How to build a custom motherboard?

[vanangamudi]

How to build a board similar to rpi or beaglebone? What do I need to study to get things started. Most of the online tutorials cover assembling a PC. But I want build my own motherboard. I believe the things I need to understand is the way figure out compatibity between different components. How do I build linux for the board that I would fabricate? may that is a separate question.

My objective is to build a router with open hardware. The already existing projects like Project Turris are not financially viable in my region.
Thanks in advance. I am familiar with computer science and microprocessors programming. What should I study in order to build motherboards with motherboards and other components?

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Electrical Engineering.

Circuit board layout software exists.

You'd have to study the specs for the components you want to put on the board (SoC and peripheral chips, network controllers, etc.) then lay out traces appropriate to the components you're connecting. (Minimizing distances and so on.)

Then you'd have to have the board you design fabricated somewhere. And then you'd have to test it out, make edits to your design (no way you get everything right on the first try, nobody does) and get another one made.

Pricey.

If you want a router with open hardware, install dd-wrt on a Raspberry Pi and attach a couple USB NICs. Or look into the Banana Pi.

 

[DigDog]

building a motherboard does not seem feasible - you would need access to advanced technologies and the actual soldering and circuit priniting is done by machines. besides that, you need to be able to design the mobo first.
i'm sorry but this is like asking, "how can i make my own CPU". you cannot.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

building a motherboard does not seem feasible - you would need access to advanced technologies and the actual soldering and circuit priniting is done by machines. besides that, you need to be able to design the mobo first.
i'm sorry but this is like asking, "how can i make my own CPU". you cannot.

Really? This guy did.

http://www.wired.com/2009/05/homebrewed-cpu/

But... yeah, you have to be a farging genius.

@OP - If the stuff on this page seems like light reading to you (it doesn't to me), you and four of your closest friends might have the engineering chops to design a motherboard.

 

[vanangamudi]

Since the designs schematics are available for raspberry or beaglebone, can we strip down unnecessary parts and upgrade the wifi to support concurrent dual band operation?

can I exercise somewhere to know how to figure out the compatibility for interfacing components?

 

[piasabird]

Cheaper to buy a router. Harder to get the kind of specs you mentioned. That is probably only available on a higher end network card. Jetway makes some motherboards with like 4 network adapters but they are a little expensive and often cards designed like this have low-end processors.

 

[DigDog]

Really? This guy did.

http://www.wired.com/2009/05/homebrewed-cpu/

But... yeah, you have to be a farging genius.

@OP - If the stuff on this page seems like light reading to you (it doesn't to me), you and four of your closest friends might have the engineering chops to design a motherboard.

pfft

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=8.....69i57j0l4.6689j0j1&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

but yeah.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Since the designs schematics are available for raspberry or beaglebone, can we strip down unnecessary parts and upgrade the wifi to support concurrent dual band operation?

can I exercise somewhere to know how to figure out the compatibility for interfacing components?

The Banana Pi people already did exactly that.