Boot from SSD using Hardkernel's Odroid HC4

[Bagel]

My current HC4-setup consists of 1 SSD and 1 HDD. The SSD contains the most recent Armbian-image (Buster-based) (https://redirect.armbian.com/odroidhc4/Buster_current).

Long story short: it won't boot from SSD, and Google tells me it is because Armbian is not compatible with Petiboot. Armbian suggests the following solution:

 

"Important: To be able to boot clean Armbian mainline based u-boot / kernel experiences, you need to remove incompatible Petitboot loader that is shipped with the board. From the Petitboot, go for “Exit to shell” and these commands to remove the Petitboot:"

# flash_eraseall /dev/mtd0
# flash_eraseall /dev/mtd1
# flash_eraseall /dev/mtd2
# flash_eraseall /dev/mtd3

"This will make your SPI flash memory empty and would start from SD on next boot."

 

However, it doesn't mention whether this works for booting from an SSD. Does it? And if not, is there a possibility of booting Armbian from an SSD without using an SD-card?

 

Thanks in advance!

 

P.S. I found the following (unresolved) related question: https://www.reddit.com/r/ODroid/comments/moxxhl/uboot_from_sata_on_hc4/

[Werner]

For most boards at least the boot loader needs to be stored either on EMMC, SPI or (in most cases) microSD card. The system itself can be on an SSD or NVMe.

[Bagel]

Thanks for your response. Thus I could flash a separate boot loader to an SD-card? Which boot loader do I need?

[Werner]

I'm not familiar with this board(family) but did you try to simply use nand-sata-install script and choose OS on SSD and bootloader on microSD?

[lanefu]

Yeah either would need to modify ubooy config on sdcard or flash uboot to spi. (Which we dont have access to yet)

 

Hc4 support is early days.  If you're not an expert with uboot id suggest just booting from sdcard for now

[Green Daddy]

Boot from SSD without SD card is currently not supported on HC4. However, it is easy to have only the boot loader on SD card (as @Werner stated above):

- flash armbian image to SD Card

- erase petitboot as stated above

- boot armbian from SD Card

- run nand-sata-install within armbian

after this

- only the boot loader rests on SD card (i.e. you need the SD card plugged in for it to be able to boot) - but no I/O on SD card after boot loader

- OS root partition (and entire system) runs from SSD

- any update updates boot loader and kernel where they actually reside - so no special precautions needed (despite the usual "update may break something")

 

I am running on this setup and it works like a charm for me.

 

Hope that helps

 

Green Daddy

[Bagel]

Good to see so many responses (indicates an active community :))

@Green Daddythanks for your step-by-step-guide! My HC4 is happy with the provided solution.

[ChrisO]

Hi

 

Which image do you both use? I've just booted Armbian_21.05.4_Odroidhc4_buster_current_5.10.43.img and and Linux believe there is no link on eth0, it's what ethtool reports and I cannot access the network.

BTW, I didn't erase Petitboot, just forced booting from SD-card by pressing "reset" button during power-on.

When booted into Petitboot ethernet works but I didn't manage to istall an OS. I see (snooping on the net) my HC4 downloading the netboot-odroidhc4.cfg file but nothing happens.

Quite dissapointed with my new toy :-(

 

Regards,

Chris

 

 

[Igor]

2 hours ago, ChrisO said:

Quite dissapointed with my new toy :-(

Those are development boards   But I think we are close to getting stable support based on clean open source. We want to get rid of vendors proprietary solutions as soon as possible. Troubles as you have are the price that needs to be paid. Boot from SPI is also under development - not sure if it will be done before this major release.

We are just about (this month) to push out major update, where many things for this board was fixed. Try this image:
https://imola.armbian.com/dl/odroidc4/nightly/Armbian_21.08.0-trunk.114_Odroidc4_hirsute_edge_5.13.8.img.xz

 

It works perfectly on my C4:
 

  ___      _           _     _    ____ _  _   
 / _ \  __| |_ __ ___ (_) __| |  / ___| || |  
| | | |/ _` | '__/ _ \| |/ _` | | |   | || |_ 
| |_| | (_| | | | (_) | | (_| | | |___|__   _|
 \___/ \__,_|_|  \___/|_|\__,_|  \____|  |_|  
                                              
