Igor

Hi all.
I've finished my review video of the NanoPi M4V2. Here is it.

Special thanks to @JMCC @balbes150 @pask and @martinayotte.
Cheers all.

Modern kernel code - when you use armbian-config way of installing kernel sources (on Debian Buster or Ubuntu Bionic based Armbian) - you only need to go to the source directory and run "make zImage|Image" and you are done. In some case some wireless drivers might have issues with compilers ... but don't take this feature as granted yet.

Yes. We "just" need a working startup configuration in ifupdown, systemd or with network manager. Whatever. I made an image the other day, just for test and currently you don't have any network connection out of the box ... one can connect to WiFi with one of most rubbish adaptors out there. I do have no interest to dig into this, but I saw people are still trying/hope to use this board with recent kernels.

You know what, I did a reboot THEN the update, worked fine.
Very happy with Armbian over all, considering how cheapo this hardware is.   It's a print and DNS server now (!) great stuff.
Thanks

This is still an amateur project which is dealing with thousands of issues and thousands of people with a pinch of needed resources. When it's done it's done. Try upgrading to kernel 5.3.y (armbian-config -> system -> alternative kernels) since we will be ditching 4.19.y soon.
 
If you help around https://www.armbian.com/get-involved things go little faster.

broadcom ap6212a like on most of the others. You can see it on the photo: 

1234  
https://github.com/armbian/config/blob/master/debian-software#L426

We need to see serial console logs.

Hmm... actually yes - is the role of Armbian to teach users about Linux? Probably not, IMHO, they're better served by the Pi Folks - Raspbian is good training wheels for folks dipping their toes into Linux
 
 
The average Armbian user is not a paying customer - there are no Service Level Agreements dictating that any bug of a defined severity level must be fixed within a specific timeframe.
 
So yes - just ignore it for the most part, step in if is sounds fairly interesting - sounds a bit mean spirited perhaps, but generally folks will step in to help out, and if it's really a bug that is directly traceable back to Armbian code - then if it pops up enough, fix it directly, or delegate it to someone who is maintaining it (better to delegate, as that person knows the code likely better).
 
So if someone has problematic hardware - "my whoflungpI Zero2W with the built in XYZ WiFi adapter doesn't work" - well, it might be crap hardware, and in the sub-$50USD field of hacker boards and TV boxes, there's a fair amount of crap - can't fix bad hardware, and there, someone will tell them, use something that does work.

Installer always use u-boot from package. If you haven't update that .... works as expected. 

Installer always use u-boot from package. If you haven't update that .... works as expected. 

True. Larger developers community is the reason we are getting somewhere in the first place. I am aware of that. Also groups around projects helps to achieve more and less work is doubled, tripled ... but relationship between creators/contributors and average users, "I am new to Linux", support is rather extreme even without dealing with Raspberry Pi herd.
 
User: I am (also) reporting that functionality X is broken. (they have no idea that this "small bug" might represent a project worth months of work)
Two days later.
User: Hey, have you fixed this?
 
If "user" would be my paying customer we would terminate the contract right away. Sadly I am seeing such daily and that's why I am upset. How to deal with this and how to do it less personal way? Just ignore?
 

Perhaps its already there? We are moving to 5.3.y (current DEV) when possible ... otherwise it goes this way too: https://www.armbian.com/get-involved/

Always hard to mask HW w/SW, but that's always been true - and sometimes it's upstream at a chip level errata.
 
Don't sell the community here short - there are plenty of active contributors here that have specific skills, and some do this kind of work in their day jobs - but it is a valid point that it's unpaid, volunteer time, and resources are never enough.
 
The fact that Armbian is on the radar as a serious distro is a good sign of the quality of the community.

Miracles are usually made by bad/cheap powering.
https://forum.armbian.com/forum/31-sd-card-and-psu-issues/
If your powering is on the edge, this is the case.

https://github.com/armbian/build/issues
https://github.com/armbian/config/issues
https://forum.armbian.com/staffapplications/application/6-we-need-board-maintainers/
https://forum.armbian.com/forum/38-feature-requests
 
 

I remember seeing some patches from @megi about USB3 PHY few days ago ...
We will get those probably in his 5.4.y branch later.

... and you have to trust that compilers aren't fake  Or that rootfs was not somehow tempered in the build process ... or package in the upstream repository is somehow not security problematic.
But some are later mislead by flashy ads/words promising wonder upgrades and convenience ... and you get what you were afraid to get 
 

Someday  I wasn't sure that I will manage to RFC package naming 
but its almost done by now.
 

 We were not that bad, but it was fun sending pop-up messages around to X terminals. 

We are working on it. Thanks for your support.

Yes, I read the official docs but it was not enough. I'll try to find the analysis you're referring to. Could you please remember when was it written?
 
