Modern Debian running on the old Rockchip RK3128

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The Rockchip RK3128 is an old 32-bit ARM chip found in cheap TV boxes and tablets. This open-source collection of drivers, patches, configuration and documentation gets it running Debian 13 on Linux 7.3.1, covering Mali-400 graphics through Mesa Lima, H.264 and HEVC hardware decoding, hardware JPEG decoding, display stability, audio and Wi-Fi. The maker used Claude Code to investigate hardware behaviour, develop and debug driver changes and write validation tests.

The repository reports measured gains on an RK3128 reference board: shader programs compiling to 42 instructions instead of 76 with upstream Lima, demo scenes going from about 25.5 to 51 frames per second, an end to display FIFO underflows after setting the LCDC NoC priority, a patched ALSA using about 62% less CPU, and a 12 MP JPEG decoding in 386 ms instead of 1.7 s. Code taken from other projects is attributed, and the stated aim is to keep these chips out of landfill.

It is a reference collection of source and patches rather than a ready-made bootable image, and chip-specific details such as clocks and device trees still need checking before using it on other RK31xx chips.