Best hardware platform for native compiling...

[David Jander]

Hi all,

This might sound as a stupid question (and maybe sligtly off-topic), but I 
have not found an (easy) answer and I suspect many on this list will have a 
good suggestion to make:

We are developing (and maintaining) different embedded linux systems based on 
different PowerPC processors. From small MPC852T with little RAM and Flash, 
up to 400MHz MPC5200- and MPC5121e based systems that resemble more a PC or 
netbook than an embedded system in terms of RAM and storage.

For smaller systems we use a customized ELDK-based OS and cross-compile almost 
everything on a PC.

For bigger systems we often run a debian-derived OS like Ubuntu, and many 
pieces are compiled natively on the target... just because it is easy and 
quick to do, and cross-compiling certain packages can be a real pain.
But, a 400 MHz e300 core is not really fast for compiling, so I have been 
considering buying some sort of PowerPC-based system with a faster processor, 
just as a "build-server" (a G5 would do wonders I guess).

It seems like the only real option is one of the smaller IBM Power servers, 
but that seems overkill to me. We also don't feel like buying some old 
second-hand Apple gear.

Is there any other available and affordable platform that can be used to run 
linux and compile software natively for 32-bit PowerPC?

Any suggestion is welcome!

Best regards,

P.S.: I am writing this while running "dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot" on the 
package "xserver-xfbdev" from ubuntu 9.04 on a MPC5121e.... it will take 40 
minutes ;-)

-- 
David Jander
Protonic Holland.