Turing Pi 2
Infrastructure
arm cluster hardware
SHOW HN2020
How HN took it
7 positive, 25 neutral or asking, 2 mixed, 18 critical, out of 52 comments about the project. Thread score -0.18.
Idea: 4 for, 7 againstDesign: 2 for, 6 againstPricing: 0 for, 4 againstPerformance: 1 for, 1 against
The thread, comment by comment
Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.
positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker
What HN said
What people liked
Compact cluster form factor and upgrade path from V1 are appealing
From 2 comments
I spent a bit of time testing the v1 board, and while it isn't without fault, it's the best SBC-based cluster project I've used (haven't personally tested the SOPINE Clusterboard…
geerlingguy on HNIT's amazing device! For now i'm running a few RPi devices and i was dream about such device to put them in for more processing power.
mobilio on HN
Useful for testing and CI on ARM
From 2 comments
I use mine to host some non-revenue-generating websites (they are super cheap for that purpose), and also for some ARM image builds that I integrate into my Docker/Kubernetes…
geerlingguy on HN>>Besides academic uses to perhaps teach distributed systems on these are there any real world use cases for these clusters? A considerable amount of people is already assembling…
barumi on HN
Objections
Cost is high compared with x86 hardware or a used laptop
From 3 comments
ThinkPad W530 fits the bill quite well. Broken screen puts it at around $100-150, $300 gets you fully working one. Less tyhan 4 CM4 modules, and what about Turing Pi 2 case?…
rasz on HNi often see people claim raspberry pi cheap but in reality it's not. a cluster like this is probably not cheap and performance wise, it's slower than, say an AMD x86 system.
tuananh on HNYes, but I would opt for the newly released HC4 if two drives were fine. If you are looking for four to five drives, I'm sure someone will make a PCB at some point that uses A…
InvaderFizz on HN
Unclear practical use case beyond teaching
From 3 comments
Besides academic uses to perhaps teach distributed systems on these are there any real world use cases for these clusters?
dogma1138 on HNOutside of doing it for the heck of it (which is a valid enough use case , IMHO), what practical use do you see out of this ? To me, it looks like I can do all of the same things…
draklor40 on HNMain use case might be doing whatever you would do on 10 year old laptop reused to be your home server. Similar performance, similar power usage.
rasz on HN
Shared SATA and PCIe limited to two slots; no redundant power
From 3 comments
Theoretically yes, but there seem to be only 2 PCIe (and probably x1 slots). And the interconnect will be quite slower (I suspect) btw. the modules. All those GPIO pins are gonna…
draklor40 on HNThere is nothing in the schematics about multiple power supplies or battery backups, etc. If you are hooking up all 4 rpis to the same power source , might as well replace it…
draklor40 on HNBut like, how? Mounting a volume in read/write mode on more than one machine is obviously going to corrupt it
anaisbetts on HN
32GB RAM claim is misleading since each CM4 has up to 8GB
From 3 comments
I don’t understand the claim about 32GB RAM. The diagram shows slots for four RPi compute modules, each of which has 1GB RAM.
billsmithaustin on HNThe new compute modules comes with up to 8 Gb of RAM. Here is a detailed review of new CMs https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2020/raspberry-pi-compute-module-4-review
nsky-world on HNReading https://turingpi.com/turing-pi-2-announcement/, they have designed a “Raspberry Pi 4 Compute Module (CM4)” with 8GB RAM.…
Someone on HN
Requests
Rack mount case
From 2 comments
Rack mount case would be nice.
silasb on HNRack mount form would be nice. Please do it!
tuananh on HN
PCIe switching
From 2 comments
PCIe switching would have been really interesting to see, even in a non-concurrent mode. One also desperately wishes that multi-host network adapters had a low-end market. A 1 x…
rektide on HNPCIe switching sounds nice, but let me tell you that it is a terrible nightmare on every level. Hardware: these PCIe switches are finicky as all get out; will it link up to your…
jackyinger on HN
Mixed CPU architectures in one box
From 1 comment
Long term request for the next Turing ( mixed CPU cards together - in a Box! ) + ARM cards + X86 cards + RISC-V cards
pella on HN
Questions
What is the price?
From 2 comments
This is very neat. I’m sorry if I missed it, but have you announced pricing?
russell_h on HNWhat's the price?
MichaelBurge on HN
How does shared SATA work across nodes?
From 2 comments
Stupid question, how do these 4 SoCs share the 2x SATA ports? Do you assign them to a specific processor somehow? Are the other machines booting off of PXE boot?
anaisbetts on HNBut like, how? Mounting a volume in read/write mode on more than one machine is obviously going to corrupt it
anaisbetts on HN
Does the CM4 firmware support PXE boot?
From 1 comment
Out of curiosity, does the firmware in the Compute Module allow for PXE boot? Would be a neat way to handle corruptions of the SD / eMMC. Flick the power off through the Turing…
capt_hotpants on HN
Alternatives named
Used x86 laptops or mini PCs with VMs
From 3 comments
Main use case might be doing whatever you would do on 10 year old laptop reused to be your home server. Similar performance, similar power usage.
rasz on HNYou could get an off-the-shelf x86 machine in the same form factor and run the cluster nodes in VMs, for instance. Maybe you could argue that four RPis on a network are more…
ianhowson on HNThinkPad W530 fits the bill quite well. Broken screen puts it at around $100-150, $300 gets you fully working one. Less tyhan 4 CM4 modules, and what about Turing Pi 2 case?…
rasz on HN
Raspberry Pi with the Pi Dramble cluster
From 1 comment
I spent a bit of time testing the v1 board, and while it isn't without fault, it's the best SBC-based cluster project I've used (haven't personally tested the SOPINE Clusterboard…
geerlingguy on HN
AWS Graviton ARM instances
From 1 comment
Today we are thrilled to announce the Turing Pi V2. The Turing Pi V2 is s compact cluster in a mini ITX form factor with 4 x cluster nodes, 2x mini PCIe (Gen 2) ports, 2x SATA…
nsky-world on HN