Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-21 20:24

I can confirm seb3733’s findings.

Performance between Q4OS and Pi OS feels the same.
I have it on a fast and even faster SD and the even faster SD makes a bit of difference, wonder if seb3733 will test external SSD. If so let us know if that goes even better.

I came across some things with Trinity which are not confined to the Pi version, not that important, adding languages would be nice though:

- How to add a language after inital system configuration on first boot?
- After changing theme, taskbar is positioned vertically on the left side.
- Under some (unknown) circumstances, logout takes a lot longer than expected.

For now, I would call this a release candidate…

Any particular area where you want us to test?

q4osteam · 2024-03-21 20:40

- How to add a language after inital system configuration on first boot?
See https://www.q4os.org/dqa007.html#inter , run in terminal:
$ addlanguage

- After changing theme, taskbar is positioned vertically on the left side.
- Under some (unknown) circumstances, logout takes a lot longer than expected.
We will take a look

NoMoreWindows wrote:

For now, I would call this a release candidate… Any particular area where you want us to test?

Great No particular request for testing now, just report what you find notable.

Last edited by q4osteam (2024-03-21 20:45)

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-21 21:39

Some more remarks, nothing serious.

These two warnings are confusing to novice users.
- After first boot, starting software center warns that “sudo apt update” could/should be run.
- When running desktop profiler it warns a “raspberry profile” is to be overwritten.

I managed to crash the system:
- Run full profile install.
- While that is busy, open Chromium.
- Open Chromium open with an error “Aw snap” and “errorcode 11”.
- The profile install stops with “errorcode:70”.
- After a few clicks the system hangs.
- After reboot profile install can be continued succesfully but Chromium error stays.

seb3773 · 2024-03-22 09:54

NoMoreWindows wrote:

I have it on a fast and even faster SD and the even faster SD makes a bit of difference, wonder if seb3733 will test external SSD. If so let us know if that goes even better.

Testing it on a sata SSD right now, with usb3 adapter (not a very good one, I think we can achieve better speed with a good adapter), and it makes a HELL of a difference. It's far far better, more responsive and very close to the "real" desktop experience I was talking before.

Without any other optimisations than the q4os default setup, boot in ~ 30sec, libre office writer opens in 2sec, chromium about 2/3 sec, even youtube video playing benefits from it (because of the disk caching I presume).

This is really really good, so good, that I realize the usage of sdcard is not the good choice for a pi4, as it can boot very easily from usb:
just do in the konsole:
sudo rpi-eeprom-update -d -a
then sudo raspi-config > boot options > boot rom version > choose latest (be carefull to select "No" to "reset boot rom to defaults" ; after that, in the raspi-config menu, boot options > boot order > I selected usb then sdcard (other options availables)

Try it, you will be surprised

----------------
Some other things about this release:

- in /etc/sudoers.d/010_pi-nopasswd you have
pi ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL

this is the default setting for a raspberry, not asking for password when using sudo. But, for a desktop usage like it is intended with q4os, I think it's a security risk, it will be better to have this :
pi ALL=(ALL) ALL
(removing NOPASSWD)

- I notice Redmond splash doesn't display user name. Not a big deal, just wanted to tell you. (I'm adapting my win10 theme pack for the q4os rasberry version, it already works very well).

- I'm experimenting with chromium flags (lots of post about this for raspberrys on different forums), I have tested and selected a set of flags that makes thing a bit better without compromising the stability (this is always the problem with chromium flags), this is what i have so far:

--ignore-gpu-blacklist --enable-checker-imaging --cc-scroll-animation-duration-in-seconds=0.6 --disable-quic --enable-tcp-fast-open --enable-experimental-canvas-features --enable-scroll-prediction --enable-simple-cache-backend --max-tiles-for-interest-area=512 --num-raster-threads=4 --default-tile-height=512 --enable-features=VaapiVideoDecoder,VaapiVideoEncoder,ParallelDownloading --disable-features=UseChromeOSDirectVideoDecoder --enable-accelerated-video-decode --enable-low-res-tiling --process-per-site

Testing it now, will report if any problems but it helps, browsing is less laggy, and video perf seems a bit better.

