New ARM SoCs Supported By Linux 4.7, Including The First Mainline LG ARM Platform

[phoronix]

Phoronix: New ARM SoCs Supported By Linux 4.7, Including The First Mainline LG ARM Platform

Seven ARM pull requests were submitted on Tuesday for the Linux 4.7 merge window...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Linux-4.7-ARM-Changes

[starshipeleven]

- The ASpeed platform was added with the SoC platform updates, which is "what most whitebox servers use as their baseboard management controller." There is the AST2400 and AST2500 SOCs supported.

HELL YEAH. These are the most common SoC used in BMC, and the average BMC firmware is VERY subpar, and total crap on the safety angle.

EDIT: clarification for the uninitiated, a BMC is a crappy ARM device bolted to a server board that allows you to work on its BIOS, connect devices, reboot, reinstall the OS as if you were there physically. They are basically a "good" hardware backdoor. It is active even when the server is powered down (that's why it allows you to do magic with the system).

They work decently (if you have a board where they got them right at the first tries) but are pretty unsafe and full of "engineering backdoors", as the same people making motherboard firmware are also tasked to make their firmware.

[microcode]

Also congratulations to LG, assuming they're responsible for the mainlining.