rafman

@Lancoly Your board seems to be a x96Q Board v5.1 You can try to boot your board with following image : "MiniArch-20240715-6.10.10-board-h313.x96_q_v5.1-SD-Image.img.xz" if your board is booting then you can install also Armbian by modify the extlinux.conf

@svsruof Yes entering to FEL mode and verify the IDs is a Safe method that indicates that your board is Allwinner and not a Fake board like RK322x or something else. in FEL mode you can flash your device firmware with PhoenixSuit if your device is bricked, or to investigate your board with sunxi-tools. Both operations requires knowledge of your hardware otherwise you may easily brick your device. From your serial log you posted your device seems to have secure boot enabled by the manufacturer firmware. (SBOOT / [01.260]secure enable bit: 1) this does not allow non trusted boot environmet and probably this is the reason that you can not boot from SD card. I am still looking for a way to override this situation and unlock the boot process (as i have also a similar bricked board) on some Chinese boxes and is very difficult to find the original manufacturer firmware (for investigation) because they don't publish it. I also have tried sunxi-fel in order to boot linux via USB but without success (usb_bulk_send() ERROR -7: Operation timed out on H616) If someone knows a method to override this situation on Allwinner (H313 / H616) is welcome to help.

@svsruof FEL is a low-level subroutine contained in the BootROM on Allwinner devices. It is used for initial programming and recovery of devices using USB. In order to Enter to FEL mode you need a Male to Male USB cable. 1> Disconnect power supply from your TV-BOX. 2> connect the USB cable to your PC USB port. 3> with a tooth pick PRESS continuously the button inside AV port and connect the other end of USB cable to the USB (OTG ) of your TV-BOX ( Note: if you have 2 usb ports on your tv-box try the left first ) 4> Release the the button you pressed with the tooth Pick (after 3 - 4 seconds) Now you must be FEL mode. if your tv-box is booting to android then you an not in FEL mode. (repeat the procedure and/or change the USB port on TV-BOx ) When you successfully enter into FEL mode you will see nothing on Serial console output and your device will not boot to installed os. To ensure that you are in FEL mode you (if you are using Windows) go to Device Manager and examine the USB devices root tree you must see a device with the bellow IDs USB Device(VID_1f3a_PID_efe8) if you are using linux open a terminal and give the lsusb command and exam the device IDs. if you see above IDs then you are in FEL mode and you can use sunxi tools for further investigation.

@WayneGibbous I am glad to read that my post helped you. The board you have posted is common fake Chinese H313 board sold by various sellers on Alliexpress and other online stores. (i already have one) They sell it as H313 X96Q (2GB Ram and 16gb Rom) for about $20 however Emmc is 1Gb Ram and 8gb Rom the onboard CPU chip is marked with stencil as H313 but is Rk322x (and not RK3528) This board can host LibreElec and Armbian (with some hacks). The good point of this board is that onboard Ethernet works without problems, but is less powerful than H313 Note: When i installed Armbian to this board i tried to upgrade the device firmware via armbian-config (after the installation on emmc) However I encounter problems with USB devices (keyboard and mouse) after the upgrade. Then I erased the emmc and I use this board with a fast 64GB SD card and it runs smoothly and with plenty of storage space.

@svsruof you may have hardware incompatibilities, I will try to help you. TV boxes is a pain story and you never know what you really have except if you investigate further your hardware. You can try different miniarch images variants regarding your board (x96q) until one is booting, there are 5 different images for 5 different board variations of x96q (e.g lpddr3, v1.3, v5.1 ...) I don't know your hardware but keep in mind that there are also FAKE boards with rk3228a or Rk3229 as x96q variants you have to investigate your Hardware first, rk322x boards are fake boards marked as H313 (on chip) and these are not compatible with Allwinner images (but you can still install Linux with other images for rk322x) One safe method to verify if you have Allwinner board is to set it to FEL mode (by pressing the internal button with a toothpick) connect a male to male USB and then read your USB devices with lsusb command. you can find more information here : https://linux-sunxi.org/FEL Another problem that you may face is locked u-boot loader and/or device secure boot enabled by the manufacturer in this case you need to analyze the original manufacturer firmware (if available) to see the unlock possibilities or to try to unlock it via adb (if possible). Serial debugging is a must. Unfortunately i can't post miniarch images links here due to forum rules. however is very easy to find it. If you are able to boot a miniarch image or a LibreElec image then is easy to install Armbian as well with some modifications on extlinux.conf Tip: place a detailed image of both sides of your board. Someone may have the same and may guide you regarding your problems

@son pham You can try this image: https://github.com/warpme/miniarch/releases/download/v20240715/MiniArch-20240715-6.10.0-board-h313.x96_q_lpddr3_v1.3-SD-Image.img.xz

Continue .. An other issue With Z1 Tv Box is that i tried to install the image to eMMC via armbian-install. Installation succeeds but after system was not able to boot directly from eMMC. With MiniArch-20240715-6.10.0-board-h313.x96_q_lpddr3-SD-Image.img eMMC boot is without problems. This probably has to do with U-boot because Miniarch uses extlinux to boot in a seperate fat partition .... I will try to manual partition the eMMC to see if this is resolved. At this time The Box Operates with SD card with Armbian_community_24.8.0-trunk.495_Orangepi3_noble_current_6.6.36_gnome_desktop.img with ssh, apache, php, mariadb and firebird3 server installed ALL works OK and stable (and relatively fast) except the HDMI on console, Cpu Temp, and onboard Ethernet. the Ethernet issue also exist in miniarch but with miniarch i had no HDMI issue. I suspect the panfrost driver in combination with the box DTB (sun50i-h313-x96-q-lpddr3.dtb) .. I will investigate it further. This my progress for now.

Hello everyone I have a X96 clone named Z1 with 2 GB Ram and 16 GB Rom that I was able to boot and install MiniArch with the image ( MiniArch-20240715-6.10.0-board-h313.x96_q_lpddr3-SD-Image.img ) this work Correctly with the box. I went further and investigate the possibility to install Armbian and I confirm that I was able to Install Armbian (with some hacks) I have used the bellow image : Armbian_community_24.8.0-trunk.495_Orangepi3_noble_current_6.6.36_gnome_desktop.img.xz The box works nice but with 3 issues 1> HDMI image is broken on console and I have a green image with pixels 2> No Ethernet Adapter Recognized and i used a USB to Ethernet adapter. 3> No CPU temp