[Introduction to U Boot? /Lack of fundamental understanding]

Thanks @FRANK333 , I actually have an orange pi too so bookmarked that guide.

 

For future readers:

As for changing u-boot on Le Potato, I just followed 

https://docs.u-boot.org/en/latest/build/gcc.html
https://docs.u-boot.org/en/latest/board/amlogic/libretech-cc.html

they've guides for lots of boards. Everything seems to work so far as I was able to boot into armbian. 

 

Also, I recommend getting a USB U-art cable and using the terminal program minicom so you can see what happens during u-boot and with timestamps

[Le Potato U-boot is slow?]

Alright, thanks again to the replies ! I followed the u-boot guides and it worked out !  

 

"make menuconfig" let me change the environment variable I wanted to. Compiling took just a few minutes.

 

I did the dd commands from the guide and was able to boot the board. Armbian is intact, no issues.

[Le Potato U-boot is slow?]

@usual user  thanks for the reply. I found 

 and posted there what I did (edit boot.cmd), but to no success.  As you said, it uses the defaults, though this doesn't happen with u-boot on debian. There, I'm able to use setenv and saveenv without issue.

I found a guide to build u-boot https://docs.u-boot.org/en/latest/build/gcc.html and https://docs.u-boot.org/en/latest/board/amlogic/libretech-cc.html
but I'm not really sure I understand how I could integrate that into an existing armbian image

[Introduction to U Boot? /Lack of fundamental understanding]

similar to what @phier asked, I'm trying to change the u-boot environment variable bootdelay . I've tried adding

Quote

bootdelay=10

to armbianEnv.txt with no effect (it is still at the default of 2).

I then added

Quote

setenv bootdelay "10"

to boot.cmd and ran

Quote

mkimage -C none -A arm -T script -d /boot/boot.cmd /boot/boot.scr
 

This completed and I can see that boot.scr got the line, but still the boot delay is at the default of 2.

Any idea what I am missing @lanefu ? I'm on a Le Potato booting from the microsd card

[Le Potato U-boot is slow?]

https://docs.u-boot.org/en/latest/usage/cmd/env.html 

 

Yes I should be able to change the boot-delay of u-boot but it doesn't persist, when I restart the value is gone.

 

I interrupt the boot by hitting any key.

 

Then I do

Quote

env set bootdelay 0

 

Then I should be able to do 

 

Quote

env save

but "save" doesn't exist. 

 

 

I will look into how to build/replace this version of U-boot

[Le Potato U-boot is slow?]

  1 abled^M
  2 DDR scramble enabled^M
  3 DDRREAD:0;0.0;CHK:0;^M
  4 no sdio debug board detected ^M
  5 TE: 1883999^M
  6 ^M-13^M
  7 DataBus test pass!^M
  8 AddrBusMMC:   SPI:0;CHK:A7;EMMC:400;NAND:81;SD:0; - FAIL^M
  9 DDR3 chl: Rank0 @ 912MH test pass!^M
 10 Load fip header from SD, src: 0x0000c200, des: 0x01400000, size: 0x00004000^M
 11 New fip structure!^M
 12 Load bl30 fr1100000, size: 0x0000d600^M
 13 00, des: 0x05100000, size: 0x000NOTICE:  BL3-1: v1.0(release):3348978^M
 14 NOTICE:  BL3-1: Built : 1L CPU setup!^M
 15 mpu_config_enable:mmc@72000: 0, mmc@74000: 1^M
 16 Loading Environment from nowhere... OK^M
 17 In:    serial^M
 18 Out:   serial^M
 19 Err:   serial^M
 20 [BL31]: tee siz key to stop autoboot:  2 ^H^H^H 1 Load bl33 from SD, src: 0x0003c25:44:01, May 12 2017^M
 21 [BL31]: GXai@droid07]^M^M
 22 OPS=0x84^M^M
 23 fe e4 eizing runtime service opteed_fas^M
 24 ^M
 25 U-Boot 2022.01-armbian (Feb ech-cc^M
 26 ^M
 27 Model: Libre Computer eth0: ethernet@c9410000^M
 28 Hit any MiB/s)^M
 29 ## Executing script at ^M
 30 ## Loading init Ramdisk from Lize:    24300899 Bytes = 23.2 MiGXL:BL1:9ac50e:bb16dc;FEAT:ADFC3et vddee to 1000 mv^M
 31 Board ID = 3^M
 32 CPU clk: 1200MHz^M
 33 DQS-corr enLoad bl31 from SD, src: 0x000202t^M
 34 SoC:   Amlogic Meson GXL (S905X) Revision 21:d (84:2)^M
 35 DRAM:  ^H^H^H 0 ^M
 36 Found U-Boot script /boot/boot.spaccount=1^M
 37 24300963 bytes read in 1046 ms (ok^M^M
 38 [Image: gxl_v1.1.3221-2cfba69 2017-05-27 16:03:58 qiufang.dtart!^M
 39 high task start!^M
 40 low task start!^M
 41 ERROR:   Error initial17 2023 - 22:31:00 +0000) libretswitch to partitions #0, OK^M
 42 mmcOK^M
 43 ## Flattened Device Tree blob at 04080000^M
 44    Booting using the fdt blob at 0x4080000^M
 45    Loading Ramdisk to 3a816000, end 3bf42d63 ... 1 GiB^M
 46 0 is current device^M
 47 Scanning mm08000000^M
 48 U-boot default fdtfile25 bytes read in 3 ms (73.2 KiB/e=ttyAML0,115200 console=tty1 co fixup script (meson-fixup.scr)^M
 49 ## Executing script at 32000000egacy Image at 13000000 ...^M
 50    Image Name:   uInitrd^M
 51    Image Type:   AArch64 Linux RAMDisk Image (gzip compressed)^M
 52    Data Sc 0:1...^M
 53 cr^M
 54 8147 bytes read in 3 ms (2.6: amlogic/meson-gxl-s905x-libretibata.force=noncq usb-storage.quirks=0x2537:0x1066:u,0x2537:0x105fff ... OK^M
 55 ^M
 56 Starting kernel ...^M

 

----------------------

took 9 seconds before I saw the "starting kernel"
 

[Le Potato U-boot is slow?]

thanks for the reply @SteeMan . I don't have the connector for uart, but I should be able to post a video clip (hopefully with OK quality) later today.

 

I will get a USB UART connector over the weekend.

 

When you turn on the power for one of these sorts of boards,  is it normal for the led to just stay red for 5+ seconds ? From what I can see, it's actually only spending a few seconds in u-boot before it starts showing the systemd services (the messages like "[ OK ] ...") 

 

I'm starting to wonder if it's my power supply..

[Le Potato U-boot is slow?]

So Le Potato (and Sweet potato) take about 10 seconds before reaching systemd. Is there a way to speed this up? 

 

I've tried putting boot_delay=0 as well as console=serial in armbianEnv.txt in hope of shortening the time in u-boot, but these didn't change anything.

 

I've also tried building this image with no initramfs and no loadable module support.

[usb otg help needed]

@goosnarrggh (Late) thanks for the reply! Did you happen to get a chance to play with this?

[usb otg help needed]

ls /sys/class/udc > UDC
ls:write error: Device or resource busy

I'm trying to get an armbian device (banana pi m2 zero and/or the orange pi zero LTS) to function as a USB client, but I can't seem to get the above step working. Any suggestions? lsof UDC returns nothing.

 

On the RaspberryPI 4 this worked without issue