Pinebook Pro

Preamble

Pine64 hardware always was tad rough around the edges but not enough to be not usable, I’d say. I’ve used their single board computers for past several years and in my experience they were not particularly better or worse than many others I’ve managed to try. In general I like that the company itself is quite open to public contributions and their hardware lineup is not that big, but covers all the ’necessary areas’: energy efficient SBCs, performance/utility SBCs, couple of laptops, couple of highly experimental cellphones(!) and widely know soldering iron that I came to like a lot as well.

Hardware

It is lightweight, it is built okay and it is arm64. Some stuff is not on par with major brands, like plastic crumbles here and there a little bit, and bottom lid is like a sharp knife when removed, but overall I can’t complain.

┌─────────────┬────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ CPU         │ 4x ARM A53 @ 1.4GHz + 2x ARM A72 @ 1.8 GHz │
│ GPU         │ ARM Mali T860 MP4 GPU                      │
│ RAM         │ 4GB LPDDR4 RAM                             │
│ Display     │ 1080p IPS Panel                            │
│ Storage     │ MicroSD, eMMC, M.2 SSD (optional adapter)  │
└─────────────┴────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Full specs can be found here.

Software

This is the fun part! I’ve used OpenBSD there mostly, played with NetBSD (albeit briefly) and only swapped to “stock” Manjaro at the end of 2024. Note that playing with some of the more obscure operating systems requires UART connection via 3.5mm audio jack.

Overall there is a plethora of OSes to choose from (mostly GNU/Linux distros though, but still).

Photos