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Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

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Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#101

Post by Raphael_Amiard »

slantyyz wrote: post #70
comboy wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went with raspberry pi + LCD. Even though there are many LCD options I recommend going with their official pi touch display, it just works without headaches. I did use their official enclosure, but it doesn't really seem to be well designed for wall mount (some 3d printing and magnets helped). I think going with an android tablet is fine and headache free. I just don't like aesthetics of that solution.

> I think going with an android tablet is fine and headache free. The problem with many tablets is that leaving them plugged can cause batteries to swell, which can end up being a huge headache. I've heard stories of offices that used iPads as wall mounted displays having this problem, so I don't think any particular make or model is immune to this issue. I considered Pi+Monitor, but for me, something like the Pineta…

> I considered Pi+Monitor, but for me, something like the Pinetab is a cleaner, simpler solution. And at $99 without the keyboard, that's a pretty decent price.

Of course you should go for what is easier for you, and the pinetab does sound easier, however I'd argue that it is not cleaner.

Separating the screen and main unit will allow for a more serviceable solution, changing either piece if it breaks, or upgrading the main unit if you need more power/different connectivity.

Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#102

Post by slim »

jcun4128 wrote: post #21
wpietri wrote: post #13

Very interesting! I've been looking for cheap wall-mountable touchscreens so I can have permanent, single-purpose interfaces and displays. For example, I have a KanbanFlow board to track my work, and I use an old tablet mounted to the wall next to my standing desk. I was thinking I'd get cheap Android tablets and root them, but I'd much rather support something where it's built for user control from the beginning.

Side thought... is it even cheaper if you just have displays/use an ESP to do http requests to a local server... guess depends what they have to do. I mean I think you would need a 32 to drive the display too vs. just an ESP01

I don't think they're capable of displaying a web page

Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#103

Post by zozbot234 »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #92

I've got an old windows tablet with similar specs, old intel atom, 2GB ram. (linx1010b) Its gathering dust because its so underpowered, could not find a use for it as a GUI user device. I think some kind of kiosk / iot hub with display application could work, if you put in the effort.

Newer Linux releases generally work quite well on these tablets as far as hardware support goes. The one thing that's marginally underpowered is the amount of RAM, and in my experience 2GB still suffices for simple use cases.

Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#104

Post by Teknoman117 »

jjice wrote: post #40

Absolutely incredible for the $120 price point. If they release a PineTab Pro in the future with 4 (or dare I say 8GB) of ram, I'd be all over it. At that point, I could really start to be productive. 2GB is a bit limiting for the modern web unfortunately, but there is a ton of potential here. I'm considering buying one to use as my main machine for this next year at Uni. Taking notes in VS Code/Vim would be fine, bu…

Having only 4 GiB of non-expandable RAM is really my only complaint with the PineBook Pro. I bought one anyways though. The only other complaint would be not being upfront about the video encoder and decoder not being ready, but the decoder looks like it'll work when kernel 5.8 releases. Still though, it's hard to find a $200 laptop with a 1080p IPS display regardless, it being open source just makes it so much cooler in so many ways.

I just wish it was easier to try out git kernels (ones with the prototype patches for video decode) on ARM devices. Having to deal with hacking up device tree files is a bit daunting. It's a good learning experience nonetheless.

It's nice to be able to collect random patches for things and apply them to your kernel and pretty much being good to go on x86. With ARM you have to ensure you instantiated the driver in the device tree file which gets stuck in the boot partition along with the kernel .

Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#105

Post by Maha-pudma »

michaelmrose wrote: post #87
Maha-pudma wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't expect my comment to be popular, and it's probably going to decimate the measley 7 points I've accrued (I had 9 prior) as might this one, but I tend not to buy anything without a decent warranty. I'm certainly not buying anything that could go wrong after 30 days without any recourse other than paying to get it fixed or to buy a new one. My view about warranties are to do with the confidence the seller/manuf…

Complaining about down votes usually attracts you guessed it... more down votes. I didn't down vote either your prior post or this one. I value durable things. My 8ish year old desktop just died. Both my phone and my laptop are 5 years old. On the other hand I see the value in cheap things that will be affordable to all made by small distributors that value our freedom to use our devices. Everything in life is some d…

Im not complaining, I'm expecting it; and I'm not fussed either, I don't care about internet points. Down vote away it bothers me not.

Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#107

Post by Maha-pudma »

TomMarius wrote: post #88
Maha-pudma wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't expect my comment to be popular, and it's probably going to decimate the measley 7 points I've accrued (I had 9 prior) as might this one, but I tend not to buy anything without a decent warranty. I'm certainly not buying anything that could go wrong after 30 days without any recourse other than paying to get it fixed or to buy a new one. My view about warranties are to do with the confidence the seller/manuf…

Not all devices are supposed to be that good. This is a hacker grade toy device, not something you should depend on - after all, the price reflects that.

True as that may be it's just as true I won't be buying this. If there's one thing guaranteed to annoy me it's flakey hardware.

Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#108

Post by hsitz »

julianlam wrote: post #14

This is interesting to me because I'm in the market for a new tablet. Is this more of a hacker device (IR blaster, odd assortment of ports, full OS, etc.) or consumer? It should ideally pass the wife test...

It doesn't sound like this is for you. If "wife test" means the wife using and it and liking it, pretty sure it would fail. It's not what this is marketed for. An Amazon Kindle tablet would be more what you're looking for, if this is the price point you want.

Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#109

Post by veridies »

This looks wonderful, and I bought it as soon as preorders opened; I'd love to have a Linux tablet to read books on and take to work (I'm a teacher, not a programmer). It definitely is pretty low-powered, though, and I'd appreciate a higher-end alternative. Is there any Windows-based tablet that you can reliably and easily install Linux on?

Re: Pinetab – 10.1″ Linux Tablet with Detached Backlit Keyboard

#110

Post by terhechte »

jjice wrote: post #40

Absolutely incredible for the $120 price point. If they release a PineTab Pro in the future with 4 (or dare I say 8GB) of ram, I'd be all over it. At that point, I could really start to be productive. 2GB is a bit limiting for the modern web unfortunately, but there is a ton of potential here. I'm considering buying one to use as my main machine for this next year at Uni. Taking notes in VS Code/Vim would be fine, bu…

I bought a Chuwi Surbook Mini for $300 two years ago and am running Linux on it: https://www.chuwi.com/product/buy/Chuwi-SurBook-mini.html

It works reasonably well. I have touch screen driver support (even managed to get it working with Wayland, once, though that was too slow for the Atom processor), the keyboard is good, and the speed is o.k. The major downside is that the touchpad on the keyboard is terrible. They also went with a custom connector, not the Surface Go one, so you're stuck with a subpar touchpad. Since Linux is not always very touch friendly, it is a bit tricky to use (when no external mouse is available).

Edit: It also has one USB-C and two USB-A and a SD Slot, which is quite handy for a device of such a size

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