All Activity

@billymore To convert a standard Armbian root filesystem (typically an ext4 partition) into the rootfs.cpio.lzma.uboot format required for RAM booting, you must package the file tree into a CPIO archive, compress it with LZMA, and then wrap it with a U-Boot header. 1. Extract the Armbian RootFS First, you need the actual files from your Armbian image. Mount the image to a temporary directory on your Linux PC: mkdir -p /tmp/armbian_root If you have your Armbian .img file ready, run this command to find the start sector of the root partition (usually the second partition): fdisk -l armbian_image.img Multiply that Start number by 512 to get the exact offset for the mount command. sudo mount -o loop,offset=YOUR_OFFSET armbian_image.img /tmp/armbian_root 2. Create the CPIO Archive Pack the entire filesystem into a newc format CPIO archive. It is critical to perform this step as root to preserve file permissions. Atlassian cd /tmp/armbian_root sudo find . | sudo cpio -H newc -o > /tmp/rootfs.cpio 3. Compress with LZMA Compress the archive using the LZMA algorithm to minimize its size for RAM loading: lzma -9 /tmp/rootfs.cpio # This creates /tmp/rootfs.cpio.lzma 4. Add the U-Boot Header Use the mkimage tool (from the u-boot-tools package) to add the 64-byte legacy header that U-Boot uses to identify the ramdisk. mkimage -A arm -O linux -T ramdisk -C lzma -n "Armbian Initramfs" \ -d /tmp/rootfs.cpio.lzma /tmp/rootfs.cpio.lzma.uboot -A arm: Target architecture (use arm64 if applicable). -T ramdisk: Identifies the image type as a RAM filesystem. -C lzma: Specifies the compression used. -d: Input data file.

Netplan, like the whole systemd is the worst thing that ever happened to what we call "linux" overall. It was a dirty hack by canonical to overscript things and mantain a "foot in the door" to coerce users into a useless .yaml. A classic example of a solution in search of a problem that DID NOT EXIST. It's made with the same mentality of SYSTEMD by redhat, systemwide-cancer that was useless in its inception, just to make "a brand" and softly "vendor-lock" your product and give credibility - and make a lot of moooney - on HELPDESK SERVICES. But many years have passed and since nobody removes the crap, because "UBUNTU=LINUX" in peoples mind, and distros have adapted to it, since not many care about complex networking, it's just an icon flashing on their desktop, and most of the time it boils down to just make a laptop wifi work reliably (not as trivial as it seems). If you have to deal with a LOT of complex networking setups i.e. bridges, lot of network interfaces,VPNs, VLAN/VXLAN etc, those YAML scripts are just something you REALLY DO NOT WANT. Even the "ifupdown" route sometimes is not feasible, because systemd is such a systemwide-cancer that silently breaks things because you know, 1000000 lines of init code - that even spreads to your boot code in EFI environments - seemed such a GREAT idea to redhat, and it -incredibly- linux users swallowed this lump of sh*t like it was fine a chocolate cookie, I read people all the time in forums saying "ohhh it's SOO easy!". My advice: go Alpine Linux or OpenWRT or other similar "skeletal" distros to regain control of your network interfaces (and your system as a whole). It's a lost battle with anything netplan/systemd, you have to rely on a script that writes another script that get interpreted by another script and finally by another "black box" like systemd JUST TO do things like "echo <PARAMETER> > /sys/something". It's exactly what we needed, 3 or 4 more "abstraction layers" with 3 or 4 different syntax. It was obvious vendor-locking, but hey, let's jump into the bandwagon, because why not ? I'm pretty sure lots of people made a lot of money out of this, also.

Thanks Nick for the reply and the explanation - Appreciate your assistance. I think this is where I'm facing the problem with the Armbian version I have found (vs. MiniArch) I don't know what exactly and where to write using sunxi-fel. For MiniArch, image builder for the TX1 explains to use the following commands to boot via FEL (but where it crashes): sunxi-fel -v -p uboot bootloader/u-boot-sunxi-with-spl.bin write 0x40200000 Image write 0x4fa00000 dtbs/allwinner/sun50i-h313-tanix-tx1.dtb write 0x4fc00000 load-kernel.scr While for Armbian, I don't know exactly what to send (except sending the bootloader u-boot which works but starts Android). @Nick A : you suggested a command: write 0x4ff00000 rootfs.cpio.lzma.uboot I understand that I should use this with sunxi-fel - but could you tell me more? Should I add it to existing Sunxi-fel command or? What is the purpose of this command?

