I have two 2,5" external hard drives, which I use for backups. So far I have used them with different machines mostly on USB2 ports, never had an issue. So I thought surely the PBP USB3-port must be able to power them, but that does not seem to work. One won't spin up and sits there clicking, the other one does spin up but starts clicking once I try to mount it. So now I bought a USB-C to USB-A converter and hooked the drives up to the USB-C port, and now the one that wouldn't spin up mounts (the other one does still does not mount). I couldn't find any power specification for the USB-ports in the Rockchip datasheet, but I am a bit puzzled because so far even the cheapest netbooks would power these drives even on USB2...
Is this the expected behaviour?
With some issues of suspend, I noticed that hibernate is not an option on the default Debian OS.
Using flash drives, either eMMC or NVMe, returning from hibernate is pretty fast.
On implementation, I've always used hibernate with dedicated swap partition. That's not in the default Debian OS. Easy enough to fix.
Anyone interested in hibernate?
Or hybrid-sleep?
How does hibernate work with swap file?
Note: hybrid-sleep is a combination of suspend for a set time, and if not restored to full power on, automatically hibernate. The hibernate image is written at the beginning of hybrid-sleep. If battery power dies suddenly during the suspend phase, you still have your hibernate image to resume to.
I used an external USB 3.0 hard drive to both apply an additional power load on the system and to offload compilation writes (decrease writes to eMMC).
In summary:
The PBP performed well, no lockups or freezes experienced.
The max SoC temp measured during make -j6 was 74 degrees Celsius, within recommended operating range.
The SoC/GPU temperatures do differ throughout operation (to my surprise).
Data indicates that under kernel compilation with external hard drive attached, the battery does not discharge while attached to the DC power supply.
Subjectively, although the bottom of the laptop did get very warm it was not uncomfortably so. I did not think to measure the case temperature with anything other than my fingers.
UPDATE 02 DEC 2019:
The tools used to run the compile test can be found here:
Really enjoying my PineBook Pro, I don't mind working around a few niggles here and there and I appreciate the hard work that has gone into this (and is still going into this!). It's genuinely a lovely device.
I have just one issue that's a show-stopper: A key cap (or is it 'keycap'?) has fallen off, for no obvious reason, and I can't work out how to refit it. It's not had much use and I'm not a keyboard thumper, so it's a bit disappointing, but enough moaning - how do I get it back in place?
The scissor-type mechanism is still attached to the underside of the key cap (see attached image), and I can see that a part of it must slide under a metal hook-type piece on the keyboard... but I can't figure out how to manage that.
Has anyone else had to do this? Please help!
I know some people were planning to move their key caps around, instead of waiting for the ANSI keyboard I assume - anyone done that yet? If so, shout up.
If it's not possible to refit it (& I really hope it is!), is this a warranty-type situation?
Thanks, all, for your help.
Bicko.
Just wanted to give the Pine64 team a big thank you for making a computer that is fun for me again, in the sense of the hardware and OS (ARM is pretty new to me...not counting that one I ignore in my phone). There have been a few in my life...my first Amiga 1000, the first time I built a MP computer for Linux (Mandrake) and this little Pinebook Pro. Part of the fun is figuring out for yourself what you can get to work and navigating its quirks and attributes, but a big part of the fun is the anticipation of seeing what the community can do with it.
I know at $200.00 this is not a profit making enterprise, so thank you for producing a a device for and about the community.
I lose audio output whenever I reboot my PBP. I've gone through sound preferences, hardware, speaker options, tried different profiles and tested them. Currently "stereo output and stereo input" puts sound out. If I reboot, I no longer have sound even with the same profile I selected earlier. I have to go back to sound preferences and try other profiles. How can I get sound on the PBP consistently without changing the profile?
Just wonder if there's any guide on how to read the console via UART?
I've done everything written in the wiki:
1. Bought the USB to DB9 cable.
2. Soldered a 3.5mm audio jack to it (pin 2 - to the tip, pin 3 - to the ring, pin 5 - to the sleeve).
3. Switched the UART toogle on.
4. Plugged everything in.
5. Ran screen /dev/ttyUSB0 1500000.
6. Powered on the PBP.
7. Saw nothing.
