PinePhone Pro

PinePhone Pro - Explorer Edition

serial debug cable - mine is a 3-pin type to 3 positions female header pinout

tip - white     (RX from pinephone)
ring - red      (TX from pinephone)
base - black    (GND)

baud rate is 1500000 instead of 115200, 8n1.

back to mobiles page.

History

2026-10-04: I set privacy switch 6 in the down position, thus enabling the serial port over headphone jack.

2026-10-04: switching microSD cards, FreeBSD boots too.

2026-10-04: using rk2aww boot menu to select option 3, I can boot and updated u-boot which allows me to boot from an (U)EFI partition. Now pmOS boots.

2026-10-04: it seems like all images now requires UEFI. So, I booted SailfishOS from the emmc, enabled ssh, ssh'ed in (user name is defaultuser), downloaded the pp.tar.gz with the browser, and used ssh to install things. Like this

[defaultuser@PinePhonePro ~]$ devel-su 
Password: 
[root@PinePhonePro defaultuser]# pwd
/home/defaultuser
[root@PinePhonePro defaultuser]# cd Downloads
[root@PinePhonePro Downloads]# cd ppp

[root@PinePhonePro ppp]# ./spinor-flash-initial-setup.sh 
Machine: Pine64 PinePhonePro (pine64,pinephone-pro)

SPI NOR Flash:

- Total size: 16384 KiB
- Erase block size: 4 KiB
- Write size: 1
- Manufacturer: gigadevice
- Part name: gd25lq128e
- JEDEC ID: 257018

Bootable images currently present in SPI NOR flash:

Idx Header     Off 1      Size 1     Off 2      Size 2     Notes/content
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
0   0          2048       4096       0          0          (padded) 0='rk2aw'

Auto-calculated layout for rk2aw dual bootloader scheme:

Area                 Offset     Size      
---------------------------------------------------
rk2aw primary        0          65536     
rk2aw backup         65536      65536     
spl fallback         131072     393216    
spl primary          524288     389120    
itb fallback         913408     2097152   
itb primary          3010560    2097152   

Erasing 16777216 bytes at 0
Erasing 65536 bytes at 65536
Writing rk2aw backup area at 65540 (size 14332)
Writing rk2aw backup area at 65536 (size 4)
Erasing 65536 bytes at 0
Writing rk2aw primary area at 4 (size 14332)
Writing rk2aw primary area at 0 (size 4)
Erasing 65536 bytes at 65536
Machine: Pine64 PinePhonePro (pine64,pinephone-pro)

SPI NOR Flash:

- Total size: 16384 KiB
- Erase block size: 4 KiB
- Write size: 1
- Manufacturer: gigadevice
- Part name: gd25lq128e
- JEDEC ID: 257018

Bootable images currently present in SPI NOR flash:

Idx Header     Off 1      Size 1     Off 2      Size 2     Notes/content
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
0   0          2048       6144       0          0          (padded) 0='rk2aw'

Auto-calculated layout for rk2aw dual bootloader scheme:

Area                 Offset     Size      
---------------------------------------------------
rk2aw primary        0          65536     
rk2aw backup         65536      65536     
spl fallback         131072     393216    
spl primary          524288     389120    
itb fallback         913408     2097152   
itb primary          3010560    2097152   

TPL size = 67584, SPL size = 124928
Writing Zeroed magic header at 131072 (size 32)
Erasing 393216 bytes at 131072
Erasing 2097152 bytes at 913408
Writing U-Boot ITB at 913408 (size 1073152)
Writing U-Boot SPL at 200704 (size 123278)
Writing U-Boot TPL at 133120 (size 67481)
Writing Rockchip bootloader header at 131076 (size 2044)
Writing Bootloader header magic bytes at 131072 (size 4)
Machine: Pine64 PinePhonePro (pine64,pinephone-pro)

SPI NOR Flash:

- Total size: 16384 KiB
- Erase block size: 4 KiB
- Write size: 1
- Manufacturer: gigadevice
- Part name: gd25lq128e
- JEDEC ID: 257018

Bootable images currently present in SPI NOR flash:

Idx Header     Off 1      Size 1     Off 2      Size 2     Notes/content
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
0   0          2048       6144       0          0          (padded) 0='rk2aw'
5   131072     133120     67584      200704     124928     0='U-Boot TPL' 1='U-Boot SPL'

Auto-calculated layout for rk2aw dual bootloader scheme:

Area                 Offset     Size      
---------------------------------------------------
rk2aw primary        0          65536     
rk2aw backup         65536      65536     
spl fallback         131072     393216    
spl primary          524288     389120    
itb fallback         913408     2097152   
itb primary          3010560    2097152   

TPL size = 147456, SPL size = 124928
Writing Zeroed magic header at 524288 (size 32)
Erasing 389120 bytes at 524288
Erasing 2097152 bytes at 3010560
Writing U-Boot ITB at 3010560 (size 1163776)
Writing U-Boot SPL at 673792 (size 123278)
Writing U-Boot TPL at 526336 (size 145916)
Writing Rockchip bootloader header at 524292 (size 2044)
Writing Bootloader header magic bytes at 524288 (size 4)

2026-10-04: I wrote the developer image to a different card (16 GB) and inserted that into PinePhone Pro. This card doesn't show up in the U-Boot menu either. Maybe I need to update the U-boot on the phone.

2026-10-03: the phone boots SailfishOS from the emmc, if I select that from the U-Boot menu.

2026-10-03: using c2, I wrote a developer image onto a 64 GB microSD card, inserted in the PinePhone Pro and powered on. Unfortunately the card doesn't show up in U-boot menu.

2024-12-16: serial console - The baud rate may be 1500000 instead of 115200.

2024-12-16: I created this page.

2024-12-12: at 15:20 local time the package got delivered.

2024-12-11: I got shipping update from DHL. I had to pay MVA (value added tax) NOK 1200.- and a handling fee NOK 229.- the total was NOK 1429.-

2024-12-10: the package was shipped via DHL.

2024-12-03: I ordered a PinePhone Pro Explorer Edition. Price was USD 399.-, shipping was USD 35.- for a total of USD 434.-. Converted this is about NOK 5048.27

PinePhone Pro

Links

local links

History