OrangePi Zero2 - Allwinner H616

[Ronald Van Der Veen]

Hi all, thanks for the effort taken to try and make armbian to the orangepi sero 2 H616. I've got one of these devices myself and wanted to give the available precompiled images a go. And yes I know there's no support. and also know most things will not work (yet).

 

Just wanted to let you know that i've got the same experiance with the images as other newbies. The recommended buster image of januari 25 isn't booting from SD. probably becuase this image is using bootbranch v1

When I do compile my own version, It boots perfectly but I do run in to the same problem with the ethernet controler. I'm under the impression that eth0 should work. But maybe my bad.

The eth0 becomes ready wit an IPv6 apipa address. DHCP recuests do fail on the device. setting up a fixed ip won't help either. I'm able to ping the adapters assigned IP, but i'm unable to reach the gateway.

 

 

[yar83]

On 1/29/2021 at 9:19 PM, jernej said:

@yar83 you really didn't read this thread, right?

Yes, I really didn't read this thread. I tried, but... I was so frustrating of my two days struggle so just closed eyes and breathlessly waited for a miracle. But realty hurts me one more time. Now i'm reading thoroughly the thread and other materials. Thanks for all.

[jernej]

Good thing is that things are coming together slowly. There is a hack to make USB work and first part of display stack started to work (not usable yet).

[Igor]

If someone wants to proceed the legacy u-boot / kernel route ... I made a head start, but my board died while trying  and its stuck in not finished state: https://github.com/armbian/build/pull/2620 Remaining problem is (probably) how to add DTB to the initramfs. If you salvage that from the stock build, Armbian boots up.

[Werner]

I can send you mine but shipping is probably more expensive than simply ordering a new one

[Igor]

22 minutes ago, Werner said:

I can send you mine but shipping is probably more expensive than simply ordering a new one

 

Thank you for your offer. Will get a replacement from Xunlong when possible.

I still have one in the CI lab, but it's deep in the rack  I rather hope someone else has a strong enough interest to proceed on this.

 

BTW. Considering the number of boards that I had played with in a past decade, there were just a few that died off completely in my hand: Opi Zero2, Olimex Lime2, Odroid XU4 and C4. Didn't inspect the reasons so I can't tell if it was my fault. There were a few others with a partial hw failure such as broken SD card slot, connector fell off, ...

[XFer012]

I have a working OrangePI Zero2 with stock Xunlong image; but I'm a total newbie vs. Armbian, DTB, Initramfs etc.

If I can help someway, just let me know (unfortunately I need step-by-step instructions or a pointer to a tutorial).

[Werner]

7 minutes ago, XFer012 said:

newbie

Then unfortunately there is not much you can help with. Armbian on mainline is far from usable on mainline. Just dig through this entire topic.

[XFer012]

undestood

[jernej]

If someone has too much time, here is extremely basic and hackish H616 display driver (HDMI up to 1080p only): https://github.com/jernejsk/linux-1/tree/h616-hdmi (take branch as-is, USB works too)

[hexdump]

@jernej - from irc i remember that some special u-boot hack was required for you to enable hdmi - is this still required or did you find another way to get it working? will have a look at your code over the weekend.

[jernej]

It's not a hack but missing clock initialization. I submitted fix to U-Boot: https://patchwork.ozlabs.org/project/uboot/patch/20210201172557.3776708-1-jernej.skrabec@siol.net/

 

Currently non-working features are scaling on video plane, YUV formats and resolutions > 1080p.

[hexdump]

@jernej - well done! - it works well on my h313 x96q box

[jernej]

oh, there is plenty of bugs left to fix... but for normal use should be enough.

[XFer012]

Pardon my newbieness,

is there a tutorial I can follow, to build a working Armbian bootable image based upon jernej's kernel?

 

Thanks

 

[Igor]

7 hours ago, XFer012 said:

Pardon my newbieness,

is there a tutorial I can follow, to build a working Armbian bootable image based upon jernej's kernel?

 

Thanks

 

You can't cheat this in any way 

[XFer012]

thanks!

[yam1]

On 1/18/2021 at 12:41 PM, yam1 said:

Just another data point, the following code initializes an ili9341 display on DRM, but there is something else wrong with SPI or driver (but tested driver and it works under H6). One could see the display initializes under X, but the mouse pointer is kind of messed up (1st pic), also X terminal is garbled (2nd pic) . X would then eventually shut down because of lack of input device or something else.

 

Note: Same behavior with fbdev driver.

As an update to my earlier post, I changed the SPI frequency to 16mhz and the display came up showing the desktop (I was using 48mhz - it worked on other H6 boards.) However, the display shut off a little bit after that.

[Henry Delphing]

What is the current status of the daily snapshot images for I2C and USB?   

Are they now working?

[Werner]

6 hours ago, Henry Delphing said:

What is the current status of the daily snapshot images for I2C and USB?   

Are they now working?

No idea. Feel free to test.

[maigonis]

8 hours ago, Henry Delphing said:

What is the current status of the daily snapshot images for I2C and USB?   

Are they now working?

I don't see any new commits lately on sources, so most likely no.

