this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2023
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pine64 (pine64.com)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
 

Anyone have a pine phone and running Linux (Ubuntu) as your EDC?

Thinking of buying a cheap phone with new number to see how it goes. Would like to talk and text though.

Any excitement on these new developments and with what is going on with frame works also?

Edit: What phone would you recommend to do it with? Pine phone is med range pricing.

I currently have a GP6a

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

See @linuxphones. I have PP and PPP. I run ArchLinux. PP is slow, but the battery lasts a bit better then PPP. PPP is more powerful, but CPU is too hungry and the phone heats a lot. If you need long battery life or you type a lot, then buy with the Pine keyboard. It's chunky and have some quality issues, but I would say it worth it. Software currently immature. I would recommend buying only if you are a very experienced user.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I have a pp too, would recommend aside from the fact it constantly turns on randomly.

(This is a joke)

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I just bought a pinetab 2 and they don't even have a functional WiFi driver for the chip they use. Would not recommend

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Honestly, why did you expect anything different?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What do you mean? Ofc you'd expect the hardware you buy to actually work, like in all other devices.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

You're clearly new to Pine64 😉

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Because it advertised WiFi and Bluetooth on the website and there was no mention of the lack of drivers anywhere to be found

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago

Pine64 is known for very shoddy software support and almost none of their devices have every bit of the hardware working on release, if any. A missing wifi driver is too be expected with them, not an exception.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

I have a pinephone (not pro) collecting dust, because it's nowhere near as usable for anything, sadly. But I look forward to linux on phones. I recommend a OnePlus 6 with your choice of linux on phones to be honest.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

IMO the most functional pine64 gadgets are the pinetime and pinebook pro, those you can daily drive. The phones are not ready yet, they are good devices to play with but I wouldn't use them as a daily driver, you could miss an important text or phone call and you want a reliable phone in case of an emergency. If you just want a cheap phone that doesn't spy on you I would get a 'dumb' phone.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

Be ready to flash your phone often if you do, but they can work well when they want to

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I own a Pinephone and it wasn't ready for daily driving. Even the battery issues meant that when sleeping, phones wouldn't always wake to receive a call which can be critical. Software is still quite immature, but I would consider buying a Pinephone Pro from them in future as happy with hardware side of things. It will get there, and it's cool to see the progress, in the end, I went with a Pixel with GrapheneOS (degoogled android) which is pretty reliable for the essentials and having access the android apps in a sandbox.

If you're looking for a daily driver, it's probably the best bet right now.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If you're only making phone calls and send texts then you can make do. Be sure to bring a power bank with you.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Or an extra battery. Their keyboard case has a battery built in, too. Iirc

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Does anyone here know the status of gnome for phones? I'd like to do something like that but only when gnome's ready

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Sadly, there's rarely any information on that

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Ypu can try one of the phones that are supported by Ubuntu Touch. I don't know how good it runs but there are several cheap (= old) phones on the list.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

This is 100% the way.

Pine hides their hobby-grade hardware behind in-development software. I owned both a PBP and PPP and much as I'd like to say otherwise, really can't say anything to recommend either.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Chiming in to say that my Fairphone 4 worked well with Ubuntu Touch, though I have since come to the conclusion that Waydroid doesn't really work for my usage due to many social apps not integrating well with notifications, as well as missing AGPS support, so I am back on Android with CalyxOS. If you find that GNU/Linux is not daily-driveable for you, I can definitely recommend that.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Awesome, did not know it existed!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

pine phone gave me no joy at all

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