Open hardware smartphone PinePhone Pro starts to ship – to developers only, for now
(2021/12/08)
- Reference: 1638963013
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2021/12/08/pinephone_ships_developers/
- Source link:
Open-source-hardware vendor Pine64 has started shipping versions of its upgraded smartphone and new e-ink tablet – but so far, only to developers.
There's more to affordable Arm hardware than the bare single-board computers (SBCs) from, for example, the Raspberry Pi Foundation, or [1]TI's BeagleBone .
Hong Kong vendor Pine64 started out with the crowd-funded $32 [2]A64 SBC, but then started building this core design into laptops, smartphones, tablets, even smartwatches – with open designs that support multiple operating systems.
[3]
The A64 board, with a 1.2 GHz quad-core A64 Arm SoC – Allwinner's fourth generation after entering the market with a splash [4]a decade ago with the A10 – formed the basis of the PineBook in 2017, and later the PinePhone.
[5]
[6]
With 2GB of RAM and 16GB of flash, the original models already looked rather dated when the device started shipping in 2020, despite a later "Convergence" upgrade with 3GB of RAM and twice the flash.
Now, slowly, the company's second-generation devices are trickling out. The newer kit has 4GB RAM and a 1.5 GHz Rockchip RK3399 (with two Cortex-A72 performance and four Cortex-A53 efficiency cores).
[7]
The upgraded notebook, the PineBook Pro, [8]appeared briefly last year . With 64GB of flash, optional NVMe, and USB 2, 3 and C ports, it has a respectable spec, which together with [9]ongoing silicon shortages means that despite a price bump from $199 to $299, you can't [10]have one .
[11]
Click to enlarge
You will also have to wait to get your hands on a PinePhone Pro, unless you're an OS [12]developer . The original PinePhone supports some 20 different Linux variants, to which the laptops add NetBSD, OpenBSD and RISC OS. There's even a nifty-looking [13]keyboard .
Given the levels of interest in [14]user-maintainable phones such as the Fairphone and de-Googled [15]phone OSes such as /e/ , quite a few keen hackers will be in the queue in front of you.
[16]KDE maintainers speak on why it is worth looking beyond GNOME
[17]EU open source study highlights economic benefits but says Union is 'on the back foot' with industrial policy
[18]Chinese chip designers hope to topple Arm's Cortex-A76 with XiangShan RISC-V design
[19]DIY with Akamai: What to do when no one sells the servers you need? You build your own
The company also offers tablets with cases presumably hand-whittled from pure unobtainium, to which it recently added an e-ink model, the PineNote, which is now shipping to developers.
Given levels of customer [20]dissatisfaction with the Remarkable e-ink tablets, this too might get geek pulses racing – which you could measure with a [21]PineTime , one of its products that is available. Just don't hold your breath. ®
Get our [22]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2013/06/11/review_beagleboard_beaglebone_black/
[2] https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pine64/pine-a64-first-15-64-bit-single-board-super-comput
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YbDkxxthMGuddmMhevWGQwAAAEg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2012/05/10/product_round_up_arm_mini_computers_the_best_and_the_rest/?page=5
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YbDkxxthMGuddmMhevWGQwAAAEg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YbDkxxthMGuddmMhevWGQwAAAEg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YbDkxxthMGuddmMhevWGQwAAAEg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2020/11/16/kde_maintainers_speak_on_why
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2021/05/12/gartner_shortage/
[10] https://pine64.com/product/14%e2%80%b3-pinebook-pro-linux-laptop-iso-uk-keyboard/
[11] https://regmedia.co.uk/2021/12/07/pinephone_smartphone.jpg
[12] https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/PinePhone_Pro#State_of_the_software
[13] https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=13684
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2019/09/11/fairphone_3_stripped/
[15] https://www.theregister.com/2018/09/24/grab_your_degoogled_open_source_altandroid_now/
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2020/11/16/kde_maintainers_speak_on_why/
[17] https://www.theregister.com/2021/09/13/eu_open_source_study_highlights/
[18] https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/06/xiangshan_risc_v/
[19] https://www.theregister.com/2019/06/14/diy_akamai_servers/
[20] https://www.trustpilot.com/review/remarkable.com
[21] https://pine64.com/product/pinetime-smartwatch-sealed/
[22] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
There's more to affordable Arm hardware than the bare single-board computers (SBCs) from, for example, the Raspberry Pi Foundation, or [1]TI's BeagleBone .
Hong Kong vendor Pine64 started out with the crowd-funded $32 [2]A64 SBC, but then started building this core design into laptops, smartphones, tablets, even smartwatches – with open designs that support multiple operating systems.