I think zram can improve the general performance, I will test it as well as other perf tweaks as the system seems very stable now.

q4osteam · 2024-03-22 10:08

Great feedback, we will go through all the remarks. Yes, the sudo configuration seems to be one of really important, we will likely fix that.

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-22 12:14

seb3773 wrote:

Testing it on a sata SSD

I was playing with booting from USB 3.0 stick and Pi OS. 64-bit Pi OS gave good results. Pi OS 32-bit was slower.

How do you copy Q4OS Pi system to the SSD for booting from the SSD?

(I used SD card copy program, but on Q4OS that does not allow me to copy to the USB stick. On Pi OS it does.)
(I followed https://www.tomshardware.com/how-to/boo … y-pi-4-usb to boot from USB.)

======

This build seems very stable and looks like we are down to performance tweaks and cosmetic details.

Here are some:

- Splash screen during boot is Pi OS, could be Q4OS?
- SD Card copier is there but does not allow copy to USB media.
- Is accessing Q4OS Pi over VNC supported? (I think I can figure it out, but I'm spending already a lot of time on this Q4OS Pi testing... )

q4osteam · 2024-03-22 12:51

NoMoreWindows wrote:

I used SD card copy program, but on Q4OS that does not allow me to copy to the USB stick.

Install RPi imager and use the app the same way as with PiOS:
$ sudo apt install rpi-imager

- Splash screen during boot is Pi OS, could be Q4OS?
Yes, however it will take some more work and time

- SD Card copier is there but does not allow copy to USB media.
$ sudo apt install rpi-imager
What failure does it report ?

- Is accessing Q4OS Pi over VNC supported?
Yes, that should work the same way as PiOS

seb3773 · 2024-03-22 12:51

NoMoreWindows wrote:

How do you copy Q4OS Pi system to the SSD for booting from the SSD?
(I used SD card copy program, but on Q4OS that does not allow me to copy to the USB stick. On Pi OS it does.)

I used balena etcher, it allow you to write image on large disks

NoMoreWindows wrote:

- Splash screen during boot is Pi OS, could be Q4OS?

It's just a plymouth theme, it's possible to change the theme used by a q4os one for example, or just change the image.
For example, I'm actually using my win10 theme, who already has a plymouth theme (the win10 one).

Edit: I was slower than Q4OS Team

Last edited by seb3773 (2024-03-22 12:52)

seb3773 · 2024-03-22 12:55

q4osteam wrote:

- Splash screen during boot is Pi OS, could be Q4OS?
Yes, however it will take some more work and time

if it can saves you some time, you can use the default plymouth theme installed (pix) , and just change the image which is here:
/usr/share/plymouth/themes/pix/splash.png

** Something I forgot to mention in my previous post:
wmctrl command doesn't work on the release, with this error:
/usr/bin/wmctrl: cannot execute : required file not found

not very important, but wanted to report.

Last edited by seb3773 (2024-03-22 12:59)

q4osteam · 2024-03-22 13:05

seb3773 wrote:

wmctrl command doesn't work on the release, with this error: /usr/bin/wmctrl: cannot execute : required file not found

Yes, we can confirm. It looks like PiOS bug, however we will check it more.

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-22 18:51

q4osteam wrote:

- SD Card copier is there but does not allow copy to USB media.
$ sudo apt install rpi-imager
What failure does it report ?

I don't think there is anything relevant here but this is what prevented me from booting Q4OS Pi from a USB stick.

Before I was using the "SD Card Copy" program to create a bootable USB stick. Now I created a Q4OS Pi boot USB Stick with the Imager.
With Q4OS the SD Card Copy program could not detect the USB stick as a target. On Pi OS the SD Card Copy program DID show the USB stick as target, so there is something different.

But of course it is way simpler to write to the USB with the Imager program so I don't need the SD Card copy program anymore.

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-22 19:13

As a user without any knowledge of the inner working of the system, I would say this is a usable and stable version.

I consider the performance just a 'feature' of the Pi.

Thanks for reviving my Pi!

seb3773 · 2024-03-22 21:40

NoMoreWindows wrote:

As a user without any knowledge of the inner working of the system, I would say this is a usable and stable version.
I consider the performance just a 'feature' of the Pi.
Thanks for reviving my Pi!

