05-30-2020, 09:41 AM
This is correct. There are no clever ways around it; it's just not possible to have more than 4 gigabytes of RAM attached to the RK3399.
Honestly, though, I seriously question the utility of adding more RAM to the Pinebook Pro. This would mean
- Worse power efficiency, since DRAM, even low-power DRAM, uses a surprising amount of power. Battery life in suspend is already not great as it stands.
- Higher cost, since RAM, especially the shiny-new LPDDR4, is not inexpensive.
- More internal electromagnetic noise from the refresh clock, probably, though I admit my SDR projects might make me usually discerning about that.
All this, and to what end? The ability to have more browser tabs open, compile more complicated code, or compress bigger archives? 4 gigabytes seems to be plenty for almost everything that a Linux-driven subnotebook is usually aimed at (and it notably blows every Raspberry Pi, save for the most expensive version of the Pi 4, directly out of the water). 4 gigabytes is really quite a lot of RAM.
Others have gone into greater depth about this in other threads, but it evidently bears mentioning again: 8 gigabytes of RAM is not a particularly reasonable goal at the moment. There are so many other aspects of the device that could use improvement before that.
Honestly, though, I seriously question the utility of adding more RAM to the Pinebook Pro. This would mean
- Worse power efficiency, since DRAM, even low-power DRAM, uses a surprising amount of power. Battery life in suspend is already not great as it stands.
- Higher cost, since RAM, especially the shiny-new LPDDR4, is not inexpensive.
- More internal electromagnetic noise from the refresh clock, probably, though I admit my SDR projects might make me usually discerning about that.
All this, and to what end? The ability to have more browser tabs open, compile more complicated code, or compress bigger archives? 4 gigabytes seems to be plenty for almost everything that a Linux-driven subnotebook is usually aimed at (and it notably blows every Raspberry Pi, save for the most expensive version of the Pi 4, directly out of the water). 4 gigabytes is really quite a lot of RAM.
Others have gone into greater depth about this in other threads, but it evidently bears mentioning again: 8 gigabytes of RAM is not a particularly reasonable goal at the moment. There are so many other aspects of the device that could use improvement before that.
