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Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

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11–20 of 77 posts

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#11
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The target market for the Raspberry Pi foundation is education. They get cheap boards into the hands of people everywhere and provide plenty of documentation to get them started. Raspberry Pi has the biggest community, and therefore it’s the best choice for anyone looking to get started. If you’re the type of person who needs very specific features like AES acceleration, then you don’t want to invest in a board aimed…

In my opinion, Raspberry Pi's main problem has to do with using SD cards, which are prone to errors and corruption. It's a kind of media storage that works best if it operates more statically--for instance, you read some photos on your camera, remove a few, take some new ones... and that's it for the day. They are not intended to undergo a large number of read/write cycles on a regular basis, and that's what the Rasp…

The problem of reliance on an SD card is somewhat less nowadays with the Raspberry Pi 4. Its faster USB3 support allows you to just use the SD card for the /boot partition to boot the system, while you can maintain everything else (root, userspace) on an attached USB drive that can handle heavy reading and writing.

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#12
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The target market for the Raspberry Pi foundation is education. They get cheap boards into the hands of people everywhere and provide plenty of documentation to get them started. Raspberry Pi has the biggest community, and therefore it’s the best choice for anyone looking to get started. If you’re the type of person who needs very specific features like AES acceleration, then you don’t want to invest in a board aimed…

In my opinion, Raspberry Pi's main problem has to do with using SD cards, which are prone to errors and corruption. It's a kind of media storage that works best if it operates more statically--for instance, you read some photos on your camera, remove a few, take some new ones... and that's it for the day. They are not intended to undergo a large number of read/write cycles on a regular basis, and that's what the Rasp…

Pi 4s can boot from USB now, as of the Sept 2020 bootloader update. No need for microSD.

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#13
post #2

There's quite a few third party boards that are far better than the Raspberry Pi 4. I found the Rpi4 quite disappointing, especially the half-supported GPU and the lack of AES/crypto extensions in the ARM64 chip. Only ARM64 chip I've ever seen that lacks those.

What boards would you consider "better" and for what reasons (gpu and crypto extensions, or are there other factors)? I run a few raspberry pis and always looking for new/better toys.

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#14
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion, Raspberry Pi's main problem has to do with using SD cards, which are prone to errors and corruption. It's a kind of media storage that works best if it operates more statically--for instance, you read some photos on your camera, remove a few, take some new ones... and that's it for the day. They are not intended to undergo a large number of read/write cycles on a regular basis, and that's what the Rasp…

The problem of reliance on an SD card is somewhat less nowadays with the Raspberry Pi 4. Its faster USB3 support allows you to just use the SD card for the /boot partition to boot the system, while you can maintain everything else (root, userspace) on an attached USB drive that can handle heavy reading and writing.

You can boot entirely from USB on the Pi 4s now. Don’t even need the microSD for the boot partition.

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#15
post #12
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion, Raspberry Pi's main problem has to do with using SD cards, which are prone to errors and corruption. It's a kind of media storage that works best if it operates more statically--for instance, you read some photos on your camera, remove a few, take some new ones... and that's it for the day. They are not intended to undergo a large number of read/write cycles on a regular basis, and that's what the Rasp…

Pi 4s can boot from USB now, as of the Sept 2020 bootloader update. No need for microSD.

No, not only Raspberry Pi 4's. I've had this on my bookmarks for a while, which explains how to boot any Pi (some models differ with regards to the procedure, or the need of an SD card, such as the Raspberry Pi Zero, which still needs one): https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/hardware/raspberry...

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#16
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The target market for the Raspberry Pi foundation is education. They get cheap boards into the hands of people everywhere and provide plenty of documentation to get them started. Raspberry Pi has the biggest community, and therefore it’s the best choice for anyone looking to get started. If you’re the type of person who needs very specific features like AES acceleration, then you don’t want to invest in a board aimed…

> The target market for the Raspberry Pi foundation is education. I'd bet 80% of the sales are to hobbyists/companies. It's a weird setup. Have a look at this page: https://www.raspberrypi.org/about/meet-the-team/ There are two groups of people: * Raspberry Pi Foundation (100+) * Raspberry Pi Trading (27) My understanding: The people in "Raspberry Pi Trading" do the hardware/software/documentation/product management/…

An interesting thing about that "meet the teem" page is the diversity.

Most Linuxish projects are a pale sausage fest!

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#17

How does the onboard battery charging IC work? Can I hook up a 3s li-ion battery and charge it via the 12v power input? Does the battery kick on if the main PSU is interrupted?

I think that this could be an underlooked, but absolutely killer feature for this board. Built-in support for high-capacity li-ion batteries that automatically kick-in for a battery backup would be awesome for homemade NAS set-ups, not to mention a whole host of robotics-y or home automation projects.

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#18
post #16
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The target market for the Raspberry Pi foundation is education. I'd bet 80% of the sales are to hobbyists/companies. It's a weird setup. Have a look at this page: https://www.raspberrypi.org/about/meet-the-team/ There are two groups of people: * Raspberry Pi Foundation (100+) * Raspberry Pi Trading (27) My understanding: The people in "Raspberry Pi Trading" do the hardware/software/documentation/product management/…

An interesting thing about that "meet the teem" page is the diversity. Most Linuxish projects are a pale sausage fest!

I guess that's why they put the Raspberry Pi Foundation people first, then.

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#19
post #2

There's quite a few third party boards that are far better than the Raspberry Pi 4. I found the Rpi4 quite disappointing, especially the half-supported GPU and the lack of AES/crypto extensions in the ARM64 chip. Only ARM64 chip I've ever seen that lacks those.

What is your favorite alternative?

Re: Pine64 Unveils Quartz64 SBC

#20
post #6

Coupled with that 10-inch e-ink panel that they mention will be available when it launches, this could make for a great machine for working (reading, writing, coding...). I hope the price is not very steep.

I worry more about the price of a 10 inch e-ink panel.

Yeah, those can easily be in the $200 range.
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