I guess the one thing this article doesn’t answer is why the default hardware configuration is for the slower transfer rate? Is there some downside to this mod?
In the Future Improvements section on the linked blog post to the original mod it says "HS400 mode is supported by hardware but it's not currently supported by the sunxi-mmc drivers in the Linux kernel."
So it seems plausible that support for the faster HS200 mode (that's enabled by this mod) was added after the original devices shipped. Just a guess though.
If you do the mod and it causes issues, you can revert to the original DDR52 mode through software, assuming you didn't break anything while soldering.
Just off the top of my head (without doing in-depth research in the to PinePhone specs), potential gotchas:
1) The 1V8 power supply cannot cope with the additional power demand (just cause "it boots" doesn't mean it will be fine in all scenarios).
2) The SKU of the chip used cannot operate (or is not guaranteed to operate) at the higher speed + lower voltage.
3) The phone stops being EMC compliant.
A bit of research, probing and testing can answer those questions and screen for others. The PinePhone seems like it is aimed at a very technical crowd so I'm sure someone will figure it out :)
Probably just a fail-safe configuration that never got adjusted after so many iterations. As I understand it the hardware is still developed by a small team and they are working on a diverse number of different platforms (PinePhone, PinePhone Pro, Pinebook, Pinebook Pro, PineTab, PineCube, PineDio - the list goes on). They tend to have their hands full just getting things working and fixing bugs.
I think this wide approach works really well with their goal of community driven development. All the hardware variety gets more people interested and more people contributing. A person who cuts their teeth on one device might be a pioneer for the next one.
I feel I'm a sucker for these devices. I love all of them =)
The pinebook pro caught my attention first (actually bought both an ANSI and ISO variants). Then the pinephone was delivered to my house. The pinepower followed shortly thereafter by the pinetime. I am anxiously awaiting for the pinenote to develop into a useful device, and I'll prolly end up getting that as well.
I've had a great experience with nearly all of the devices. The pinephone is a bit anemic power/ speed-wise for me to use it often, but I knew that going in. It still has a lot of potential and development on the software side has been fun to watch.
> I feel I'm a sucker for these devices. I love all of them =)
I would very much love a PinePhone, but I'm married to the Samsung Note stylus. Is there any really good active stylus, that works as well as the Note? I don't need any particular app, just using a stylus on the screen for general use (clicking, swiping, keyboard, long-press) would be great.
The rubber stylii are decent for clicking, but horrible for swiping.
If anything, I expect this to use lower power.
However, it won't work with some SD cards that one could possibly want to use via an eMMC breakout adapter.
That's my suspicion for why they had this in a late board revision in the first place.
There is a separate microsd slot on the pinephone, why one would want to use an adapter from the semi-proprietary emmc connector to microsd is beyond me.
Right, seems pretty irresponsible for the article writer to be writing to an audience that is geared towards beginners or at least people that don't understand electronics. It is irresponsible to not write about or at least try to deduce what the ramifications of doing this mod will do. And if they can't do that, I argue it would be better to stay out of the topic for writing purposes.
They're not. Anybody that has a soldering iron warm and that doesn't shy away from hacking on a board populated with SMD components and that makes it past the 'do this only if you feel confident with the procedure' warning is well above beginner level.
PinePhone's likely are mostly in the hands of people who have significant overlap with those in that group mentioned above rather than your average grandmother, unless she takes after Grace Hopper.
Finally, this is hacker news, which once upon a time meant that people who frequent this site knew how to make things, and there are still a few of us left. So bring on the soldering required articles.
See also the recent thread on headphones where people are complaining about non-replaceable batteries and longevity, but a minority are digging out soldering irons and replacing batteries and fixes broken devices.
It's a phone, not a pacemaker. Contributions to the sum of human knowledge should be welcomed even if the person isn't "qualified", those with more to add should do so if they feel inclined.
Hard disagree. No one should do anything if they don't understand the consequences.
It's no one's job to baby proof the world.
If someone hasn't learnt that lesson yet they might be paying looks up PinePhone price $399 to learn it.
A lot of people write SW without underestanding the consequences. See recent NPM disaster for one example. Or Firefox (UI, "features") for another example. Ok, and Solar Winds for the best example.
What are you talking about? It’s a cell phone. And besides the world does not need to hand hold every singe scenario in case someone not smart enough comes along. Ya working with electrical mains should put out a strong warning but this is nothing. If people can not evaluate the skill level required before they do something that is on them. If someone needs to tell you taking the exposed electronics of your phone and taking a several hundred degree hot soldering iron to those electronics and then also removing parts that there is a risk you could damage something then you have a lot more to worry about then ruining a phone.
Yeah, all those absolute beginners with PinePhones and soldering skills. Or, maybe it isn't a problem because almost anyone who can read and understand the instructions let alone casually follow them is probably going to be OK.
If the article instead purported to show you where on the Switch you could attach a car battery using jumper cables and spit to unlock Yoshi's Island then I could see you having a point.
> If the article instead purported to show you where on the Switch you could attach a car battery using jumper cables and spit to unlock Yoshi's Island then I could see you having a point
Wait do you have a YouTube video on how I can do this?
Which ones? I'm only aware of boards that aren't anywhere near the £5-35 price class the Raspberry Pis inhabit, and even then there's just absolutely nothing like the third party ecosystem that the Pis have.
I am very Interested in a good mobile Windows/Ryzen laptop with a MacBook Air-comparable form factor, performance, and battery life. Please link if you know of one.
All the Intel machines I've looked into have fans and still manage to be 30-50% slower.
Me too. Let me know if you find one. If I was in the market for something like the MacBook Air, I’d definitely get the MacBook Air.
I’m fact I use an M1 iPad right now. It’s great. For browsing Facebook and video calls and doing remote work, it’s perfect. And for serious workloads, those go straight to my desktop workstation (AMD). Best of both worlds.
Not in the x86 arena. Every time Apple gets involved with a CPU developers (Motorola, IBM, Intel) their needs splits from the developers desires. This time they decided to go on their own (well after years of doing this for the iPhone). Note: They have been involved in the ARM CPU market since the days of the Newton.
Many other manufacturers had made power-efficient ARM chips, however, the mainstream computer makers (just a few years ago including Apple) did choose x86 compatibility over power efficiency.
Just because you have money doesn't mean you have a market. Just to run a plate to create test cpus cost in the millions. All others were happy with the incremental upgrades that they were getting from ARM. Apple needed more and started creating CPUs for the iPhones a few years back
Looks like I did misunderstand, I thought they actually meant the silicon technology itself which is now available to the others and they all have designs coming using it.
There's a 100Wh restriction on laptop batteries imposed by civil aviation, which the 16" MacBook Pro hits, so this is not a problem that can simply be solved with thicker chassis and larger batteries either.
> There's a 100Wh restriction on laptop batteries imposed by civil aviation
This made me curious so I looked it up and found this bit on FAA's web site:
> Size limits: Lithium metal (non-rechargeable) batteries are limited to 2 grams of lithium per battery. Lithium ion (rechargeable) batteries are limited to a rating of 100 watt hours (Wh) per battery. These limits allow for nearly all types of lithium batteries used by the average person in their electronic devices. With airline approval, passengers may also carry up to two spare larger lithium ion batteries (101–160 Wh) or Lithium metal batteries (2-8 grams). This size covers the larger after-market extended-life laptop computer batteries and some larger batteries used in professional audio/visual equipment.
