Software support
Orange Pi offers Debian, Orange Pi OS (Arch), an Arch Linux-based distribution, and Android 14.0 images. While the selection isn’t huge, we had a great experience installing and running the Debian image based on kernel version 6.1.44, which worked smoothly and without issues. Overall, the experience felt like using a mini-PC running Linux OS, and the bottom line is that it works smoothly.
Debian Bookworm running GNOME desktop environment
The less positive
Having a pair of 5Gbps Ethernet ports is an incredibly useful feature for an SBC (single board computer), but in terms of software support, the Orange Pi team could have provided OpenWrt and OPNsense images to fully unlock this board’s potential to function as an advanced mini firewall or an access point. That said, hopefully additional images will be added in the future. In the meantime, using Debian as a firmware solution is the best option for most users.
This is great, but i have a Orange Pi 5 Max almost a year and still there is only first versions of few images for that board and few beta on some forums. So support for that is like zero after board is released.
From my checking, the Orange Pi 5 Max supports around 3-4 distributions. There’s often a delay for new images after hardware release, but the popular RK3588 SoC has solid support. You can always upgrade your existing distribution and install a newer kernel with the latest packages. You can always switch to an RP5 that has less powerful hardware but comes with better software support.
I think this is BS, no announcements form the Orange PI, nothing on the forums.
I would definitely buy this with 32GB or 64GB, now that would be a decent platform
It’s not ready yet, but the news is reliable, and the company has also shared some updates about it.
Well, if they truly on this, this will be a great SBC, I would buy one immediately.
This should be marketed using like 5$ vouchers in ARACE, OrangePI would immediately gauge the interest and get some early revenue o produce the board