[btrfs]

. Begin: Running /scripts/local-top ... done.
Begin: Running /scripts/local-premount ... Scanning for Btrfs filesystems
[    3.934244] sun50i-h616-pinctrl 300b000.pinctrl: supply vcc-pf not found, using dummy regulator
[    3.944448] sunxi-mmc 4020000.mmc: Got CD GPIO
done.
[    3.972822] sunxi-mmc 4020000.mmc: initialized, max. request size: 16384 KB, uses new timings mode
[    4.018158] mmc0: host does not support reading read-only switch, assuming write-enable
[    4.028069] mmc0: new high speed SDHC card at address 0001
[    4.034421] mmcblk0: mmc0:0001 SD 29.2 GiB 
[    4.040510]  mmcblk0: p1 p2
[    4.052644] random: fast init done
[    4.080309] sunxi-mmc 4020000.mmc: data error, sending stop command
[    4.086606] sunxi-mmc 4020000.mmc: send stop command failed
[   33.760590] usb1-vbus: disabling
[   33.763836] vcc3v3-ext: disabling
[   33.767485] vcc3v3-ext2: disabling
[   33.771202] cldo1: disabling

 

can't run any image getting same error. image from orangepi on 4.9 linux work but i need driver for mt6701u which is not present there, and AP mode not work. please help to run image. i'm new to builds with git. tried different sd cards. spent week building images with different config and patches from this thread all same error.

 

 

[Werner]

41 minutes ago, btrfs said:

 

 

please help to run image. i'm new to builds with git

 

 

You find your answer in the very first post of this topic

[lampra]

2 hours ago, Werner said:

You find your answer in the very first post of this topic

Off-topic: Do we need to open a new thread (in general chit-chat maybe?) if we seek experiences from other forum members and not from the person who started the current thread?

[Henry Delphing]

I have tested with the daily version of 3/30/2021.    I found that I2C worked.   USB not worked. 

Two image are added.  These images are what I have captured.

(*) Also, I have noticed that Wifi is not ready either.

 

 

[XFer012]

Could you describe the steps you followed to build your experimental image?

I've found generic steps to build Armbian, but it looks like you used a different kernel and custom configuration? What about DTB?

I would like to play a little with my Orange Pi Zero2, even if most of the stuff does not work yet.

[jernej]

9 hours ago, Henry Delphing said:

USB not worked.

It's possible to make it work if you enable all USB nodes in DT. It seems like some HW quirk.

[XFer012]

I decided to have a bit of fun with the Unstable (Hirsute) from April, 3rd.

Kernel is

Linux orangepizero2 5.11.11-sunxi64 #trunk.69 SMP Thu Apr 1 21:56:55

 

My board has 512 MB of RAM.

I'm running headless.

 

OK:

Well, it boots! That's nice!!! 

Ethernet works, with DHCP

Debug UART (the 3-pins one) works, at 115200

MicroSD works. Looks quite fast too (hdparm clocks at 44.5 MB/s)

Load average is 0 when doing nothing!! With original custom image from OrangePi, it shows about 1.00

 

Not OK yet:

USB port does not work (tried with pendrive): inserted device not detected at all (like if USB port is not present)

Reboot does not reboot: powers off the board

Armbian-config: trying to set CPU speed and governor exits with this error:

/usr/lib/armbian-config/jobs.sh: line 1115:
Error: Expected at least 5 tokens for --menu, have 4.
Use --help to list options. / 1000: syntax error in expression (error token is ": Expected at least 5 tokens for --menu, have 4.
Use --help to list options. / 1000")

Unable to detect (or change) CPU frequency/governor:

cpufrequtils 008: cpufreq-info (C) Dominik Brodowski 2004-2009
Report errors and bugs to cpufreq@vger.kernel.org, please.
analyzing CPU 0:
  no or unknown cpufreq driver is active on this CPU
  maximum transition latency: 4294.55 ms.
analyzing CPU 1:
  no or unknown cpufreq driver is active on this CPU
  maximum transition latency: 4294.55 ms.
analyzing CPU 2:
  no or unknown cpufreq driver is active on this CPU
  maximum transition latency: 4294.55 ms.
analyzing CPU 3:
  no or unknown cpufreq driver is active on this CPU
  maximum transition latency: 4294.55 ms.

 

Some dmesg entries indicate the kernel is still alpha-stage, as expected:

sun50i-h616-pinctrl 300b000.pinctrl: supply vcc-pf not found, using dummy regulator
sun50i-h616-pinctrl 300b000.pinctrl: supply vcc-pi not found, using dummy regulator
dwmac-sun8i 5020000.ethernet: supply phy-io not found, using dummy regulator
dwmac-sun8i 5020000.ethernet: Current syscon value is not the default 51fe6 (expect 0)
usb1-vbus: disabling
vcc3v3-ext: disabling
vcc3v3-ext2: disabling
cldo1: disabling

 

 

Summary:

To me, the current Unstable image (April, 3rd) looks quite nice already. Lots of stuff work!

Great work Armbian! Thanks!!

 

Any tests I may perform, to be of any help?

 

[Henry Delphing]

On 4/3/2021 at 6:28 AM, jernej said:

It's possible to make it work if you enable all USB nodes in DT. It seems like some HW quirk.

How to do that?   If I can enable USB to activate my webcam, it is already almost 100% usable to me.

 

[lampra]

I tried today the recommended and test(03042021) images.
The kernel booted, but I could not pass the password change using UART at 115200 (cu, bootterm, minicom) nor I could connect from ssh using Ethernet cable. I will try with a new sd card next week.