About the Pinebook - What to expect

[Nick]

Hey Nick

Regarding the build quality: the 11" is solid and very lightweight. I am not going to lie, the 14" prototype was not as good -- but this may be one of the reason the design was changed. I guess we will find out soon enough. 

The alignment of and quality of plastics, etc. on the prototypes and presumably the production units is higher than you may think (have you ever held one of the ASUS Chromebooks ? -  feels very similar, but considerably lighter). 

In terms of quality, the keyboard is really the highlight here, with solid feeling keys that have a good travel distance - honestly its very nice, albeit the keystrokes sound a bit hollow (because the case is largely hollow?). The trackpad is serviceable; it does have multi-touch which works well. NB. perhaps I am a bit spoiled when it comes to trackpads as the only laptops I have used in the last decade are high-end macbooks.

Regarding software, as I wrote in my initial post, android 7 beta builds have all been a pleasure to use. The eMMC makes opening and switching between apps super snappy too. Even my BT headphones worked instantly without any issues ... its a smooth experience all around. 

Regarding Remix OS, tllim said publicly that Jide released their SDK to him privately .... connect the dots

So software-wise, the real undertaking here is BSP and Mainline Linux. Mainline is coming along thanks to sunxi and, as I've already written, we already used it on the PB. However, its not something the average user would like to use at this point. So for now its BSP Linux for us, and any-and-all forms of contributions to make this as good of an experience as possible are very welcome.  

I don't know if elementary (similarly to Cinnamon and other Gnome 3-based desktop environments) will run or does it require DRM? I am correct that Elementary is Gnome 3 right ? I'm sure that pfeerick or Xalius can answer this better

edit: Minecraft will run on android without issues I'm pretty sure, given that the racing game ran at approx 30fps  

Luke,

Thanks for all the info and for taking the time to answer all my questions. I'm now more excited than ever. So then the build quality does look to be pretty good, reminiscent of the Chromebooks.

I doubt Elementary will run on the Pine but it's not a deal breaker... I'm leaning more and more towards using this as an android laptop. Plus unlike with remix, there's no app compatibility issues because it's straight up android.

I can easily see this as a lightweight android gaming, word processing, internet browsing device that crushes most of its competition. For geeks like me, this is a dream.

I just hope I signed up early enough that I'm not going to be waiting 10 months. Lol