I have just received my Pinebook Pro last week. Being a newbie, I am having some fun times setting up the Pinebook to fit my needs. I am mostly doing machine learning and mathematical optimization so this is an interesting experiment for me to try to achieve it using Pinebook. I am glad that many Python libraries such as numpy, scipy, scikit-learn, pandas are already included to be set up through pacman. But some others are missing.

My question is whether there is a way to set up a deep learning framework such as PyTorch in Pinebook. It is not for actual running purposes but mainly for development. I can find a couple of Keras libraries. There is also OpenCV. However, neither of these pieces are complete to work on a full framework. Any ideas?

Hello,

Having issues with the microphone on my PinePhone BH edition, I contacted Customer Service. After exchanging many emails Pine64 agreed to send me a replacement "daughter / side board", waiving the shipment fees if I pay $9.99 for the spare part. I was to create the order then email them the order number so they can refund the shipping fees (see their message below):

"Reviewed your communication with support team#2. To close the case ticket #XXXX  friendly, you purchase the item: PINEPHONE USB-C SIDE BOARD SKU: PPHONE-SIDEB $9.99, we waive the shipping cost.$11.99.

[...]

Let us know the order ID after you ordered the spare parts.

Have a nice day!

Regards,
Pine64 team"


After a few weeks (15/06), when I was nearly sure the microphone was faulty, I made the order, paid for the spare part plus the shipping fees, then emailed back the "Pine64 team" letting them know the order number so they can refund the shipping fees. I haven't heard back since. Today, after a week, I got an automated message from Pine Store (sales@pine64.org) informing me that my order was completed and shipped. The invoice shows the full amount, including P&P and the final value means that I will be paying custom duties and handling fees to the Post Office.

Not a word from Sales, or Customer Service, and I emailed them nearly every day.

I am a big fan of Open Source, PinePhone, and I really want so support the community but the so called "customer service" experience is hugely disappointing. I am afraid Pine64 is far from being a supplier who cares for their customer.

First, thank you to all involved in developing these solutions.  I could not design and build a Pinebook, and likely couldn't port NetBSD to it.

A few months ago, I dug out an old laptop to use as a portable VNC terminal to operate and administer the various computers (some "headless") that I have, which run NetBSD and Debian/Raspbian Linux. After finding out that the hard drive was quickly dying, I sought out another cheap, used laptop.  I also found out about the Pinebook which seemed more lucrative, since I wouldn't need to buy new obsolete batteries.  I then found out that it would be quicker to get a Pinebook Pro.  So I ordered one.  A few covid months went by but then one day I got a tracking number.  Two days later I had the Pinebook Pro in my hands, all the way from Hong Kong!  I can't get things that quickly from a hundred miles away.  What an amazing machine.  It seems very well engineered and built, especially considering the price.

I thought I would use the Pinebook Pro to download NetBSD.  I quickly discovered an error in my DHCP server.  The Debian that came with the Pinebook Pro would always clobber /etc/resolv.conf, even though I was using a static IP.  Oddly, I have two other machines running Debian Buster, which do not have this problem.  But I fixed the server, and was able to download a NetBSD image.  I could not boot from the SD card though.  When the SD card was inserted, the eMMC would not boot, but neither did the SD card. 

So I took the bottom off the Pinebook and switched off the eMMC, and switched it back on immediately after the SD card started to boot.  This turned out to be pretty straightforward and not as scary as I had read.  The trick is to open the lid 90°, and lay the Pinebook on its keyboard, with the display overhanging the edge of a table, for disassembly.  I carefully stood the Pinebook up on its side to operate it.  Of course, I made sure to remove the plastic standoffs first.  A speaker did fall out, but I pressed it back in.  When picking up the Pinebook to stand it on edge, I picked it up by the display half so as not to put any load on the hinges.

I tried for several days to use sysinst to install with small partitions.  There is something wrong with sysinst, going back to at least version 8, on every platform I've used it on.  The partitioning barely works and does some very bad things.  I never did get it to give me a working, bootable setup on the Pinebook Pro.  I only tried this because I like to have small partitions so that I can quickly make uncompressed images that easily fit on USB memory sticks.  So rather than try to partition and install manually, I put the installation image on the eMMC and let it grow itself.  When doing this, you can link /targetroot to / and still use sysinst to configure the system and install pkgsrc.

I initially did have some hiccups with the wifi.  I used FTP to retrieve the NetBSD image from a local server.  I had the "flood of checksum errors" problem.  But I rebooted and tried again, and did not have the issue again.  In fact, except for sysinst occasionally crashing, I'm finding NetBSD-current to be very stable.  Right now, it's compiling kde4, and has been doing this for over twelve hours.

Are these connected to an unused UART that can be enabled in devicetree? Or something else?

I have just found that my Android phgone is on its way out and I am thinking of really using the Pinephone instead, despite still being in development.

One feature I would like is the ability to backup my phone and SMS records for future reference. I tried to search for them, but have not found where they are stored.

As long as I can transfer the 2 files to my pc, I can find a way to convert them to CSV and then to LibreOffice Calc.

Can someone tell me where this info is stored, please?

Today I noticed that @ayufan had a Ubuntu 20.04 build, so I decided to try it out. No matter what I do, however, I cannot get any sound from the speakers. I have tried everything I could find on this forum, and made sure that the speakers were turned up in alsamixer, but no luck. Ideas anyone? Other then no sound and the printing service missing (which I can live with) I have really been loving this build.

Using Blender app I made a mockup of pinetab USB speaker dock.....

A model of a speaker dock for the Pinetab using blender. Use the files as you desire.

USB power supply (perhaps  micro USB 5 volts  2 AMPS) can supply power to speakers,
as well as recharging  the Pinetab batteries using  USB OTG port
Audio cable is connected to Pinetab headphone jack.
- Four USB ports
-magnets will hold Pinetab firmly in slot
-back panel of dock  (which holds Pinetab upright) is screwed onto main body


blender file download....
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_HIf9dX...sp=sharing

mp4 video animation

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CubPZUP...sp=sharing

image..
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Og8OYwg...sp=sharing

I'm using the recent release 53 and am having trouble getting X windows applications to display.  When I try to run Xmir, it errors saying Failed to Connect to Mir.  I tried variants of DISPLAY=:0, DISPLAY=:1, DISPLAY=:2, and DISPLAY=.  The error is:

Quote:Fatal server error:
(EE) Failed to connect to Mir: Failed to connect to server socket: No such file or directory

Hi all,

Is there a clear instruction how to upgrade an 1st batch Pinebook Pro with original (Debian-Mate) OS on MMC to the new factory Manjaro or 20.06?
I've already tried manjaro 20.02 and 20.06 on SD and there are fine, so I like to update it to MMC to free up the SD slot.

Another option would be to install it on the SSD and boot from MMC to SSD, but I haven't found a real clear up to date instruction yet.
Or can we have a multiboot bootloader on MMC?

Regards Paul

Since I've got my Pinebook Pro this problem keeps haunting me. WiFi gets really bad on negligible distances and obstacles.

Here are some speedtests I've just did: