The Dreaded Red Led of Nothingess

[pfeerick]

Yep but I have a feeling that many have been a bit disappointed when they have expected a more finished product, comparing it to the RPI which have had years to iron out production issues etc.

Exactly. When the first version of the raspberry pi came out (boy does time fly!), it was nowhere as stable, feature complete or polished as it is now. Having said that, it didn't take long for it to shape up quite nicely... then again, it helps when at least one of the developers of the board actually worked for the chip manufacturer as his day job!

Since this came out after the Raspberry Pi, people (myself included) where expecting this to be a much more refined product that it was. Another project that I backed that was funded six months prior, the Chip, was cheaper, lowered powered, and just as behind in fulfilment... for probably the same reason the pine64 was... they didn't limit the number of backers to ensure they were able to fulfil in a reasonable time frame, which is what some of the others do after doing their due diligence prior to starting the campaign. Anyway, not running to schedule is pretty much the norm for kickstarter projects, so nothing unusual there. When I finally got my chip (as backer 26,196 of 39,560, so just past the middle of the crowd), I unboxed it, and on their website, there was this nice glossy web app that let me pick what OS flavour I wanted (ie desktop or headless or server), and away I went. Everything worked, and they have an excellent wiki and very friendly discussion forum.

Then the pine64 board arrives, and I go back onto the pine64 forum and wiki, and go... where do I start... information is scattered everywhere, images are out of date, multiples sites to go to... (Lenny had just started the Pine64.pro site), and I go... what on earth have I backed this time? If I'd backed as a kernel developer like I could have with the Chip, I would have understood why the state of development was an absolute mess. But it's been over six months having been successfully funded, and not even a well laid out 'getting started' guide, or even a blog to keep people up to date with the state of affairs of development. And there are still people complaining about their shipments, and bits missing, and not getting through to support. Thankfully haven't head any scary stories about backers bashing down their front door after their boards when they were delayed by two months...

Now having said that (and not even starting on the fact that Chip with their 39,560 backers to the Pine64s 36,781, and overshot their goal by about four times what they wanted, just like the pine64, has pulled a unbelievably good campaign  and excellent end user experience), and before a certain individual on the forum takes it upon himself to say that this is pine bashing, this is most certainly NOT. It is simply highlighting the fact that given the high quality of products and kickstarters out there, and the way this board was promoted, peoples expectations where much higher, so they are so much more bitter and annoyed once they realise the true state of affairs. I do think pine64 jumped the gun a bit on this one... they were quick to promote it as the 'first $15 64bit board' but not so quick to say that time would be needed to ensure that all it's capabilities would be unlocked. It was marketed as a board that would be ready to use just like the raspberry pi - load up an android image, or a media centre image, or a desktop image, and away you go. However, that isn't the case. It wasn't marketed as a development board, where you'd need to put stuff together and make compromises. 

Now, with all of that out of the way, I suspect this board isn't that far off being at the same level as the Raspberry Pi was when it was first released. Not all the peripherals are 100% yet, and some are just non-functional. However, progress has been made on those, and the work of longsleep and Lenny has made it possible for most of us to start using the Pine64 in some limited fashion, depending on it's intended use. If you want it as a headless server, then it's pretty much ready to go. If you want if for a lightweight desktop replacement, as long as you don't expect to much from it in some quarters (ie. stable internet browsing with firefox or chrome & video acceleration), then it's pretty robust now with Lenny's linux images. 

So as long as you don't might some rough edges, and the occasional barb when you're least expecting it, the pine64 is perfect ;-D