+- PINE64 (https://forum.pine64.org)
+-- Forum: PINE A64(+) (https://forum.pine64.org/forumdisplay.php?fid=4)
+--- Forum: Linux on Pine A64(+) (https://forum.pine64.org/forumdisplay.php?fid=6)
+--- Thread: +PINEBOOK Fedora 30 on Pinebook (/showthread.php?tid=7844)
Fedora 30 on Pinebook - sdgathman - 08-14-2019
Moderators: can we add a Fedora subforum?
Fedora 30 installed on my Pinebook with only a few issues. The main one being that brightness defaulted to 0 on the original aarch64 image. :-P
I booted the SD on an rPi3 to do initial configuration, and updates. Then used the dracut option to create a multi-platform initrd for the new kernel, and moved the SD card back to the Pinebook. The newer kernel defaults to brightness 2 - so I took it into a dark bathroom to navigate /sys and set a higher brightness, and change the text console fonts to the biggest available. :-) Fedora uses upstream kernels, so it reflects the state of A64 support in the mainline kernel.
I've been using it a few weeks now. Here are the biggest issues:
1) the biggest issue is lack of support for cpufreq on A64. It feels like 500Mhz, but without any supported readout, that is subjective. Bogomips is 48.0. I don't know what the cpufreq actually defaults to, but let's just say I do aarch64 builds on a 1G rPI3... What is needed to get that upstream?
2) the second most annoying problem is lack of support for internal wifi. This is worked around by adding one of those tiny EdiMax wifi dongles (the big long ones can pose a danger of geting caught on something and damaging the USB port).
3) the third problem is inability to read mic input. The mics are active - because if you turn up the gain, they feed back. And if you connect some speakers to the audio out, the pinebook becomes a megaphone. However, ALSA doesn't know how to make the mic data available to apps like Sound Recorder, Linphone, etc.
4) the internal bluetooth is also not supported. It would be nice to connect decent speakers (the internal speakers are understandably tinny tiny ones) or headset without resorting to an audio cable or yet another dongle.
5) the Mali GPU is not supported. I just use LXDE, which doesn't require 3D, and video playback is fine (xorg reports video accel active). So this is the least important unsupported feature for this user.
I should mention that the sound quality via decent headphones attached by audio cable is quite impressive. Engineering clean audio in a digital environment takes a lot of attention to detail - so kudos to the engineers.