Pine64 PinePower

 I recently bought one of these and it has absolutely taken over my desk:

I plug my DeX dock that needs 9V into the first USB port. My S20FE charges "super fast" plugged into the 65 watt USB-C port. And the wireless charger on top (not pictured) is just the right size for my new Samsung Zflip 3 phone when it's folded in half. It's like they were made for each other.

Official Product Page 

Ameridroid Order Page (currently sold out!)

June 1st 2021 Purge

Google will be purging content from inactive accounts on that date. There's a good chance PELinux will be on their hit list. Apparently the 32-bit R3 version is still actively used in Mexico because of the offline (no Internet required) Spanish/English translation engine (Apertium). The front-end app no longer compiles so I may re-upload that one. The rest will likely fade into bit oblivion. Get 'em while you still can!

The New H2+

The Sabrent 512 GB M.2 SSD makes this little computer stoopid fast. CrystalDiskMark says 1750 MB/sec read and 1500 MB/sec write.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/fh6VSFSSXHkzM1RS7

My Odroid H2+

I liked the first one so much I just ordered a second Odroid H2+. Here are a few YouBoob videos I made in various states of consciousness. I like to call it Insomniac Theater:

ZFS in Ubuntu 20.10

Changes coming to ZFS in Ubuntu 20.10 include enabling autotrim by default and the ability to encrypt root during install. Of course, those of you who read my blog already know how to do both those things, so no need to wait. ;)

FYI though, I found that autotrim hadn't actually done a trim on my SSD yet by running:
 zpool status -t
So I started it manually with:
 sudo zpool trim rpool
 It took about 2 minutes to complete.

ZFS Encrypted Root

ZFS in Ubuntu 20.04 is stable and enterprise ready. It's really Canonical's customizations for the desktop that are experimental. The installer in particular is, at the moment, fairly limited in how you can setup your system. Despair not though, there's always a l33t h@X0r on the case:

Encrypting ZFS on Ubuntu 20.04 by Linsomniac

The Z File System in Ubuntu 20.04

ZFS has actually been around for quite some time. It was originally invented by Sun for use in Solaris. It has many advanced features like an improved RAID5 called RAIDZ. And though there's a bit of a learning curve it eliminates some complexity, like the need for a separate logical volume manager.

With the release of Ubuntu 20.04 it'll be possible to use it for your entire desktop system. But why would you want to use a "server" filesystem on your desktop PC? Well, in short, it makes upgrading your system bulletproof. Now every time you upgrade packages with apt it'll create a snapshot automagically. If something goes wrong there'll be a boot menu option that'll let you rollback your entire system to before the upgrade. It's fast, easy and you won't even know it happened, until you need it.

While technically it's still an experimental feature, I expect it'll become the default install option at some point in the future. If you haven't familiarized yourself with ZFS yet, now would be a good time to do so.