Anyway, your writeup is excellent! You may consider to copy+paste it into the Docs. Thank you.
 
great
fantastic
 
Also I finally found it in the code in lib/debootstrap.sh file and I see that ROOT_FS_CREATE_ONLY='force" will force running "debootstrap" command which will essentially rebuild rootfs from DEB packages downloaded from Debian / Ubuntu.
 
 
I run Orange Pi Zero at home since I'm a cheap bastard ;-). I have very simple applications for my single board computers. Simple enough to use Arduino so Orange Pi Zero works fine and I'm happy that I don't pay for VGA / HDMI output. And yes, Wireless sucks - that's why I use RJ45.
 
The company that I mentioned has bigger budget than my household so I'll take a look at supported boards and recommend something more expensive and reliable.
 
Thank you very much Igor!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

The other day I got an email (which I have less and less time to deal with) saying why we don't provide SHA numbers for 7z archive. He is afraid to open our archive and my answer was not satisfying him. Since I can't afford to educate people in person (or change anything in this regard) I didn't proceed.
 
Where can I get the file hashes (MD5, SHA1, SHA256, or SHA512) for each download so that I can verify that my image download is pristine and not corrupted in any way?  I've searched quite a bit and couldn't find this important info on your site.
 
Me:

They are inside 7z file.
https://docs.armbian.com/User-Guide_Getting-Started/#how-to-check-download-integrity
 
Thanks. I think it would be a good idea to publish the hash also for the 7z file the same way raspbian does for their compressed file (https://www.raspberrypi.org/downloads/raspbian/).  When I download any file from the web, I calculate the hash before interacting it with. If the hash doesn't match what the vendor has published on their website, I don't even attempt to extract or use it in any way. It's a good a security practice in my opinion.

Thank you.  
 
 
We know hardware more in details. The rest, user land, is from Debian ... or (Stallmanised) Ubuntu if you choose that flavour. Debian (and any other distribution) is a (major) step back if you look to the ARM single board computers.
 

One user write a very good analysis but can't find it ... This is ours: https://docs.armbian.com/Developer-Guide_Build-Process/ but its several years old.
 
1. Cross-compilers are essential for building from sources and for building on a generic x86 platform. They came from Linaro or ARM and are PGP signed (by Linaro / ARM). https://releases.linaro.org/components/toolchain/binaries/ If you don't trust them, you can build compilers from sources ... with another C compiler you trust  We have as many compilers we need to build all sources. Debian trusts Linaro.
2. Aptly is one of many Debian repository management tools. We choose to use this one. It's open source https://github.com/aptly-dev/aptly and works well.
3. Rootfs, applications and scripts, are cached, PGP signed (by me) and securely uploaded to our servers, like the rest of the stuff. This only shorten the build process in this task section (from 20 minutes down to 10-30 sec or whatever time you need to download 300-500Mb) which you can recreate with Debian debootstrap if you like. Packs are identical to all builds, only divided on package base (Stretch, Buster, Bionic, Buster-minimum, Buster-desktop ... ) and arhitecture - arm / arm64 in our case. We merge this with freshly compiled board support packages, u-boot, kernel and export ISO image which you can merge to the boot media.
4. Ask with more questions. Not sure if I remember everything you might need to know ... It's a big project by now. I was full time for few years and  we would like to hire if there will be enough income. There is plenty of work.
 

All binary code which we use is stored here:
- https://github.com/armbian/build/tree/master/packages/blobs (various open stuff plus some bootloader blobs. some hw is not possible to bring up without)
- https://github.com/armbian/rkbin (rockchip bootloaders, essential for rockchip)
- https://github.com/armbian/firmware (wireless firmware, not essential)
 

If you are happy with this, which is the cheapest hardware, how happy you will be with something which is not that limited  BTW. Wireless on this chip is garbage beyond repair. 

I usually get them directly from China. With DHL its virtually the same delivery speed, except it doesn't make sense to pay so much extra and deal with customs for just one board. Try here: https://www.antratek.com/boards/sbc/nanopi but I looks like they are out of stock .... sometimes China store is also out of stock and you need to wait for certain models. 
 
Allwinner H5 boards are not latest, but they are just fine and today well supported, but I don't know what that means from a sellers perspective. How long they will make them? Don't know.
 
I use this board to run my home automation for months without any troubles.

H2 = H3 - 4k video
 
The difference is in the other components. Wifi on Opi Zero is total crap, while on Lite is little better. One is best out of those three, while recommended is Orangepi PC+ ... less overheating due to better voltage regulation.

Will be enabled when development branch "arm64" gets merged to the master:
https://github.com/armbian/build/commit/09341a28e5d962836cbfd79d383cbdccd16a0ae7