I’m glad that RISC-V SBCs are starting to become usable.
Reads like FUD, as you go on to list a bunch of items that RISC-V actually already delivers.
Point per point:
>long term support
Is achieved via upstreaming drivers[0] and providing documentation[1], something that e.g. StarFive is doing much better than Raspberry Pi ever has.
>strong software ecosystem support
RISC-V is rapidly building the strongest ecosystem.
>performance parity
JH7110 SoC used in boards like VisionFive 2 provides CPU performance between Raspberry Pi 3b and 4, at much lower power consumption.
TH1520 SoC used in boards like Sipeed Lichee Pi4A[2] provides performance above Raspberry Pi 4.
Both SoCs provide faster GPU (JH7110 is 4x that of Pi 4, TH1520 is faster), better hardware video codec blocks, cryptography acceleration, faster memory interface, faster I/O outside of the SoC and otherwise better and more built in peripherals.
Note: Raspberry Pi have been used as reference points as they are, by far, the most popular ARM SBCs.
>It'll be a few more years
As proven above, it's already there against the Raspberry Pi line.
But next year it'll be better, as RISC-V will finally compete with the fastest cores available. This is based solely on what's already announced (Ascalon, Veyron, P570 and so on).
RISC-V enables the best processors.
0. https://rvspace.org/en/project/JH7110_Upstream_Plan
That's not what ARM thinks[0].
>There is nothing inevitable about RISC V.
As it turns out, the decisions have long been made, and RISC-V has been chosen.
0. https://thechipletter.substack.com/p/risc-v-part-2-ambitious...
Lots of companies have made their decisions, projects are kicking off -- for example Samsung just started porting .NET and Tizen to RISC-V for use in their future TVs and other products. LG similarly. It will take five years for the products resulting from that to emerge, but they are coming.
The RISC-V ISA didn't even formally exist as a frozen spec a little over four years ago. Ratification in July 2019 was the starting gun for many to start projects. The results of that are just emerging in the last months -- the VisionFive 2, tne Lichee Pi 4A, the 64 core Milk-V Pioneer.
A lot more things have gone into the pipeline since then, and will be emerging in the next two to three years. Things up to around Apple M1 performance ... from multiple companies.