Thanks! Though not guaranteed, likelihood makes me a bit more confident now. ^_^

TL;DR: Linux No, Android Yes

The desktop linux binary is currently only x86__64. But work is being done https://github.com/futo-org/Grayjay.Desktop/issues/83

Lineage should be able to install the android version for armv8.

I haven’t done any of this, just from what I’ve read. YMMV

Arch Wiki has a rather decent article about wiping disks: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Securely_wipe_disk

Assuming your Pi runs a Linux distro, most of those tools should be already present on your system.

I'm not familiar with the hat, you can always run hdparm /I against the drive and see what the output is.

Very helpful, thank you! One question on this:

a proper SATA controller and connection

Are we just talking about a SATA hat here?

Turns out my comments were not brief, but once you get the hang of it you can write down the commands you are using and repeat them.

I scripted the whole thing for work, so it is getting more and more rusty.

OK, to be clear, you can boot to raspbian or your distro of choice and use hdparm if you have a proper SATA controller and connection. This does not work on NVME drives.

#shred

If you have a spinning disk and either are forced to use a USB to SATA adapter or if the drive itself does not support secure erase, then you can use the shred command.

shred -fv /dev/sdb

will write random data to the sata device sdb. f is for force and v is for verbose. You can add z to add an extra zero pass and z to change the number of passes. That means that

shred -z -n 5 /dev/sdb

should do 5 passes and then zero on drive sdb

It will ALSO work for older parallel drives that identify as hd or that still appear as sd with a USB adapter. You had better check your devices with a lsblk before you run it. It will probably overwrite the OS of a running system.

Last word on shred is that it is ungodly slow. One pass of 1 tb takes 1.5 to 3 hours.

#hdparm

For SATA drives that support it, you can use hdparm. A deep explanation of what I'm doing is available here: https://grok.lsu.edu/article.aspx?articleid=16716. I could write out how to do it, but it goes into greater detail.

For forcing the system to sleep, you may need to

echo disk | sudo tee /sys/power/state

Also, be sure to set a password when prompted. If you omit the password, you may brick the drive. I have rarely been able to unbrick a drive.

This process may take several hours. The output of hdparm -I (that is an uppercase i) should tell you how long.

#NVME

Check processes here: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Solid_state_drive/Memory_cell_clearing#NVMe_drive

I have followed them once upon a time, but i haven't done it in years and cannot offer solid advice.

It's funny, I was about to post a reply to help - but I looked up my answer (just to me sure), and it turns out I was wrong!

So I'm learning something here, too. Bookmarked so I can see what Spikes posts later

Yes! You can use SATA secure erase features. Give me a few and I'll post a brief set of commands.

Cyber crooks had physical access to network switch to steal ATM cash.

As long as i can pop the pi out and put in a better one when it comes out, this seems great. Otherwise its shite.

Probably just means that it's really not that good. So it's at best usable, rather than any amount pleasurable to use.

Prices and capabilities have been increasing. The benefit having specifically the Raspberry Pi in a laptop (versus another ARM solution) is the massive ecosystem around the Raspberry Pi.

I would consider $300 very cheap for a laptop in 2025, though I imagine the appeal is more the open and “hackable” nature of the platform.

The CM5 performance is good enough for a casual web browsing machine, and it uses very little power, so it’ll last forever with a decent battery.

It's a con that the keyboard and trackpad are usable? I looked at the review to see why and he says its servicable..so unsure what it means by it being a negative.

Wasn't the deal with raspberry pis that they were tiny and cheap? I'm out of the loop as usual, but what is the appeal of a raspberry laptop?

I really don't like that they misused a pair of USB connectors for the GPIO. There are lots of other connectors that are much more suitable for that.

Monster.

This is pretty cool, I would consider buying a pre-made kit for such a device, especially if the resolution was higher than 768.

The project wouldn't be at all notable otherwise.

I was gonna say, what the fuck kind of credentials is that ?

great nepotastic headline, Tom'shardware...

Thanks

I’m very sorry if my dumb joke caused any regret. It was low-hanging fruit and I thought it would be funny.

Speaking only for myself, when I sense ambiguity, I ask questions to try to improve clarity. On the internet it’s especially easy (understandably) for people to assume a “hostile” or “negative” tone in any bit of writing, even if that’s not intended at all. You can also try a bit of role-playing, where you assume you asked the question and read your answer as if it was something someone else responded to you with. If you vibe with that approach, you can use it to “tune your tone”, or “writer’s voice”.

I’m no expert, either, these are simply my own anecdotes and I often fail miserably at taking my own advice, as humans are wont to do. Again, I appologize if my lazy attempt at humor caused any distress. I’m happy to have you here and to be able to talk like this. Please reach out any time!

I'm physically disabled in social isolation where this is my only external human contact. I tried to share the abstract learning curve on the path I have taken from asking the same questions to finding more useful information. How should I engage with others so that I never have moments like this where I regret my only method of human interaction?