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+--- Thread: Hey Guys - what are you running? (/showthread.php?tid=11286)
Hey Guys - what are you running? - zer0sig - 09-04-2020
So, I've done my share of reading, and it's clear that the H64 PINE models work with far less OS builds than other models. I don't have any fantasies about benchmarking Crysis on these, but they seem like a nice solution for an SBC with good power and features for the price.
My question is, what are folks running? I am thinking that if I can get this running as a NAS type setup, or some other single-function simple server, that I can probably save the RockPro64 I will inevitably get for other tasks (probably a TV-connected Linux machine with a decent GUI though I may get others as well). What are you using these for, and what Distro/OS?
Secondly,
from benchmarks I saw from ayufan, it looks like the H64 actually outperforms the Rock64 - this was based on geekbench scores - and I wouldn't expect the H64 build to be better optimized than the Rock64 build with deemingly far better development engagement. Are you guys seeing similar results? Not that the RockPro64 still seems to be twice as fast as either of these two, and personally I could live with a bunch of original A64 devices (right now I have an a64+ and an OG PINEbook with a PBP and A64-LTS on the way). But I'd love to know if anyone has input on trying different builds, what seems to work well (I'd try a GUI but am an experienced system engineer working in Linux/Unix CLIs for 20+ years), and if there are any gotchas I should know about that maybe aren't super obvious even after a glance through the forums and teh almighty goggles.
Thanks! This community is awesome. I may never develop anything better than maybe some shell scripts but i plan to try, bugtest, support, and maybe offer some script work for anything i get a chance to work with.
RE: Hey Guys - what are you running? - as365n4 - 09-06-2020
The best support provided for the H64B is probably by Manjaro thanks to user roel and with a bit of tweaking Arch Linux Arm will work too.
Debian is a pain in the but as for Vanilla Debian you have to build the system from scratch as Debian provides no image and Armbian is just a mess, no official support and even their latest Installer script can't get a User Account created so it never finishes.
Personally I use my H64B Boards for FlightTracking and ShipTracking and as Distro I use Arch Linux Arm as I need AUR support to get my tracker working.
Have a look at https://aur.archlinux.org/ to see if your desired package/app is available.
RE: Hey Guys - what are you running? - zer0sig - 09-09-2020
I'd heard about not having support but not being able to create a user account is just kind of sad.
I see there's a NetBSD build. Ever try it?
I will probably be trying it on something, because once shipping happens, I'll have 5 PINE devices that have NetBSD builds. I'm leaning toward that if it is well developed, or Arch. Thinking I might replace my PINE64 A+ with it for my local DNS and other things that don't need a GUI.
RE: Hey Guys - what are you running? - bapound - 09-12-2020
(09-06-2020, 04:58 AM)as365n4 Wrote: The best support provided for the H64B is probably by Manjaro thanks to user roel and with a bit of tweaking Arch Linux Arm will work too.
Debian is a pain in the but as for Vanilla Debian you have to build the system from scratch as Debian provides no image and Armbian is just a mess, no official support and even their latest Installer script can't get a User Account created so it never finishes.
Personally I use my H64B Boards for FlightTracking and ShipTracking and as Distro I use Arch Linux Arm as I need AUR support to get my tracker working.
Have a look at https://aur.archlinux.org/ to see if your desired package/app is available.
Could you perhaps elaborate on the "tweaking" that you needed to do to get Arch Linux Arm working? I have been having a lot of trouble with the "supported" operating systems, ie haven't gotten any to work except Android, and was thinking about trying Arch Linux Arm. I'm new to all this, so maybe that's where the issues have been coming as well ...
RE: Hey Guys - what are you running? - zer0sig - 09-13-2020
While I wouldn't mind trying Android, I definitely would rather be able to run a version of regular Linux (or BSD) - I could live with headless CLI or a GUI-based machine.
bapound, how is Android on the H64? I already have a Fire TV that is reasonably well put together but I'd still be up for trying an Android on my TV. Will probably get a Pinetab so I'll have a tablet option - though if I could cobble together a better performing Android build on the H64 and 3d print a case, that could be cool as well.