The Nanopi M4 (not V2) has only 2GB of RAM. It could also possible that my device has an other (or older) Android. And you have to use the HDMI port 1 in the "middle". Not the HDMI under the TF slot!

I didn't notice it. I'm away from Home now. Will try to do some tests this weekend

http://blog.armbian.com/content/images/2026/02/githubhighlights-2.pngThis week’s Armbian development saw significant progress across board support, software modules, and workflow enhancements. Notable additions include new board images for ForLinx OK3506-S12, Cix-ACPI, and expanded support for Raspberry Pi 400, 500, and RPi3 series. Improvements to build targets and kernel patches were implemented, alongside fixes for overlayfs module logic and OpenMediaVault installation. The imager received updates for macOS compatibility and enhanced handling of write-protected devices. Several workflow optimizations and cleanup tasks were completed, streamlining concurrency and retry logic. Updates also targeted Debian trixie/sid for app builds and refined base images for specific boards. Overall, the changelog reflects a strong focus on broadening hardware compatibility, improving reliability, and optimizing development processes. Add exotics board to apps blacklist. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#233Add ForLinx Vendor // OK3506-S12 Board. by @vidplace7 in armbian/armbian.github.io#235Add Rpi 400 and 500 series. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#227Add RPi3 series as reusable / virtual targets. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#225Add: Cix-ACPI board image & Cixtech Vendor image. by @HeyMeco in armbian/armbian.github.io#237arch: arm: dts: add ForLinx OK3506-S12 (RK3506J). by @vidplace7 in armbian/linux-rockchip#446Build targets: enable and disable build targets. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#9377bump to next rc. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#9376cleanup leftover traces of oftc and matrix. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/documentation#876create rewrite-patches workflow. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#9364descrube update #9191 custom LOGLEVEL with UBOOT_LOGLEVEL. by @iav in armbian/documentation#868Exclude armhf, riscv64, and loongarch64 from apps builds. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#234extensions: radxa-aic8800: allow 6.19; skip DKMS only on >= 6.20. by @HackingGate in armbian/build#9397feat(software): add OpenMediaVault installation module. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/configng#751feat: add locked badge and disable selection for write-protected devices. by @SuperKali in armbian/imager#97feat: detect macOS /Applications folder on update failure. by @SuperKali in armbian/imager#101Fix OMV installation - via armbian-config. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/os#429fix(system): correct overlayfs module status logic and conditions. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/configng#749fix(system): improve overlayfs module config handling and status check. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/configng#750fix: align macOS ARM artifact naming to aarch64 (#99). by @SuperKali in armbian/imager#100fix: enable multi-stream XZ decompression for Khadas OOWOW images. by @SuperKali in armbian/imager#98mekotronics-r58x-4g: mainline u-boot v2026.01; mainline 6.19 kernel (edge). by @rpardini in armbian/build#9398meson64-edge and rockchip64-edge: rewrite kernel patches against 6.19. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#9382Normalize kernel config hash inputs. by @iav in armbian/build#9277Orange Pi 3B: Generate alternate SPI image for booting from SATA. by @dust-7 in armbian/build#9388Orangepi lite2 and one plus: change crust config. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#9374Race conditions: installing packages before adding a repo. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#9393Refactor RPi imager JSON generation to Python script. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#228Remove redundant git pull --rebase that causes failures. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#230Revert "build(deps): bump setuptools from 80.10.2 to 82.0.0". by @iav in armbian/build#9392Revert "Sunxi64 EDGE: Add missing audio related modules and other". by @pyavitz in armbian/build#9380RK3506: Pin U-Boot to known-working commit. by @vidplace7 in armbian/build#9390rockchip: Add CSC board ForLinx OK3506-S12 (RK3506J). by @vidplace7 in armbian/build#9394rockchip: Allow dt overlays that disable nodes. by @vidplace7 in armbian/build#9396RV1106: Reduce kernel memory footprint (fix boot on 64MB boards). by @vidplace7 in armbian/build#9399Set DESKTOP_APPGROUPS_SELECTED to empty for nightly desktop images. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#231Sunxi64 EDGE: Add missing audio related modules and other. by @pyavitz in armbian/build#9373Treat legacy branch same as vendor in target generation. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#226Update apps targets to Debian trixie/sid, headless builds. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#232Update base image for specific boards in config. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/os#427Workflow improvements: standardize concurrency and retry logic. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/armbian.github.io#229 View the full article

