A month ago, PINE64 reported to his community that he had already made a decision: the operating system that his devices will use will be Manjaro and, luckily for users like me who do not like Phosh, the graphical environment, applications and desktop in general will be that of KDE. A few hours ago, in the monthly newsletter for March, the company has reported also that soon the PinePhone Beta Edition, and will be available in two versions.
The device is called PinePhone Beta Edition for the software, since the hardware is practically complete and does not vary anything with respect to the Community Editions. It's Beta because Manjaro is in beta, so PINE64 warns again that they are devices for which we want to tinker, but not for those who expect a perfect user experience or to use a device to depend on.
PinePhone Beta Edition will begin shipping at the end of April
The phone will be available in two versions:
- PinePhone Beta Edition, with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of storage for $ 150 (link).
- PinePhone Beta Editioin Convergence Package, with 3GB of RAM, 32GB of storage and the USB dock for $ 200 (link).
Other things that PINE64 mentions in their March newsletter are also related to their phone, and that is that they work on a physical keyboard (which should not be in Spanish if we look at what happened on the PineTab) and a fingerprint reader. These accessories will be announced in the future and will need to be purchased separately. As for other news, it should be noted that the Pinebook Pro can be reserved this month, but be careful: being ARM, there are some things that we will not have available, such as, for example, that we will not be able to play DRM content if we do not do some trick like installing Widevine Chrome OS or a Chromium specially designed for it (and I already tell you that the playback quality is not good, neither in the video nor the audio).
Returning to the phone, repeat what PINE64 says, which is not a reliable device and for all audiences, and remember that VAT is not included in the price.