Yes, it's clearly as good in term of reactivity/performances as Pi OS, but with real modern desktop features, thanks to q4os. Maybe it needs now some optimisations, for example I really think zram should be installed by default on this kind of machines, remove the useless swap file (100 Mb ) too, and some other minor tweaks... But it's already very good in this actual state. As I said, I can't wait to test it on a Pi 5: from what I've read about this last raspberry iteration, I expect very good performances, and I think it will be comparable to "classic" desktop computers... We will see.

It's a real pleasure to have q4os on the pi4, I will test it tomorrow on a pi400 that a friend will lend me, will report the results of course

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-23 18:56

On the current installation with test release 3 I get an error connection bluetooth devices. I think I remember it working with test release 2.
See attached screenshot.

Apart from that I've been using it for my daily activities, most frustrating is internet browser lagging (you can do it, but you always think "I wish I was on my regular PC"). Everything else works well enough although you shouldn't do many things simultaneously (like playing a video and editing a large text in LibreOffice).
Sometimes when doing stupid things the system can hang completely forcing you to power off/on. Probably that's the same with Pi OS. (Happened to me 2x now with Q4OS.)

Attachments:

Bluetooth error.png, Size: 40.68 KiB, Downloads: 85

seb3773 · 2024-03-23 20:36

NoMoreWindows wrote:

Sometimes when doing stupid things the system can hang completely forcing you to power off/on. Probably that's the same with Pi OS. (Happened to me 2x now with Q4OS.)

This shouldn't happen. I have a bit of experience with raspberries, and what comes to my mind about what you said is two things:
- Is the power supply ok ? Went to lots of problems like this in the past, and most of the time the power supply was in fault.
- is the cooling ok, do you have for example a little heatsink on the cpu at least ?

Another question, are you running it from sd or ssd with an usb adapter ? I experienced one freeze with the test release 2, but I was using an sd card. (even good sd cards are subject to corruption sometimes with raspberrys as I saw in the past)
I'm running it actually from ssd with an usb3 adapter, with zram and no swap file, and I disabled as much logging as I can. (there's also the possibility to mount /var/log as tmpfs) and no freeze for now, although I have overclocked the pi4 to 2Ghz cpu/700Mhz gpu (it improves the reactivity and browsing performance) . Need to test more maybe, will report if any problem like this on my side.

One more thing, I attached a script who sets some flags to improve a bit chromium experience on the raspberry, if you want to try it

Last edited by seb3773 (2024-03-23 20:49)

Attachments:

chromium_perfs.sh, Size: 1.01 KiB, Downloads: 221

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-23 22:01

@seb3733 Thanks.

Power supply is the one that came with the Pi.
I don’t have extra cooling, no overclocking. I leave the case open.
I boot from a USB 3.0 stick.

Even with the flags Firefox performs better than Chromium for me.

My guess/feeling is the hangups were caused by something I did.
(Last hangup happened when I tried to start AnyDesk which installed but is not supported on Pi.)

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-23 22:08

@seb3733 Thanks.

Power supply is the one that came with the Pi.
I don’t have extra cooling, no overclocking. I leave the case open.
I boot from a USB 3.0 stick.

Even with the flags Firefox performs better than Chromium for me.

My guess/feeling is the hangups were caused by something I did.
(Last hangup happened when I tried to start AnyDesk which installed but is not supported on Pi.)

seb3773 · 2024-03-23 23:38

NoMoreWindows wrote:

Even with the flags Firefox performs better than Chromium for me.

The same with me. Apparently, from what I've read on various raspberry forums, chromium began to lag on raspberrys since the 86 version ... Users are complaining since this version... And everyone seems to say firefox is performing better. (and it's the case)

seb3773 · 2024-03-23 23:40

NoMoreWindows wrote:

I don’t have extra cooling, no overclocking. I leave the case open.

I think a little heatsink at least is advised, even with case open. The pi4 tends to generate heat even when idle.