So far no dice with Armbian. I am trying my luck with the Radxa official image and will report how that goes eventually. Meanwhile feel free to offer ideas or procedures i could tackle

If you want to understand what should be happening under a normal installation: Installing "multiboot" (i.e. pressing the hidden reset button while powering the device) runs the script aml_autoscript That script sets some uboot environment variables that are used by subsequent boots The boot process for these boxes is to use the original android uboot to intiialize the device and then hand off the boot process to the u-boot.ext from armbian. This is done in the script s905_autoscript (or emmc_autoscript). Which then essentially just runs (for emmc): if fatload mmc 1 0x1000000 u-boot.ext; then go 0x1000000; fi; (or "mmc 0" for SD card). The chainloaded u-boot then boots via the information in the extlinux/extlinux.conf file.

Current Armbian uses extlinux to load, not uboot scripts. I can't help you unless you are willing to follow my suggestions, which you seem to not want to do.

log into android and poweroff via any "power menu" apk inside android put you armbian flashed sd (try balena etcher) and use half of ear cleaning cotton bud's stick to put and press in AV/audio port ; keep pressing then put dc power - until anything comes in hdmi out-you can try 3sec 8sec method; put bud and press count 3 put dc in while pressing count upto 8 then let go

Thank you for the update, good to hear there is possible to run Linux on the box. In other hand, little bit is surprising, I try Nanopi M4 image and many other images, but non of work for me. Far as I know Rockchip have fixed boot order (emmc -> sd cadr ... ). Do you have a working Android on emmc and Armbian on sd card? On the weekend I will try also again the SD card boot. To answer your questions: I did not use any DTB at yet I only try rkbin boot loaders which not need to build. I was also able to extract the Android 11 Image there was model name "Giada JHS558" entered, I assume you have older Android version where the vendor use the Excavator Board as basis for the device tree.

Well, i have unbound the a24 driver by now: echo -n "6-0050" > /sys/bus/i2c/drivers/at24/unbind apparently it was an Radxa specific eeprom he had hanged on to: # i2cget 6 0x50 0x00 i | xxd -r -p WARNING! This program can confuse your I2C bus, cause data loss and worse! I will read from device file /dev/i2c-6, chip address 0x50, data address 0x00, 32 bytes using read I2C block data. Continue? [Y/n] RADXX but the neighbor is a mistery: i2cget 6 0x51 0x00 i | xxd -r -p WARNING! This program can confuse your I2C bus, cause data loss and worse! I will read from device file /dev/i2c-6, chip address 0x51, data address 0x00, 32 bytes using read I2C block data. Continue? [Y/n] R-Po����������������������������

this is the u-boot command i gave ,previosly loaded armbian ,kernel 5.9 , same command give ,ftdaddr null ,but os loads , for kernel version 6.18 doesnt load , it abort booti ${loadaddr} - ${dtb_mem_addr} this is the error message im getting for booti ${loadaddr} - ${dtb_mem_addr}, other commands works perfectly 42334720 bytes read in 2967 ms (13.6 MiB/s) reading dtb/amlogic/meson-gxl-s805x-p241.dtb 40339 bytes read in 58 ms (678.7 KiB/s) [rsvmem] get fdtaddr NULL! rsvmem - reserve memory Usage: rsvmem check - check reserved memory rsvmem dump - dump reserved memory rsvmem check failed "Synchronous Abort" handler, esr 0x96000210

According to i2cdetect the "UU" means the eeprom is being accessed (used) by something, and indeed after checking dmesg i've found this: [ 8.135029] at24 6-0050: Looking up vcc-supply property in node /i2c@2ac90000/at24c16@50 failed The at24 is again a built in module and i am not sure how i can prevent it from accessing the 0x50 on i2c 6?