Welcome to Armbian 21.08.0-trunk.113 Hirsute with Linux 5.13.8-meson64

No end-user support: untested automated build

System load:   7%           	Up time:       1 min	
Memory usage:  4% of 3.73G  	IP:	       10.0.30.121
CPU temp:      38°C           	Usage of /:    6% of 29G    	

[ 0 security updates available, 7 updates total: apt upgrade ]
Last check: 2021-08-07 20:17

[ General system configuration (beta): armbian-config ]

Logs: http://ix.io/3vhZ

[ChrisO]

As for "Those are development boards" I will comment later ;-)

The imola image doesn't boot on my hc4. Nothing on HDMI attached monitor and on the serial console I get such output:

 

LOOP:35;SPINOR:0;CHK:1F;EMMC:800;NAND:81;SD?:0;SD:0;READ:0;CHK:1F;USB:8;

again and again.

Ooops, I see a small difference, your c4 != my hc4, right?

 

Regards,

Chris

 

[Werner]

3 hours ago, ChrisO said:

c4 != my hc4,

Yeah, that is right. Even though they share the same SoC images are still slightly different I think.

https://docs.armbian.com/User-Guide_FAQ/#why-i-cannot-simply-shove-a-random-image-into-my-board-to-work-like-on-my-pc

[Igor]

5 hours ago, ChrisO said:

Ooops, I see a small difference, your c4 != my hc4, right?

Oh, yes. But they are not that different and it should boot. @rpardini was trying to bring things together and this is the last addition:
https://github.com/armbian/build/commit/13329ebcd0f3f0270c7813e33599fa75d939bb24#diff-b79606fb3afea5bd1609ed40b622142f1c98125abcfe89a76a661b0e8e343910

I don't have HC4, only C4.

There is an image for HC4 as well, but it would be good that someone else test this too. So we can be sure it boots:
https://imola.armbian.com/dl/odroidhc4/nightly/

[ChrisO]

Armbian_21.08.0-trunk.114_Odroidhc4_hirsute_edge_5.13.8.img doesn't boot.

On console theese:

SM1:BL:511f6b:81ca2f;FEAT:A0F83180:20282000;POC:A;RCY:0;SPINOR:0;CHK:1F;EMMC:800;
NAND:81;SD?:0;SD:0;READ:0;CHK:1F;USB:8;LOOP:1;SPINOR:0;CHK:1F;EMMC:800;
NAND:81;SD?:0;SD:0;READ:0;CHK:1F;USB:8;LOOP:2;SPINOR:0;CHK:1F;EMMC:800;
....

[Igor]

2 hours ago, ChrisO said:

Armbian_21.08.0-trunk.114_Odroidhc4_hirsute_edge_5.13.8.img doesn't boot.

On console theese:

SM1:BL:511f6b:81ca2f;FEAT:A0F83180:20282000;POC:A;RCY:0;SPINOR:0;CHK:1F;EMMC:800;
NAND:81;SD?:0;SD:0;READ:0;CHK:1F;USB:8;LOOP:1;SPINOR:0;CHK:1F;EMMC:800;
NAND:81;SD?:0;SD:0;READ:0;CHK:1F;USB:8;LOOP:2;SPINOR:0;CHK:1F;EMMC:800;
....

 

I also tried - it seems we do have an issue. Investigating ...

[Igor]

Found a problem: https://armbian.atlassian.net/browse/AR-885 Images build from sources should already be fixed - repository fixing and images rebuild will take a day or two.

[Igor]

Today's beta was tested manually (on C4) https://imola.armbian.com/dl/odroidhc4/nightly/

[ChrisO]

This afternoon booted Armbian_21.08.0-trunk.116_Odroidhc4_hirsute_edge_5.13.9.img on  my hc4. Everything looks OK :-)

As for the "Those are development boards ", one thing I don't understand: again and again there are new SBC's popping up designed(?) to run Linux but they cannot cope with main-stream or use components not well supported. OrangePi-PC few years ago, desaster. TinkerBoard & TinkerOS.... "Recently" OrangePi-zero & onboard WiFi. Now Odroid-hc4 with broken Petitboot and one man "support".

 

Lucky us, there is Armbian! :-)

Time to login to PayPal again, thank you very much for your efforts!

 

Regards,

Chris

 

 

[ChrisO]

BTW, I cannot find linux-headers-5.13.9-meson64. Need them to build ZFS modules.

Where are they hiding?

 

Edit: I will start a new thread for this. Sorry for hijacking this one..

[Igor]

Update for HC4 - if you build from sources:

 

Spoiler