Hello LinuxNoob,
I don't have this board, I have Raspberry Pi Zero (5 of this), Zero W, and Pi 3.
Pi Zero it costs £4, it has HDMI output, to connect it to VGA monitor, I used adapter it costs £0.99, available many colours, I have 1 that is black, and some that are red etc, here these costs about £5- £10, I got it from China like the shops here do.
You plug this directly into the HDMI, the opposite end of the adapter you connect your vga cable.
No need for any drivers added , no need to flash the chip, just plug it in and use it.
It doesnt use any GPIO pins , it looks like one of the larger usb sticks.
These are Linux too, I use Debian Jessie. Ubuntu have released a version for Pi 3 too, maybe it means it is a little closer that one day I can have LL on them.
