't steal from publishers.
Michael
10-09-2007, 09:13 AM
Tomorrow DeviceVM's SplashTop product will be officially unveiled but since posting our original article on this technology and later an ASUS update, we have learned some new details about this instant-on Linux desktop environment. Specifically, yesterday a private briefing was held with David Speiser (DeviceVM's VP of Marketing), Thomas Deng (DeviceVM's CTO), and Andrew Kippen (Stage Two Consulting), where new details were shed on the technical workings of SplashTop and its future.
http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=11188
eric.frederich
10-10-2007, 11:39 AM
I can think of a lot of uses for this.
How many times have you had to find out which piece of hardware is bad in a computer?
Is it the OS installation (windows likes to mess up over time), the video card, the memory, the hard drive etc.
When I suspect it is the OS installation I usually wind up booting off of a Knoppix-like live CD and see if the problems are still there.
Another use for this would be to install Linux to a hard drive without burning any CDs.
I use Gentoo. When I install it, I use whatever Live CD I have lying around. All you need is a handful of commands. You need fdisk, wget, tar, an editor, etc.
Another good use for this would be a built in (recovery mode).
How many times has a Windows machine not been able to boot itself but all the data is still there?
You either have to take out the hard drive and put it in another computer and burn stuff to CDs / DVDs before reformating the hard drive or you have to boot into a Live Linux CD and do something similar. With this...its right there.
Now...having said that. I wouldn't want to pay more than the $0.10 it would cost me to burn a CD to have this feature.
Thetargos
10-11-2007, 02:44 AM
This needs additional development, obviously, but this is a very interesting capability. Probably not expensive to add, so it might well become a standard feature in motherboards.
Most likely, ASUS offers defaults, which means a blinking and ad tingling Web.
eric.frederich
12-13-2007, 10:27 AM
I'm just replying to this so that I can download a video. Apparently having just one post isn't enough.
I can think of a lot of uses for this.
How many times have you had to find out which piece of hardware is bad in a computer?
Is it the OS installation (windows likes to mess up over time), the video card, the memory, the hard drive etc.
When I suspect it is the OS installation I usually wind up booting off of a Knoppix-like live CD and see if the problems are still there.
Another use for this would be to install Linux to a hard drive without burning any CDs.
I use Gentoo. When I install it, I use whatever Live CD I have lying around. All you need is a handful of commands. You need fdisk, wget, tar, an editor, etc.
Another good use for this would be a built in (recovery mode).
How many times has a Windows machine not been able to boot itself but all the data is still there?
You either have to take out the hard drive and put it in another computer and burn stuff to CDs / DVDs before reformating the hard drive or you have to boot into a Live Linux CD and do something similar. With this...its right there.
Now...having said that. I wouldn't want to pay more than the $0.10 it would cost me to burn a CD to have this feature.
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