RE: Hey Guys - what are you running? - as365n4 - 09-14-2020
(09-12-2020, 10:35 AM)bapound Wrote: Could you perhaps elaborate on the "tweaking" that you needed to do to get Arch Linux Arm working? I have been having a lot of trouble with the "supported" operating systems, ie haven't gotten any to work except Android, and was thinking about trying Arch Linux Arm. I'm new to all this, so maybe that's where the issues have been coming as well ...
Since Arch does not support the H64B directly, you start with an minimal Manjaro image (Kernel 5.7.8 is the last known working) and remove the Manjaro bootsplash, add alarm and aur to pacman.conf, replace Manjaro mirrorlist with Arch mirrorlist, create missing hooks, generate new keys for pacman, remove lsb-release and then do system update and you will end up with a minimal Arch install and go from there.
And if you need eMMC support replace the dtb file with this one --> https://sourceforge.net/projects/manjaro-arm-pineh64/
RE: Hey Guys - what are you running? - bapound - 09-15-2020
(09-13-2020, 11:40 AM)zer0sig Wrote: While I wouldn't mind trying Android, I definitely would rather be able to run a version of regular Linux (or BSD) - I could live with headless CLI or a GUI-based machine.
bapound, how is Android on the H64? I already have a Fire TV that is reasonably well put together but I'd still be up for trying an Android on my TV. Will probably get a Pinetab so I'll have a tablet option - though if I could cobble together a better performing Android build on the H64 and 3d print a case, that could be cool as well.
I mean, it was fine ... I guess what I was hoping (ok, my wife was hoping) for was an Android experience like a phone, but it was not nearly as seamless on the h64. You have to put the playstore on yourself, which was difficult, and even then you can't put on some apps because the pine h64 isn't "google approved" or whatever the terminology is. You can sideload most apps using apkmirror.com ... sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. We couldn't get Facebook Messenger working, so the whole prospect was kind of a no go for her
As an aside, while I had problems before with pretty much every OS out there, I realized that a) I wasn't waiting long enough, b) sometimes you need to press enter to help get past weird boot loops, and c) for some reason the pine wasn't recognizing that particular monitor that I was using. It might be because it is an old monitor so I had to use a VGA to HDMI adapter. Anyhow, everything works swimmingly on my TV. So I have successfully used Armbian, Manjaro images built myself and downloaded, as well as Android. Now if I could just figure out the audio issues everything would be golden!
(09-14-2020, 02:00 AM)as365n4 Wrote:Awesome, thanks for the reply!(09-12-2020, 10:35 AM)bapound Wrote: Could you perhaps elaborate on the "tweaking" that you needed to do to get Arch Linux Arm working? I have been having a lot of trouble with the "supported" operating systems, ie haven't gotten any to work except Android, and was thinking about trying Arch Linux Arm. I'm new to all this, so maybe that's where the issues have been coming as well ...
Since Arch does not support the H64B directly, you start with an minimal Manjaro image (Kernel 5.7.8 is the last known working) and remove the Manjaro bootsplash, add alarm and aur to pacman.conf, replace Manjaro mirrorlist with Arch mirrorlist, create missing hooks, generate new keys for pacman, remove lsb-release and then do system update and you will end up with a minimal Arch install and go from there.
And if you need eMMC support replace the dtb file with this one --> https://sourceforge.net/projects/manjaro-arm-pineh64/
RE: Hey Guys - what are you running? - rgreen - 10-20-2020
I was trying to run Armbian Buster by way of a DietPi install on SD card, but no luck with the ethernet. Board is detected as a model A (cat /proc/device-tree/model), which I'm guessing may be the problem with ethernet.
Off to try Manjaro, which doesn't report to have complete server install support yet.
RE: Hey Guys - what are you running? - zer0sig - 10-22-2020
Yeah, that might do it. I don't even remember the difference between A and B - and the DietPi supports 5 PINE devices on their site - I think they all use the same network chip. (RTL8211)
I don't know if this is a very recent change, but I saw repeated comments/complaints that Armbian did *not* support the H64, yet here it is showing supported - unless of course, this is in error o only supports certain weird conditions.
https://www.armbian.com/pine-h64/
Also, there are a number of specific version builds mentioned in this thread, you may have already read it, but it's worth a shot.
https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=6378&page=2
I might get one of these just for the heck of it. I have most of the actual devices in one version or another, but no H64, Rock64, PineTab, SOPINE or Cluster board. PinePhone still on the way. It'd be fun to have one of everything (and not too hard on the wallet).