What do You know! # i2cdetect -l i2c-1 i2c rk3x-i2c I2C adapter i2c-2 i2c rk3x-i2c I2C adapter i2c-3 i2c rk3x-i2c I2C adapter i2c-6 i2c rk3x-i2c I2C adapter i2c-10 i2c ddc it was always there, just missed i2c -tools 😁 next: # i2cdetect -F 6 Functionalities implemented by /dev/i2c-6: I2C yes SMBus Quick Command yes SMBus Send Byte yes SMBus Receive Byte yes SMBus Write Byte yes SMBus Read Byte yes SMBus Write Word yes SMBus Read Word yes SMBus Process Call yes SMBus Block Write yes SMBus Block Read no SMBus Block Process Call no SMBus PEC yes I2C Block Write yes I2C Block Read yes SMBus Host Notify no 10-bit addressing no Target mode no And finally: # i2cdetect -y 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 a b c d e f 00: -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 10: -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 20: -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 30: -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 40: -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 50: UU UU UU UU UU UU UU UU -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 60: -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 70: -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- So we seem to have something there (at address 0x50). What would be the next steps? read out the eerpom? Also, why does the OS not take care of this automatically? How come Raspbian OS does?

I just tried to enable the i2c6 (/boot/dtb/rockchip/overlay/rk3576-i2c6-m0.dtbo) overlay by armbian-config but as i try to enter the overlay utility i get thrown out to the CLI with "Invalid overlay_prefix rk35xx" What gives?

Yes it errors because your uboot environment is screwed up by everything you have previously done. That is why I said you need to reinstall an original android firmware to set things back to a clean state before proceeding.

Hi, the hardware in question: PCIe_TO_2-CH_SATA_HAT+ In expectation for the Rock 4D forum to arrive I am posting my issue here: The Rock 4D works and all is well The two SATA drives work over USB to SATA adapters - that is not ideal in the long term IMHO The HAT just arrived and i have no doubt in my mind that it can be defective in any way - i assume it is 100% operational. But when i connect it and plug the power in the Rock 4D boots, everything else works as usual, but the HAT just sits there without any signal. My questions: 1. How do i query the eeprom via the pins 27 & 28 (ID_SD & ID_SC), do i just enable the i2c_6 overlay? 2. What then? I queried the ahci module with: `modinfo ahci` but it is both a built in and i suspect it does not support my device anyway? Looking forward to try help get this nice board supported on Armbian for other FPC equipped devices.

Over the past year, Collabora has pushed mainline GStreamer toward a first-class media and Machine Learning platform, with new inference backends, extended metadata/tensor handling, and production-ready analytics building blocks. View the full article

With its latest release, GStreamer adds native support for AI inference engines including ONNX Runtime, LiteRT, and Burn, along with tensor decoders for YOLO, face detection, tracking, and more. View the full article

Armbian 25.11.2 Noble XFCE (BSP Kernel: 6.1.115) + PanVk - mesa 26.0 (https://launchpad.net/~ernstp/+archive/ubuntu/mesaaco) + Box64 arm64 v0.4.1 ed9827920 (https://ryanfortner.github.io/box64-debs/) + proton-10.0-4-amd64-wow64 (https://github.com/Kron4ek/Wine-Builds/releases/download/proton-10.0-4/wine-proton-10.0-4-amd64-wow64.tar.xz) + dgVoodoo2 (https://github.com/dege-diosg/dgVoodoo2/releases) + DXVK-stripped v1.6.1 ~40fps@720p (low settings) box64 environment variables: Dead Space

Cheers, will do!

tried to boot this image Armbian_community_26.2.0-trunk.385_Aml-s9xx-box_trixie_current_6.18.8_minimal it gives this error scanning bus 0 for devices... 2 USB Device(s) found scanning usb for storage devices... init_part() 282: PART_TYPE_DOS 1 Storage Device(s) found reading zImage ** Unable to read file zImage ** reading dtb/amlogic/meson-gxl-s805x-p241.dtb 26728 bytes read in 57 ms (457 KiB/s) [rsvmem] get fdtaddr NULL! rsvmem - reserve memory Usage: rsvmem check - check reserved memory rsvmem dump - dump reserved memory rsvmem check failed Bad Linux ARM64 Image magic! gxl_p241_v1#

Given where you are, my only suggestion is to restore the box to a clean android firmware (so the uboot environment is restored to a clean state). Then restart with a current build (don't use the 6 year old build that you found somewhere). The two versions aren't compatible. Then get things running cleanly from SD card first, and then if you still want move the install to emmc.

Please use a build that isn't 7 years old. https://www.armbian.com/amlogic-s9xx-tv-box Read the FAQ and the install instructions linked there