justanothernoob

thanks @prahal - the only image I was able to successfully create and boot from was the initial image mentioned in my original post. At that stage there was: - eMMC with RoobiOS pre-installed - NVMe with nothing on it - micro SD card with the https://dl.armbian.com/rock-5-itx/Bookworm_vendor_minimal image Because it was booting to the error message of not being able to mount mmcblk01p as the root file system, I'm guessing that means the boot sequence is eMMC, NVMe and then micro SD. So I thought I would double-check, given that I now have a working NVMe installation ... so I reburned the https://dl.armbian.com/rock-5-itx/Bookworm_vendor_minimal image to micro SD card to see if the board would boot to that before the existing OS on the NVMe drive. IT DID! Not only that but it booted cleanly (asked me to create the root password and my user account)! I had used the same image file that I had downloaded for the first installation so I really have no idea why it worked this time. Now I guess I have to work out how to transfer that to the NVMe drive ... I suspect there are plenty of Google answers for that so that's my research for next week.

@prahal ok - so I've only been using the micro SD card to try boot and load an image from. So far, from what I understand, RoobiOS seems to be installed on the onboard emmc at a lower-priority boot option (i.e. if there's no boot OS on the NVMe, microSD or SATA III drive then boot from the onboard emmc). If I understand correctly, you're suggesting I load an empty / non-bootable micro SD card and then from the RoobiOS menu select one of your builds, chose to install to the micro SD and then transfer the bootable image to NVMe after? (Not that I know how to transfer the OS from micro SD to NVMe ... yet ... but, as I say ... more learning ) . If this is correct then happy to try that.

Preach You're 100% right - people do what they can - and we (I think that I think for most people) just appreciate what others can do that we can't For now I have what seems to be a CLI build ... I'm a Windows guy so learning about Linux. I did try dabbling 27 years ago ... but what was new then hasn't been cemented into my mind. Although interesting to see that KDE and GNOME are still a thing! But the principles make sense and much of the OS architecture is actually very similar... although the command line can be very different! For now I'm just trying to get OMV running so fingers crossed.

hey @Igor I tried USBImager but it's not playing nicely - 1st it wasn't letting me select the image. Then I realised that for some reason the "Downloads" link in the app's search wasn't working correctly and wasn't showing me all of the files that I knew were there. If I manually navigate to c:\users\xxx\Downloads then the files show up 2nd it wouldn't let me select my external 256GB micro SD card (via USB key with an SD adaptor) - the card just wasn't available as an option in the drop-down list. This may have been because my antivirus had locked the card while it completed it's scan? 3rd it looks like the "GO" button is hidden behind the other fields and I just can't select it. I've tried with both mouse and just tabbing but no joy See screenshot below (obviously, the red box is me highlighting what I think is hidden) You mention that BalenaEtcher can't handle large images but if too big a size is an issue (that's what she said!) then I wonder if maybe the 256GB micro SD card might also be a limitation? Deep breaths. Count to 10. It's all good learning Admittedly, 20 years ago I probably wouldn't have been so patient 🤣🤣 Really appreciate all of the advice being shared here. That's what "Community" is about 👍👍

@prahal thank you so much for explaining that. I tried downloading the https://fi.mirror.armbian.de/incoming/prahal/rock-5-itx/archive/Armbian_25.8.1_Rock-5-itx_bookworm_vendor_6.1.115_xfce_desktop.img.xz but Balena Etcher would fail at the end of the validation process. However ... from RoobiOS I can enter that path and it successfully downloads the image and appears to write it successfully to the NVMe drive and then reboots but only gives a single flash of blue SATA III lights and no display. I erased the NVMe partition and tried the Armbian_25.8.1_Rock-5-itx_noble_vendor_6.1.115_minimal.img.xz image with the same result. Same with Armbian_25.8.1_Rock-5-itx_bookworm_vendor_6.1.115_minimal.img.xz - no joy. Eventually I just went with the RADXA OS. It installs KDE Plasma so I've booted to command line and removed KDE and associated packages. Hopefully that effectively gives me a CLI image. Now to work through the error messages in the bootup and remove any unnecessary steps... after I manage to set the default font-size to something that doesn't have me squinting like Mr Magoo 🤣🤣

After about 45 minutes of no change from the blue circle of death I pulled the power cable out and rebooted. This time I selected the Armbian Noble build - that seemed to complete successfully - although I wasn't monitoring the whole process but when I came back it must have completed the install and rebooted. Unfortunately it was only giving a blank screen. I tried several reboots and would get the initial blue lights come on and then nothing further. Eventually I had to remove the NVMe and reformat it as a clean EXT drive and reinsert. Now I'm back to being able to boot back into the RoobiOS installation GUI. I think that next I'll try just selecting the RADXA OS and then install Open Media Vault on top of that.

@prahal - I tried burning a number of those images to SD card but none worked. With RoobiOS I see that all of the blue lights below the SATA ports (i.e. on the underside of the board) light up as blue for a couple of seconds, then they turn off and then they flash twice ... the screen comes on and after a couple of error messages the Installation GUI starts. With the images from the links you provided, I don't get the blue lights (although I do get a yellow network link light) or any output to screen. However ... in RoobiOS I'm given the option of various images to install ... including the option for "custom" - I've selected that and entered https://fi.mirror.armbian.de/incoming/prahal/rock-5-itx/archive/Armbian_25.8.1_Rock-5-itx_bookworm_current_6.12.41_minimal.img.xz This gives a circle (of death?!) and "Loading ..." in RoobiOS but I see there's flashing green light on the ethernet port - which suggests that there's activity so maybe it's just a slow download?

DOH! Typo ... RoobiOS

hi there, I'm a complete Linux noob so please forgive my ignorance. But I do have 25+ years experience in IT so am relatively conversant with basic principles - so please be patient I did try to search for any previous threads but couldn't find any. I'm trying to setup a RADXA Rock 5 ITX with OpenMediaVault for my NAS. I have a 2TB NVMe m.2 SSD that I'll use for the OS. For the NAS storage I'm using 4x Western Digital 16TB SATA III drives. I downloaded the Armbian 25.2.2 bootable image from https://www.armbian.com/radxa-rock-5-itx/ and used Balena Etcher (the legit version from Balena-io) to make my bootable microSD card. When I boot, I receive an error message of "failed to mount /dev/mount/mmcblk0p1 as root file system" I'm guessing this is because there is no emmc on this board other than what's provided for RooibOS flash? Do I just need to reconfigure the Armbian Bookworm setup script to use / look for the NVMe m.2 SSD instead of the emmc? If so, is there a way to do that on a Windows PC? If not, I may just have to go with the standard RooibOS install using Armbian Noble just to get a Linux system up and running, then edit the Armbian setup script, reflash the Rock 5 ITX and start again? Or is there something else I'm missing? Thanks in advance for your help.