Pinebook to Pinebook Pro-esque upgrade kit

[sebboh]

Hi.




Every few weeks, I search the forums and blog posts for news of the upgrade kit.



I would like to be notified as soon as one becomes available.  I worry that only a small batch of them will be sold, and I don't want to miss out!



I could just buy a Pro..  But.. You see, my spouse occasionally reminds me that I purchased an Arm-based laptop (My Pinebook 1080p) and never did anything productive with it.  So.. I want to upgrade it, and somehow imply that the original purchase was a wise one after all.



So.  I activated the "email notifications" option for this thread.  Please let me know when upgrade kits are available by replying to this thread!



Discussion of the upgrade kits is also welcome.  Here are is a search link to my other threads on these forums, all of which are related to the upgrade kit (at this time, at least!). https://forum.pine64.org/search.php?acti...r&uid=9462



Questions...



When I say Pinebook 1080p, does that refer to exactly one model, unambiguously?  Or must I be more specific?



Will the upgrade kit be compatible with the exact model of Pinebook I have?



Thank you, thank you,

--sebboh

[sebboh]

Thank you for all these replies!  Since the thread is so long now, I will summarize:

Third on my list of shortcomings is our failure to deliver the OG Pinebook-to-Pinebook Pro-like upgrade kit. In the end we were never able to overcome thermal management issues with the RK3399 in the plastic enclosures of the 11.6” and 14” OG Pinebooks. It also turned out that flashing the keyboard firmware, allowing the chassis to seemingly work with the Pinebook Pro mainboard, sadly isn’t a completely straight-forward process. I personally tried a number of times and never got it to work. Following these obstacles we reallocated the available time to deal with other issues we faced this year. We may come back to this topic at some point in 2021, but I can no longer promise a pro-like upgrade kit will be available for the OG Pinebook. Sorry.

Pinebook owner and forum user leperotero also provided a good summary in their post: Pinebook Users are a nobody.

Going forward, there are very few solutions.  Here are a couple:

1. I understand that because Luke could not find a thermal solution that could be sold as a kit, not many folks are going to get an upgrade kit.  So, let me be the first to claim this specific one:


DM me for my shipping address, Luke.  Please note that I already have a 1080p Pinebook, so not everything in the photograph is needed on this end, but I'll take whatever you send.

I'll post pictures of the piece of aluminum I use as heatsink.  It won't be pretty, but it will fit well with my gutterpunk-hacker aesthetic.  DIY!

2. A discount on a Pinebook Pro could be a worthy substitute?  I know that the $100 I sent Pine64 so long ago arrived at a critical time in the company's life--I'm glad it helped so much!  I do wish I had some functional device to help me remember my contribution.

Quite sincerely,
--sebboh

[MtnSk8]

Maybe convert the OG Pinebooks to Pinephone/sbc docks.

The "PineDock Pro" Mod!

A screen, keyboard, touchpad and extended battery for your Pinephone! (or sbc's)

[ludix]

[quote pid='92024' dateline='1616513554']
2. A discount on a Pinebook Pro could be a worthy substitute?  I know that the $100 I sent Pine64 so long ago arrived at a critical time in the company's life--I'm glad it helped so much!  I do wish I had some functional device to help me remember my contribution.
[/quote]

Why on earth do you believe you're entitled to get a discount on a new product because you bought an older one

Buy the Pro or use your OG PineBook, the upgrade kit's not gonna happen.

If you couldn't use the OG PB  you won't have much need for the Pro anyways, but that's your decision.

Maybe if you own an old notebook from a different brand you can ask them for a discount for one of the current devices

[sebboh]

hi, MtnSk8.  Yep, I've thought about this.  Maybe.  Gotta do something with it!  (See above about my spouse. )

Hi, ludix.  Welcome to the forums.  I hope you'll pardon me for only replying to part of your message.

If you couldn't use the OG PB  you won't have much need for the Pro anyways, but that's your decision.

The PB 1080p has some pretty major limitations that Luke is aware of.  I reckon that is why he tried to do the upgrade kit.

I did use it a lot, running anarsoul's work.  The PB is a good-enough ssh client.  But, not as fast for that kind of work as ConnectBot running on a (nice, for the time) 2014 android tablet with a bluetooth keyboard..

Anyone who is reading this...  I guess that I just want an engineer to respond to me.  Is my screen the same size as the pinebook pro screen?  Are the screws in the same place?  What about the battery?  Is anything reusable?  I asked questions along these lines back in 2020: https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?...6#pid65316

Meanwhile, I wasn't joking about my interest in the prototype upgrade kit.   I'll do something about the heat.  N.B. my pinebook 1080p won't be flat anymore..  But that's OK, for me.

While writing this, I searched up some old emails, and I see this:

I ordered my PB in April 2017, paid for it in September of 2018, and it arrived in August of 2018.

...I guess in that context, who cares.  I had some fun, time to move on.

Regarding 'entitlement'.. well, my understanding is that before the Pinebook, Pine64 only had single board computers..  The market for arm-based laptops turned out to be pretty big, and it put Pine64 "on the map", as they say.  I think it is fair to say that without us OG PB buyers, the Pine64 company would not exist in its current form.  And I helped.  I'm proud of that.

[Corkonian]

As much as I like the PB Pro, the original PB is still a useful system.
All I needed was a swap partition, Manjaro runs nicely and the only software that refuses to run is Cura.
My loadout consists of Manjaro, LibreOffice, Ardour, Audacity and Chromium running on the 11" PB...