I just got the 14" version, a day ago. Had to pay $30+ shipping, then $41 brokers fee. I'm in Canada, a partly communist country I guess. I saw the same laptop on another site selling with "epacket" scam, which never has brokers fee.
Anyway, rather happy overall. There was a bottom screw missing from the laptop. Also, touchpad seemed lifted in the front. One USB (right one) seemed to have some red glue in it, and nothing would fit in it. It seemed broken and glued on.
I opened it up, changed the 16 GB eMMC for a 64 GB eMMC. I saw that the right usb port had a metal piece with glue stuck in that wasn't part of the main board. Was able to remove it with a flathead screwdriver and a bit of skill. Seems to be a piece they use to position the usb port. When removed, now had a nice right usb port that works.
The touchpad has three little plastic "hooks" that hold it on the bottom. The center one was above it's supposed position, and this is why the touchpad wasn't properly seated. I just pushed the plastic and snapped the hook into place, solved that problem.
The 16GB eMMC that came with it had some type of Linux on it. The 64 GB eMMC has Android. I see no way to change the 64 GB eMMC to Linux. I would like to install Debian from USB, but have not figured out how to get into the BIOS or the boot loader.
Can anyone help me on this last part? Open up the boot loader so I can play with the laptop and Debian, FreeBSD, and a few other fun things? I don't have a eMMC flasher, otherwise I would go that way. I don't need much help, just the ability to start.
The laptop is surprisingly a good build, despite the lack of QC. Also, the battery seems like the flexible type that likes to explode, but so far so good.
(06-30-2017, 02:28 AM)AndyChow Wrote: I just got the 14" version, a day ago. Had to pay $30+ shipping, then $41 brokers fee. I'm in Canada, a partly communist country I guess. I saw the same laptop on another site selling with "epacket" scam, which never has brokers fee.
Anyway, rather happy overall. There was a bottom screw missing from the laptop. Also, touchpad seemed lifted in the front. One USB (right one) seemed to have some red glue in it, and nothing would fit in it. It seemed broken and glued on.
I opened it up, changed the 16 GB eMMC for a 64 GB eMMC. I saw that the right usb port had a metal piece with glue stuck in that wasn't part of the main board. Was able to remove it with a flathead screwdriver and a bit of skill. Seems to be a piece they use to position the usb port. When removed, now had a nice right usb port that works.
The touchpad has three little plastic "hooks" that hold it on the bottom. The center one was above it's supposed position, and this is why the touchpad wasn't properly seated. I just pushed the plastic and snapped the hook into place, solved that problem.
The 16GB eMMC that came with it had some type of Linux on it. The 64 GB eMMC has Android. I see no way to change the 64 GB eMMC to Linux. I would like to install Debian from USB, but have not figured out how to get into the BIOS or the boot loader.
Can anyone help me on this last part? Open up the boot loader so I can play with the laptop and Debian, FreeBSD, and a few other fun things? I don't have a eMMC flasher, otherwise I would go that way. I don't need much help, just the ability to start.
The laptop is surprisingly a good build, despite the lack of QC. Also, the battery seems like the flexible type that likes to explode, but so far so good.
If only there was a thread (or few) devoted to installing a new OS image on the Pinebook ;  (sarcasm, please click the link)
This is not a X86 machine and there is no BIOS. There is uboot which lives on a partition of the SD or eMMC. So you won't be booting from USB or running FreeBSD anytime soon.
(06-30-2017, 03:27 AM)Luke Wrote: (06-30-2017, 02:28 AM)AndyChow Wrote: I just got the 14" version, a day ago. Had to pay $30+ shipping, then $41 brokers fee. I'm in Canada, a partly communist country I guess. I saw the same laptop on another site selling with "epacket" scam, which never has brokers fee.
Anyway, rather happy overall. There was a bottom screw missing from the laptop. Also, touchpad seemed lifted in the front. One USB (right one) seemed to have some red glue in it, and nothing would fit in it. It seemed broken and glued on.
I opened it up, changed the 16 GB eMMC for a 64 GB eMMC. I saw that the right usb port had a metal piece with glue stuck in that wasn't part of the main board. Was able to remove it with a flathead screwdriver and a bit of skill. Seems to be a piece they use to position the usb port. When removed, now had a nice right usb port that works.
The touchpad has three little plastic "hooks" that hold it on the bottom. The center one was above it's supposed position, and this is why the touchpad wasn't properly seated. I just pushed the plastic and snapped the hook into place, solved that problem.
The 16GB eMMC that came with it had some type of Linux on it. The 64 GB eMMC has Android. I see no way to change the 64 GB eMMC to Linux. I would like to install Debian from USB, but have not figured out how to get into the BIOS or the boot loader.
Can anyone help me on this last part? Open up the boot loader so I can play with the laptop and Debian, FreeBSD, and a few other fun things? I don't have a eMMC flasher, otherwise I would go that way. I don't need much help, just the ability to start.
The laptop is surprisingly a good build, despite the lack of QC. Also, the battery seems like the flexible type that likes to explode, but so far so good.
If only there was a thread (or few) devoted to installing a new OS image on the Pinebook ; (sarcasm, please click the link)
This is not a X86 machine and there is no BIOS. There is uboot which lives on a partition of the SD or eMMC. So you won't be booting from USB or running FreeBSD anytime soon.
Can you compare the read speed of 16 GB and 64 GB eMMC storage? I tested my 16 GB in Linux and it was roughly 66 MB/s, which is not bad, it is similar to conventional HDD.
06-30-2017, 05:02 AM
(This post was last modified: 06-30-2017, 06:18 AM by Luke.)
Wizzard, I don't have a 64gb module, but I do have a 32gb module. If you are interested I can benchmark the 32gb module on my PB later today (I will edit this post). That said, I doubt there will be any difference in performance.
edit:
Code: Timing cached reads: 864 MB in 2.00 seconds = 431.78 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 222 MB in 3.01 seconds = 73.67 MB/sec
06-30-2017, 05:03 AM
(This post was last modified: 06-30-2017, 05:04 AM by Wizzard.)
Okay, try it 
Humm, seems there are errors and bugs every time I try to reach this site or post. Anyway, I will get FreeBSD running on this.
07-01-2017, 02:54 PM
(This post was last modified: 07-01-2017, 02:55 PM by Luke.)
(07-01-2017, 02:36 PM)AndyChow Wrote: Humm, seems there are errors and bugs every time I try to reach this site or post. Anyway, I will get FreeBSD running on this.
No issues, but as a new member your posts are moderated (takes time -especially now that most mods are busy on the weekend). Its a spam preventing measure; please read f orum rules.
edit: also, looking forward to seeing FreeBSD on the PB
(07-01-2017, 02:36 PM)AndyChow Wrote: Humm, seems there are errors and bugs every time I try to reach this site or post. Anyway, I will get FreeBSD running on this.
Hi Andy, nice to see someone picking up BSD. I was looking for some of the BSD developers that got Pinebook samples a while back because I was curious what the state of the project was...
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