not PinePro alone. What else can a developer of a “free” Linux phone offer?

The PINE64 company is known, first of all, for its telephones. Until recently, it would have been necessary to write “telephone”, but recently, in addition to the first model, PinePhone, the second one, PinePro, was released.

Both devices are quite popular among geeks, but the company has other devices that are also of interest to many of us. Let’s talk about them today, and we’ll even show one gadget in more detail, since we recently bought it.

PinePhone

Let’s start with the phone, so that if someone hasn’t heard of it, you can get an idea. By the way, here

we wrote

experience with the device.

Specifications:

The gadget ships with postmarketOS, UBports / Ubuntu Touch and Manjaro, and now this phone has got another version – with KDE Plasma Mobile on board. Representatives of the Pine64 community and the KDE project worked on the new revision of the device. Accordingly, the device was named PinePhone KDE Community Edition.

The model was delivered in two versions – the first with 2GB RAM + 16GB eMMC and the second 3GB RAM + 32GB eMMC + USB Type-C adapter. The adapter makes it possible to connect the phone to the monitor in order to use it as a workstation. The cost of the versions is $ 149 and $ 199 for the junior and senior models, respectively.

PinePhone Pro

This is a more advanced model that has received much more advanced hardware. The core is a Rockchip RK3399S SoC with two ARM Cortex-A72 and four ARM Cortex-A53 cores operating at 1.5GHz, as well as a quad-core ARM Mali T860 GPU (500MHz). Moreover, an updated version of the chip was developed specifically for the device, which received additional energy saving options and a hibernation mode, which makes it possible to receive calls and SMS.

As for other specifications, the device is equipped with 4 GB of RAM, 128GB eMMC (internal) and two cameras (5 Mpx OmniVision OV5640 and 13Mpx Sony IMX258). For comparison, the first PinePhone came with 2 GB of RAM, 16GB eMMC, and cameras in 2 and 5Mpx.

There is also a combined video output for connecting a monitor, Wi-Fi 802.11 ac, Bluetooth 4.1, GPS, GPS-A, GLONASS, UART (via the headphone jack), a 3000mAh battery (15W fast charge). You can still hardware disable wireless modules and cameras.

The cost of this pleasure is $ 399.

“Free” hardware and software is a very interesting topic, but we have other articles, check it out – we are talking about:
→ Small “raspberries” in a large data center
→ Dynamic UPSs in data centers: how we installed Piller CPM300 double conversion
→ Disassembly of a rare beast from Nvidia – DGX A100

PineNote

And this is no longer a phone, but rather an e-ink-based e-reader. The gadget was developed quickly enough. It is based on a SoC (RK3566) chip, plus 4GB LPDDR4 RAM, 128GB eMMC. According to the developers, the device also works with Linux. The hardware base is ready, but the software turned out to be more difficult to adapt than the hardware.

The hardest part was getting the display to activate in a Linux environment. We managed to do this, but now there are other problems, not so critical, but they still need to be solved.

Whatever it was, but the hardware base is actively manufactured in Chinese factories. You can now order the developer version. The latter will receive an EMR stylus, a magnetic case and a USB-C UART board for debugging.

The device will be shipped as the software is updated. After the final readiness, the device will be sold in the regular user version.

PineTime

Well, this is a waterproof smartwatch. Unlike phones, they cost very little – only $ 26.99.

The basis of the device is an NRF52832 MCU microcontroller (64 MHz). Also, the device is equipped with 512KB system Flash memory, 4 MB Flash for user data, 64KB RAM, 1.3-inch touch screen with a resolution of 240×240 pixels (IPS, 65K colors), Bluetooth 5, accelerometer (used as a pedometer), heart rate sensor and vibration motor. According to the developers, in offline mode the watch can work for about 3-5 days, depending on the activity of use.

The clock is almost ready, the problem, as before, is the software. It is not so easy to adapt something to the hardware of such a device. Here used by real-time system FreeRTOS 10, graphics library LittleVGL 7 and Bluetooth stack NimBLE 1.3.0. The firmware loader is based on MCUBoot.

Pinecil Smart Soldering Iron

We have this gadget at our disposal, so a full review of it will be released soon. For now, let’s talk about the characteristics, plus below is a video with unpacking the device and comments on its capabilities.

Specifications:

  • Size: 17cm x 12cm x 2.3cm
  • Weight: 88 grams.
  • OS: Yes, there is an operating system here called IronOS.
  • Chipset: GigaDevice GD32VF103TB, plus 32-bit RV32IMAC RISC-V “Bumblebee Core” @ 108 MHz
  • Display: monochrome OLED, 96 * 16 pixels.
  • Memory: 32KB RAM, 128KB Flash.
  • Connectors: USB-C PD and QC 3.0 12V-20V 3A

Unfortunately, it was never made to work via USB-C. It turns on, Windows sees it, for example. But here it does not heat up using USB-C. I have tried several power supplies, cables, etc. No. It turns on, but when you try to start heating, it writes DC Low.

With a conventional 5-20V power supply, it works without any problems. Heating to the desired temperature in just 12 seconds.

The screen is quite informative – you can change the interface (the soldering iron, yes), raise or lower the temperature, set the required time to turn off the soldering iron. Plus there are a few more advanced features.

And the PINE64 also has a power supply, a single-board PC, an IP camera and a few more systems, which we will talk about in the near future – we want to evaluate some of these devices personally.

Similar Posts

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *