Orange Pi3B 8GB LPDDR4/4X Rockchip RK3566 Quad-Core 64-Bit Single Board Computer with eMMC Socket, WiFi 5 and Bluetooth Support, Development Board Run Android/Ubuntu/Debian(Pi 3B 8GB)

I ordered this and it came quite quickly but I was still waiting on the small display I also ordered so it was about a week before I was able to set it up, figure out what driver I had to slip into the installation and script to make the screen work, then I got to use it maybe 3 times and on the 4th time I only had partial power. And no display. Also a smoking hot display chip. So I returned it and amazon was so quick on the trigger to send a replacement, that they shipped it to my mother in law's house in a different state. So there was that fiasco. Turned out her house was difficult for them to find, so without my assistance, it went back to the warehouse and finally I was able to get my replacement. So far, all is well. I use it to program microcontrollers when I am at work and it's slow. Nice being the owner of your job. No one to gripe at you, except maybe my husband who is the other half of Middle Finger Foods. The title of my business says all the things I cannot always verbalize, but The orange pi is working fine. I have some stuff to 3d print and a portable power supply to work out so I can supply separate power to the display and board but charge all at once. Got some minor design things to work out... But a full blown computer small enough to fit inside an altoids box? What's wrong with that? Not a damn thing. 5*****

Very little support and resources online this board has potential but if you're not a reasonable developer you won't find much use from this unless you're just trying to use it for a single board computer with limited options. Distros available aren't taking use of the full board.

Maybe I'm spoiled by Raspberry Pi's ease of use and enormous following and the support that comes with that. That being said, this is a cool little device for the tinkerers. And you will absolutely be doing a lot of tinkering. Despite the fact that it runs Linux and Linux-based operating systems, the Linux support software for it is awful. The Windows support software is way better...after you figure out how to change it from Chinese to English. Operating systems are kind of hairy. It has a moderately maintained Debian, and an older-than-dirt Android version. Many links on their website send you to Google Drive for links that are overused so sometimes you have to wait a day to download something, or try to find your way through Baidu ("Chinese Google"). Support is slowly improving. But definitely note the *slowly*. If you must have something that's plug and a play, go for RPi. If you don't need bleeding edge and you don't mind to fiddle around some, go for AMLogic. If you wanna tinker a LOT, grab a Rockchip device. Newer Rockchip devices do seem to maybe have better support, but I don't have any newer Rockchip devices so YMMV.

I used the Orange Pi 3B (4gb) for a MagicMirror project. Everything for MM is built around the Raspberry Pi, but I didn't want to pay the premium for a 4 year old SBC. (Perhaps R-Pi boards will decrease in price, now that they've announced the R-Pi 5.) Orange Pi's Ubuntu image on a micro SD card worked well for my project, and its easily powerful enough for what I'm asking it to do. I'd probably consider the Orange Pi Zero 3 if I were to do this project again, but I don't have any plans for that.My only real complaint is that there isn't much of an online community for this SBC. If you have problems, the limited info from the OEM might help, but you'll probably have to just figure it out on your own. I was willing to risk it, and it worked out for me. YMMV

I bought this SBC to run SVXLINK, similar to EchoLink but running on Linux.The audio / sound card or whatever they put onto the board has one major issue in my application.It records audio fine e.g. routing it into the microphone input. It also plays back audio. What I think is missing is input with simultaneous play out. That's what I would need for my repeater. Apparently I can use something called parrot e.g. talk into the computer record it and then play back. Works as expected.Then switch to repeat mode e.g. talk in and get the audio in real time back out. Doesn't work in my case!Aside, there are no audio control slider in alsamixer.I can plug in a USB sound card, it shows and surprise has the control slider.And most important, will loop the audio in real time. So you can actually repeat in real time.I tried OS's up and down the line, some support the audio issue but are a pain in the neck to get the GPIO properly working without jumping through hoops.Others do work reasonable good in the GPIO department, but don't fully support the audio.Good thing, the OrangePI is not very big, so it is not much of a boat anchor.

Update 2024-04-03: This board finally died. I had it running 24x7 for about 3 months. It was used to archive files into the drive on M.2 port which I managed to make it work. See my previous review. Not worth the money since my Raspberry Pi 4 4GB boards (four of them got during 2020) are still working great, and those are using to run web servers and DB servers. I reduced rating to 1 star. From now on I will stick with Raspberry Pi.I didn't get the Raspberry Pi 4 8G because this board is coming with a M.2 port where I wanted to run my OS and DB server from. Unfortunately I could not make it to install image into M.2 devices. Other than that it works fine with an SD card. 8G as they proclaimed. First thing you do if you use their image is to change the /etc/apt/sources.list file to pull updates from the official Debian sites. Don't leave it connected to huawei. For the price and features this is the leader of the pack. If you were a newbee stay with more expensive Raspberry Pi because it will get you going right away. I will keep it and hopefully find a way to fix the M.2 port issue.

I fried my raspberry pi (used as the controller for my 3d printer) and wasn't willing the pay the premium for a new one. I figured I would give this a try. It was a bit more work to get setup, but I have it running perfectly with Klipper installed along with a camera. I am very pleased!