As of now, the official SDK update situation for the Banana Pi BPI-R4 with the BE1400 Wi-Fi module is disappointing. The SDK source code provided by BPI-SINOVOIP based on OpenWrt V21.02 has not been updated for over a year. At this pace, by the time the SDK is fully developed, the hardware will likely already be facing obsolescence in the market.
The lack of continuous maintenance on the official SDK results in serious lag in compatibility and feature optimization, leading to a subpar user experience. Although community-maintained projects are relatively active, they remain unofficial and cannot fully replace the timely updates and assurances provided by official support.
This situation reflects the insufficient attention from the official side to this hardware platform and imposes significant uncertainty and risk on users. If the official update pace remains this slow, the BPI-R4 and BE1400 combination will struggle to maintain a competitive edge in the fast-evolving market, making its future prospects bleak.
if you need a high-end router that is “end-user friendly”, dont go with a development board.
if you complain so much about the bad wifi experience you have, then why tf dont u go and buy something which is made for end-users, like a good AP?
i loved the idea behind a GNU/Linux mobile phone, so i supported the pinephone and bought one. But i KNEW this aint gonna come close to the performance and/or functionality a 50$ android phone delivers.
if you buy “the wrong” stuff for your needs, dont shoot at the vendor.
there are parts of critic i share, e.g. they do not use and support the official openwrt version and instead forked it. but please dont mix constructive critic with critic that is solely based on your (wrong) choices.
unfortunately, my experience with all chinese companies (and i mean really all) is they dont care about the software. no matter if its a SoC, a wifi chip or something else. And its a known problem, especially with MTK, that they do not release the software under GPL, even if they steal all IP from GPL-based software. And force the companies that use their stuff with NDA’s to not release the stuff as open source.
I appreciate your response and understand where you’re coming from, but I think there’s a bit of a misunderstanding. My decision to buy this board wasn’t because I needed a high-end router or something particularly “end-user friendly.” I’ve used Raspberry Pi from the original up to the Pi 4 and have always been satisfied. This was simply me trying to challenge myself, learn something new, and kill some spare time — a hobbyist experiment, not a production deployment.
That said, I admit I didn’t do enough research before buying, and I had no idea just how bad the Wi-Fi 7 (BE14) implementation would be. It genuinely feels like a product that shouldn’t have been released to the public in this state — not even for developers. Some parts are so poorly executed that it raises questions about whether such a board could ever lead to a polished end-user product. It’s less of a development platform and more of a tech demo with marketing polish.
So while I accept the criticism for my own choice, I think it’s also fair to criticize vendors who release underbaked hardware. It’s not just a matter of wrong expectations — some of these so-called “development boards” seem more like dead ends rather than stepping stones. Just like how some countries might forever stay “developing,” this board seems stuck in that phase too.
you dont want to compare a rpi against the r4. the first prototype of the rpi was in 2006, just so u know. also, it had no wifi and only 100mbit ethernet.
comparing the r4 with a rpi is like comparing the pinephone with a samsung galaxy.
when i understood you correctly, all except wifi works as expected. so why dont u get an AP then?
then NEVER buy ANY chinese SoCs, as this is - at least from my experience - always the case.
I planned to replace my odroid n2 with a rk chip (e.g. orange pi4 or even pi5 nowadays), but i did not. now guess why. because i checked the mainline support. they work great if you know where the limits are, but if you simply buy them because “oh the spec is awesome!”, then you are doomed.
so you think the rpi1 was perfect? i can tell you, it was not. and only the developers made (rpi in general) that great.
i don’t want to stand up for sinovoip here, but if you buy something, you should check whether the part is suitable for you. and with chinese hardware you always have the problem with the software, no matter if mainline support or updates. i think it’s good that the r4 was released. and now i just hope that sinovoip takes the feedback and creates a new hw version with which everything will be better. → thats why everyone should write an email, if disappointed, and tell them what exactly is wrong.