I have been messing and tinkering around with computers since the mid 80's. Started with ZX81 and TRS80 that I found fascinating and I used to copy programs from magazines. Being honest, I am not very good at writing code. The ZX81 had a really primitive keyboard and at that time I had to hunt and peck for each character. The other thing was that you could get extra one kilobyte ram modules with dodgy connections. After spending an hour or so carefully coping code and then you jog the table, oh! Noooo, all gone. So I thought ballocks to bosic. Never mind about the TRS80, too boring.
Then in late '91 by some fangled finance deal I got a brand new 386sx 2Mb ram and a 20Mb hard drive. Dos 5 and Windows 3.0. Was all right for a bit of word processing I suppose, did quite a lot of that. I got into learning dos and playing Commander Keen. Come about '95 I went out to buy a good microphone, (could go into details but I ain't), but bought a second hand Amiga A1200 and it was light years better than the 386. Since the early naughties, when I first got into Linux, I have been cobbling pc boxes together out of second hand or discarded parts.
Now I am sitting in my room surrounded by old pc boxes. I am gleefully typing this on my Raspberry Pi3. Bliss no noise and I'm using a 32” TV for my screen. Granted that, at the moment, the RPi3 don't have the same grunt as a big Intel or AMD, but it is my everyday work horse.
I find that I can do most things that I need. I also have a Pine64, but up until recently I had been running Remix OS. Remix is good, it's a bit like a cross between Windows XP and Android, but you can't get root. On another micro sd I installed Ubuntu Mate using the RPi3 and it works OK but at present I think the Raspberry Pi has the edge despite the Pine64 is running in 64 bit mode and has 2Gb of ram. Early days yet.
With a HDMI switch I can go between Raspian and Ubuntu, at the touch of a button and with the synergy program, I can use the same mouse and keyboard (mostly). Connected by LAN I have an older Raspberry Pi 512Mb running my private WordPress server also an even older Raspberry Pi 256Mb with RISK OS. Oh! HELP ME, LinuxQuestions.org. I am pleased to meet you. I will be asking questions soon enough, and you never know, I may have some answers too.

Greetings.

Hi haywire and welcome to LQ!

Thanks for the welcome.

i have ordered my pine64, should be coming any day now... so, let's exchange notes! what OS did you install? or does it come with something preinstalled?

Hello ondoho

Thank you for taking an interest in my introduction. I backed the kickstarter project and waited a long time for my Pine64 to arrive. In the meantime the Raspberry Pi 3 became available and from my order it arrived within a few days. I already had some knowledge of rpi's and there is quite a strong community out there. On the other hand when the Pine64 finally arrived it was very new with a very small community to begin with.

Naturally at first I was exited to assemble all the case, bluetooth and wifi module. I had two 16Gb micro sd's and using my son's laptop I downloaded Debian Jessie and Android 5. Debian sort of worked, but not like I was used to, and Android at the time hardly worked at all. I then tried Remix OS wiping Android. Remix worked so I bought a 32Gb Samsung micro sd, installed Remix again, and left it at that. Using a better micro sd proved to be a good move and I would advise to get the best you can as the performance seems remarkably better.

I was a bit disappointed in a way because although Remix OS is good, it takes ages to boot up, then update, until you get an all singing and dancing operating system like Android but better. It seems to be reliable and stable but you can't get root. Some times I can still play with it, if I am in the mood, but it ain't quite my cup of tea.

Recently the micro sd with Debian showed up amongst all the detritus and clutter on my desk. I could not remember my user password but luckily I had written down my root password. I reset my user password and proceeded to update and get the sound working. I even managed to update to Debian Stretch but after a reboot I had completely lost lan and wifi connection. I must have moved to far and too fast, because I did not take any notes of what I had done. I had no idea of how to fix it, so on my trusty rpi3, I dd(ed) Ubuntu Mate on that old slower micro sd.

Now I have something to work with and I believe it can only get better as the software and community evolve. I am planning on trying different operating systems soon.

I will be pleased to exchange notes so stay in touch.

I'm a little confused.
seems you are talking about several Rpis, the pinebook being just one of them?

i admit i'm acutely interested in the pinebook right now.

did you have it for a long time? sounds like it.

btw, remix os IS android. i'm certainly hoping to install a real gnu/linux on the pinebook, otherwise what's the point in getting exotic/opensource hardware...

It has been a while since my last post and I apologise for that. Not to sure if my reply is still relevant, certainly not timely, but oh well, just a quick update anyway.

Somehow I managed to kill my Raspberry Pi 3 by plugging in too many usb things in and out without powering off properly. Still got the Pine 64, but it is not much fun running Android. Shame there arn't the graphics drivers for linux. I don't care much for Android, yes it works just fine, but I don't like it. Remix OS has gone. So much for SBC's, seemed like a good idea at the time. If only rpi could have a bit more ram.

Meanwhile I took a chance at a flea market and bought a rather battered MacBook Pro with no screws holding on the bottom cover, no power supply, and the hard drive hanging out. The screen looked OK. Some times I have to doubt my intelligents, but I had to take pity on it. I like a challenge now an then. I knew nothing much about Apple computers except they seem a bit snooty. Not really my scene but I had already handed over the cash.

After obtaining a "non genuine" power supply, it was time to see what this baby would do. The screen lit up, it complained about it's operating system, what ever version OSX it was, and got really hot, nearly burning my thigh, where I had it precariously balanced with a loose bottom cover without any screws holding it together. Oh dear!

I know, I thought, I will see if I can download El Capitain from Apple, using my Son's old laptop with Windows 7. I even registered with Apple, but because I had never bought anything on Itunes or from the Apple store, and never will, I had no luck what so ever. Shame really.

I had a spare 250 Gb sata laptop hard drive, I had downloaded the latest version of Lubuntu and had copied it to a thumb drive using Etcher. I think I had to press the option key at the same time as powering on, sorry can't quite remember exactly now, but hey, Lubuntu worked straight away so I'm a very happy chappie now. I have now bought the screws, a new "non genuine" battery and a used DVD drive. Every thing is working as it should. It has three gigs of ram I could upgrade to eight but no real need.