[3]
The A64 board, with a 1.2 GHz quad-core A64 Arm SoC – Allwinner's fourth generation after entering the market with a splash [4]a decade ago with the A10 – formed the basis of the PineBook in 2017, and later the PinePhone.
[5]
[6]
With 2GB of RAM and 16GB of flash, the original models already looked rather dated when the device started shipping in 2020, despite a later "Convergence" upgrade with 3GB of RAM and twice the flash.
Now, slowly, the company's second-generation devices are trickling out. The newer kit has 4GB RAM and a 1.5 GHz Rockchip RK3399 (with two Cortex-A72 performance and four Cortex-A53 efficiency cores).
[7]
The upgraded notebook, the PineBook Pro, [8]appeared briefly last year . With 64GB of flash, optional NVMe, and USB 2, 3 and C ports, it has a respectable spec, which together with [9]ongoing silicon shortages means that despite a price bump from $199 to $299, you can't [10]have one .
[11]
Click to enlarge
You will also have to wait to get your hands on a PinePhone Pro, unless you're an OS [12]developer . The original PinePhone supports some 20 different Linux variants, to which the laptops add NetBSD, OpenBSD and RISC OS. There's even a nifty-looking [13]keyboard .
Given the levels of interest in [14]user-maintainable phones such as the Fairphone and de-Googled [15]phone OSes such as /e/ , quite a few keen hackers will be in the queue in front of you.
[16]KDE maintainers speak on why it is worth looking beyond GNOME
[17]EU open source study highlights economic benefits but says Union is 'on the back foot' with industrial policy
[18]Chinese chip designers hope to topple Arm's Cortex-A76 with XiangShan RISC-V design
[19]DIY with Akamai: What to do when no one sells the servers you need? You build your own
The company also offers tablets with cases presumably hand-whittled from pure unobtainium, to which it recently added an e-ink model, the PineNote, which is now shipping to developers.
Given levels of customer [20]dissatisfaction with the Remarkable e-ink tablets, this too might get geek pulses racing – which you could measure with a [21]PineTime , one of its products that is available. Just don't hold your breath. ®
Get our [22]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2013/06/11/review_beagleboard_beaglebone_black/
[2] https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pine64/pine-a64-first-15-64-bit-single-board-super-comput
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YbDkxxthMGuddmMhevWGQwAAAEg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2012/05/10/product_round_up_arm_mini_computers_the_best_and_the_rest/?page=5
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YbDkxxthMGuddmMhevWGQwAAAEg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YbDkxxthMGuddmMhevWGQwAAAEg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YbDkxxthMGuddmMhevWGQwAAAEg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2020/11/16/kde_maintainers_speak_on_why
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2021/05/12/gartner_shortage/
[10] https://pine64.com/product/14%e2%80%b3-pinebook-pro-linux-laptop-iso-uk-keyboard/
[11] https://regmedia.co.uk/2021/12/07/pinephone_smartphone.jpg
[12] https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/PinePhone_Pro#State_of_the_software
[13] https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=13684
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2019/09/11/fairphone_3_stripped/
[15] https://www.theregister.com/2018/09/24/grab_your_degoogled_open_source_altandroid_now/
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2020/11/16/kde_maintainers_speak_on_why/
[17] https://www.theregister.com/2021/09/13/eu_open_source_study_highlights/
[18] https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/06/xiangshan_risc_v/
[19] https://www.theregister.com/2019/06/14/diy_akamai_servers/
[20] https://www.trustpilot.com/review/remarkable.com
[21] https://pine64.com/product/pinetime-smartwatch-sealed/
[22] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
I would have bought one on launch, but...
Neil Brown
... I didn't feel I met the criteria they had set out for being a developer. I'm a keen user, and I'm happy to make what meagre contributions I can, but I don't have the skills to make software work on a new hardware platform. So I didn't apply for one, knowing that slots were limited. When they become available to the general public - if they become available to the general public - then I'll be buying one.
(I like my PineTime, and my old model PinePhone, but I didn't get on with the PineBook Pro.)
HK is CCP now
Anonymous Coward
I would start being wary of anything more complex than a basic board component like a cap or resisor or diode or npn/pnp something real basic. The CCP is ramping up the rhetoric and it wont leave a private company to make hw destined for the weetern shores without snoop stuffing embedded in every board and circuit.
Tinfoil hat and all.
Surely a very large proportion of their potential userbase *is* developers since the average consumer doesn't give a damn if their machine is an open platform or not.
So if the developers get hold of the phone, they are unlikely to buy another (until it breaks) making it very difficult to afford to manufacture another batch and expect to recover costs. Then the developers lose interest if there are no users to benefit from their software and the whole ecosystem starts to look a little depressing.
I see this unfortunate pattern happening with kickstarter hardware projects quite a lot. But I do wish the PinePhone good luck!