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-24 10:08

seb3773 wrote:

NoMoreWindows wrote:
I don’t have extra cooling, no overclocking. I leave the case open.
I think a little heatsink at least is advised, even with case open. The pi4 tends to generate heat even when idle.

I vaguely remember I applied something years ago... (see attached picture)

Working for a few hours straight now.
As long as I behave a bit it's OK.

q4osteam · 2024-03-25 11:55

NoMoreWindows wrote:

On the current installation with test release 3 I get an error connection bluetooth devices. I think I remember it working with test release 2. ... See attached screenshot.

Yes, we can confirm some missing bluetooth packages, please install them from repositories:
$ sudo apt install libspa-0.2-bluetooth pulseaudio-module-bluetooth
and report back the result.

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-25 12:35

q4osteam wrote:

$ sudo apt install libspa-0.2-bluetooth pulseaudio-module-bluetooth

Did this + rebooted and that fixed it.

I tried also from clean test release 3 and only added blueman. That also worked. So it looks installing the full profile or some other things I did afterwards broke the BlueTooth configuration.

NoMoreWindows · 2024-03-26 14:08

Some issues remaining when I work with test version 3 (Pi 4 4GB from USB 3.0 stick):

BT problem surfaced again, removed blueman and installed again, that fixed it again.

VLC playing 720p, 1,6GB video in fullscreen is OK, but when pressing ESC to exit fullscreen, screen freezes while music keeps playing. No way to get out of this except power off/on. Playing in a window (even maximized) is OK.

Logout/shutdown taking very long (more than a minute), sometimes…

Quite impressive and pleasurable for the rest.

seb3773 · 2024-03-26 18:59

NoMoreWindows wrote:

Quite impressive and pleasurable for the rest.

indeed ! I should receive my pi5 tomorrow, will report as soon as I try ^^

I'm playing with the test release 3 on a Pi 400 since saturday, and I must say it works really good. In fact, it seems to works better (more reactivity) than on my pi4, I suspect the large heatsink in the pi 400 playing a role, I need to monitor if the cpu throttles in the pi4.

I made a little video to show you how it boots /restart and some apps launching with the pi400, including a brief look at youtube video playing. This is with my win10 theme & my perfs script applied, including a little overclocking (2000 instead of the standard 1800Mhz for the pi400) which is very safe and stable, no freezes so far (and overclocking is a very common thing for raspberrys owners in fact ). I'm using an usb3 nvme enclosure as you can see on the video.
Boot time to desktop is ~ 30sec, I did a restart at the end of the video so you can see shutdown time & boot time.
Sorry for the mess on my desktop , and the poor video quality, it was made holding my phone with one hand and the other hand to type on keyboard/mouse

My opinion is that it is really usuable as a desktop replacement, providing you don't do too much multitasking or demanding tasks, but for classic browsing/mails/office apps, it's really good. And take a look at the power usage of the raspberry ! In these times where electricity cost so much (in europe at least) this is a real energy saver. Q4Os is clearly a must on this machines.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YFYkIxDD1Q

q4osteam · 2024-03-26 20:43

Great to watch the video, thanks for that If you would make some more polished video review of Q4OS (with your theme and tweaks), we could publish it in external links section of our frontpage https://q4os.org/

Q4OS Forum

#51 2024-03-21 20:24

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#52 2024-03-21 20:40

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#53 2024-03-21 21:39

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#54 2024-03-22 09:54

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#55 2024-03-22 10:08

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#56 2024-03-22 12:14

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#57 2024-03-22 12:51

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#58 2024-03-22 12:51

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#59 2024-03-22 12:55

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#60 2024-03-22 13:05

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#61 2024-03-22 18:51

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#62 2024-03-22 19:13

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#63 2024-03-22 21:40

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#64 2024-03-23 18:56

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#65 2024-03-23 20:36

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#66 2024-03-23 22:01

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#67 2024-03-23 22:08

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#68 2024-03-23 23:38

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#69 2024-03-23 23:40

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#70 2024-03-24 10:08

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#71 2024-03-25 11:55

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#72 2024-03-25 12:35

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#73 2024-03-26 14:08

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#74 2024-03-26 18:59

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

#75 2024-03-26 20:43

Re: Q4OS 5 for Raspberry Pi

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