SteeMan

I find your research interesting. I don't have this particular box (I have a TX3 based on the s905x3 cpu). If you provided links to the source code for the dtbs (i.e. the .dts files) I'd be willing to at least look at the source code to see if anything jumps out. Also since you want the gigabit ethernet working, do you know what ethernet chip your box has installed (i.e. could you open the box and take a picture of the board and especially the ethernet chip)?

The s905w2 is actually a new processor from amlogic (bad confusing naming choice as it is not related to the s905x2). As a new processor you are not going to find support for it in mainline linux for a while (if ever). There is less and less effort in the mainline linux community to support new amlogic cpus. So this may be something that will never work with armbian.

@Menos_16 since these forums are for armbian, it wouldn't be an appropriate location for an arch Linux discussion

Note that the X96 Mini box name is very generic. There are many different manufacturers that make boxes with that name and each manufacturer may use different components (i.e. wifi chips) in their specific boards. So don't assume that the above will work for you unless you verify that you have the same wifi chip on your board.

The short answer to your question is that there isn't a dtb file for your box for mainline armbian linux kernels. The box manufacturers don't put any effort into supporting mainline linux and since there are hundreds of unique hardware boxes out there, the best you generally can do is use a reference dtb that is close to your boxes hardware. For example you say you are using the gxm-q201.dtb. That q201 is the reference board made by amlogic to be used as a template for box manufacturers to base their designs off of. TV boxes are a price sensitive commodity, so each manufacturer is looking for the lowest cost components so the final box manufacturered will differ from the reference in order to cut costs. And using generic wifi chips is one of the areas they cut costs. These generic chips generally have no mainline linux support and the box has no correct mainline dtb file. This is why the FAQ explicitly says not to expect to ever get wifi working, If you can't use a wired ethernet connection, you are recommended to get a cheap linux supported usb wifi adapter. If you have searched the forum archives an no one has reported getting wifi working on your specific box, it most likely isn't going to happen (unless you have some very specific developer skills to do the work yourself).

Please read the following FAQ post if you haven't already:

Have you followed the instructions in this FAQ post: Also, I would recommend using the toothpick method. You need to have a specific type of 'update' andoid app installed for that method to work and I have found that a lot of android boxes don't have the right update app to use that method. I always use the toothpick method to install multiboot.

Your issue is more likely that the dtb file you are using isn't correctly identifiing the wifi hardware that is in your box. Without a correct dtb file for your box, the driver won't do you any good. You need both as the dtb is the mapping between the hardware and the software of the driver.

I'm pretty sure this is a duplicate of a previously reported issue:

Also, the following thread probably is what you are looking for to answer your questions.

Since you say you have a tv box based on a rk3228 I am moving this thread to the rockchip specific forum for tv boxes.

I think these are what you are looking for:

First off I want to point you to the following TV Box FAQ item: https://forum.armbian.com/topic/16976-status-of-armbian-on-tv-boxes-please-read-first The most important information there is that TV Boxes are not supported by the Armbian project. Second, there is this other FAQ item: https://forum.armbian.com/topic/17106-installation-instructions-for-tv-boxes-with-amlogic-cpus The most important thing here is that there is no one in the community currently working on amlogic support for TV Boxes, so the latest build is from Oct 2020. Obviously that build predates the release of the x905x4 cpu by amlogic. I don't know of anyone that has tried to see if the old build (that supported the s905x2 and generally worked on the s905x3) would work on a newer s905x4 box. My guess is that it won't work until upstream amlogic maintainers incorporate refererence design dtb files into mainline kernel and someone around here creates a build that incorporates those upstream changes. If you are adventurous, you could give it a try with the current build using the s905x3 reference dtb: meson-sm1-sei610.dtb

Moved post to the proper TV Box forum

All the information you need should be in the two TV box FAQ posts: https://forum.armbian.com/topic/16976-status-of-armbian-on-tv-boxes-please-read-first https://forum.armbian.com/topic/17106-installation-instructions-for-tv-boxes-with-amlogic-cpus

Assuming you are following the instructions in the FAQ in this forum (https://forum.armbian.com/topic/17106-installation-instructions-for-tv-boxes-with-amlogic-cpus) you would just get another sd card and create a new installation on it to use.

My recommendation is to ask your questions in a forum that is dedicated to HA. There is nothing you have posted that would indicate this is an armbian issue. And given the very few people hanging out in these armbian TV box forums the likelyhood of someone here having good HA knowledge is slim.

moved to topic to General Chat as there is nothing indicating this is specific to amlogic based boxes.

Upgrades between ubuntu or debian versions have never been officially supported by armbian. The recommended approach would be to reinstall the newer version. Having said that, it should be possible to upgrade following the standard ubuntu upgrade instructions (google for examples of upgrading from ubuntu xenial to beaver). There are a couple of armbian specific things to look out for: 1) make a backup and be prepared to restore the backup as you might find that you need to try this process more than once to get it right - unfortunately because you are installed on emmc that is much more difficult than if you were running from an sd card. 2) After you run the ubuntu upgrade, and before you do a generic apt update/upgrade and certainly before you reboot, you will need to look at the armbian specific files in /etc/apt/sources.list.d and manually edit those files to convert them from the old ubuntu distribution to the new. I have done this process once or twice just as a proof of concept, but I generally find that after a couple of years, its better to do a clean install and start from there in my personal opinion.

@Sajjad TV Boxes are not supported by Armbian. There is some community work that has been done with them however, thus this subforum. Please read the following two TV Box FAQ items: https://forum.armbian.com/topic/16976-status-of-armbian-on-tv-boxes-please-read-first https://forum.armbian.com/topic/17106-installation-instructions-for-tv-boxes-with-amlogic-cpus

@Dams2000 There is no one involved in the ophub project that participates in these armbian forums. I don't know why they refer to those builds as armbian as they have no tie to the armbian project, other than they have forked off of armbian. You will need to contact the authors of that code to get an answer to your question.

Is the USB drive externally powered? I wouldn't expect a cheap tv box to supply enough power over USB to be stable.

@mattmar TV Boxes are not supported by the Armbian project. Moved your post to the TV Box Club area of the forum where users of these types of boxes hang out for unofficial help.

@prol I workaround for this issue that I am testing is to use the /boot partition from the sd card but the /root partition from your emmc. Since the boot parttion is essential not used after boot you don't really need to worry about sd card wear or speed. To do this you need to modify the boot command in the extlinux.conf file (on your sd card) to use 'root=LABEL=ROOT_EMMC' and then change the fstab file (on your emmc) to mount the correct /boot. I then cleaned up my sd card by deleting the /root partition and cleaned up my emmc and deleted the /boot partiation, but that isn't necessary. As I said I am testing this and by that I mean it works to boot, but I haven't put it through enough reboots to feel 100% confident that this will always work. But I haven't had any issues since I implemented this work around a couple of weeks ago.

You do realize this is an Armbian forum. You should ask your question in a manjaro forum.