PApabs3·Sep 19, 2020
There is an open bootloader, sadly it needs a non-upstream toolchain:
https://github.com/librerpi/rpi-open-firmware
https://github.com/itszor/vc4-toolchain/issues/7
In Raspberry Pi 4 can finally boot directly from USBlibrerpi
rpi-open-firmware
C2020–2024
librerpi / rpi-open-firmware
rpi-open-firmware
Open source VPU side bootloader for Raspberry Pi.
6Distinct people
17Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
466GitHub stars
What to know before exploring
What it is
Open source VPU side bootloader for Raspberry Pi.
GitHub
Where it is used
No documented product use has been verified yet.
What people are saying
No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.
No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.
Also in these discussions
- itszor/vc4-toolchain · linked in 4 of the same discussions
Mentioned in the same Hacker News threads. That is not proof they are substitutes.
This week on Hacker News
Nov 8–Nov 15 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/15/2026, 4:00:59 PM UTC.
No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.
Mentions over time
HN mentions by year17 dated mentions
Observed mentions: 2020-06-21 04:27:21 UTC to 2024-09-05 14:42:02 UTC.
Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.
View mention counts and date ranges
| Period | Start (UTC) | End (exclusive, UTC) | Mentions | Submissions | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 8 | 2 | 6 |
| 2021 | 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 5 | 1 | 4 |
| 2022 | 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| 2023 | 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 2024 | 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 1 | 1 | 0 |
What Hacker News says
8 sourcesThere is libre RPi boot firmware, unfortunately it relies on toolchain support that isn't upstream yet:
https://github.com/librerpi/rpi-open-firmware
https://github.com/itszor/vc4-toolchain/issues/7
In Raspberry Pi 4 can finally boot directly from USBSome links for folks who want to work on fixing the blob situation:
https://github.com/librerpi/rpi-open-firmware
https://github.com/itszor/vc4-toolchain/issues/7
In Raspberry Pi 3B+ Hackable Linux Handheldhttps://github.com/librerpi/rpi-open-firmware is a pretty serious attempt at the bootloader (incl. VC4 side). As in they can boot an OS, with some limitations but still.
In PicoRio Linux RISC-V SBC is an open-source alternative to Raspberry Pi boardOpen source VPU side bootloader for Raspberry Pi
4 points · Open discussionSince the GPU starts before the CPU, you need a blob to boot the GPU before you can start open code on the CPU. There is open GPU boot firmware being worked on but it isn't ready yet and relies on GCC support for the GPU, which isn't mainlined yet and the authors don't intend to mainline. So probably RPi will need blobs to boot for the foreseeable future.
https://github.com/librerpi/rpi-open-firmware
https://github.com/itszor/vc4-toolchain/issues/7
In PicoRio Linux RISC-V SBC is an open-source alternative to Raspberry Pi boardOpen source VPU side bootloader for Raspberry Pi
2 points · Open discussionThere is open RPi boot firmware here:
https://github.com/librerpi/rpi-open-firmware/
In A Nvidia Engineer Wrote a Vulkan Driver That Works on Older Raspberry Pi