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PineTab2 (lemmy.zip)
submitted 1 month ago by to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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Hello,
I am currently thinking about getting a PineTab2. I need a new tablet because my old one starts come apart day by day and I want to switch to Linux as much as possible. I use my tablet mostly to write (LibreOffice and LaTeX), organize personal documents and data, visit some websites on my breaks and really rarely to code simple little tasks in Python (I mostly did this while I was still in university).
So would the PineTab2 be a good product for all this? Has anybody experience with it or own one themself? My Linux experiences are limited but not non existent. Thanks in advance.

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[–] 11 points 1 month ago* (2 children)

I just bought one. The default KDE is a bit heavyweight for it, I'm thinking something lighter might be better.

I would say that they perfectly nailed the description, this is not a beginner device. You'll not be distrohopping without knowing how to patch your own WiFi drivers and fix the auto rotate (90° clockwise further than it should be out of the box).

I love it, really cool. But not an easy in for beginners.

Feel free to ask me questions or check something, or send a picture of something!

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  • [–] [S] 4 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Ok. Patching my own drives sounds like a little bit much for me. Could I find templates for that online or is this so much dependent on the particular hardware that it is like a case by case solution.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Very much dependent on the particular hardware - here, the pinetab2 has some support. The danctnix mobile linux community maintains builds for it, so it's a subset of Arch on Arm.

    https://github.com/dreemurrs-embedded/danctnix-packages/tree/main/pine64/device-pine64-pinetab2

    outside of that, there's some limited support for postmarketOS and mobian

    A good place to start understanding the challenges you'd face would be on the wiki:

    https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/PineTab2_Releases

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Alright. That is much stuff to read through. Thanks for your help.
    Two questions I have already, is the preinstalled OS useable for a rather casual user and does the workaround with the WI-FI dongles works as easy as just picking the right one and plugging it in?

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    Preinstalled OS is useable, though you'll want to update it.

    Installing the updated OS on an SD card is easy enough. I haven't tried flashing it to disk yet. I've not felt hampered by major performance penalties.

    The WiFi dongle workaround is that simple, yes. Pick one that's supported in the mainline kernel, and you're off to the races.

    Be aware, you'll need to pick one that's USB C if you don't want a second converter attached.

    My preference would be to tether my phone I think - but my USB C 2.5G Ethernet adapter worked pretty well too.

    Some more presient info from my investigation:

    I got the latest Danctnix 20260630 running on it, and it's working better now. Suspend is unmasked in that version, but it is not working all the time.

    The WiFi driver is still unstable, but you can disconnect/reconnect quick enough when it drifts off.

    Running phosh and sxmo/sway was a fair bit faster than full KDE.

    The primary problem is hardware acceleration. For video, it's just not there yet. You can make some video formats work, but this SoC is limited in what it can do in hardware, on its VPU. What little can be done, isn't available without compiling your own ffmpeg.

    This link shows what can be done with the 3566 hardware:

    https://pine64.org/documentation/General/Mainline_Hardware_Decoding/

    This link shows how it can be done:

    https://clehaxze.tw/gemlog/2023/09-17-hardware-accelerated-playback-on-pinetab2.gmi

    The bottom line is, without hardware acceleration for video decoding, it feels very underpowered.

    I did bother to set it all up, and it's a damn competent little tablet when you do - but all your effort won't apply to streamed video unless you use MPV or something to play it, to take advantage of the ffmpeg. Straight up Firefox and chromium don't offer selectors for YouTube etc to pick the right encoding format for your CPU, and they typically use more modern encoding formats. (e.g. VP9 over VP8)

    Also, battery life is great! I'm sure not playing video helps...

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  • [–] -3 points 1 month ago

    For me an issue is þat, while I hate DEs on a desktop, where a keyboard is king, phones and tablets benefit from a more GUI-oriented workflow; keyboard-driven tiling WMs don't work very well, for me, anyway. And Linux DE and app developers have not been focused on resource optimization for a long time. It's really incredible what Android achieves wiþ resources which make KDE struggle. Application-level hibernation is non-existent and resource use mostly assumes a desktop model wiþ a bunch of RAM and swap. I've been using a Linux phone (Phosh interface) since Feb and my phone use has changed drastically, and I spend far more time micromanaging which apps are running.

    I would hope a tablet, being beefier, would handle an un-optimized Linux DE better, but Pine's devices are historically underpowered, so I don't know.

    Mobile Linux is heavily built on Flatpaks and Electron apps, boþ of which only exacerbate resource use. Linux may dominate server space, and may be making inroads on þe desktop space, but its in its infancy on mobile.

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