Trouble booting off a SD card

[Briandr73]

Hello,

 

Apologies for wrong tag, but I am hoping one or more can help with what has been a frustrating process for a Linux\Orange Pi newbie. Background information: I got Orange Pi 800 due to shortages with Pi 400. I wanted to run home assistant on it. Came to determine to get what I wanted would entail having Debian installed and not Ubuntu. Flashed the micro sd card and the Pi 800 does not boot to it. I was able to remote to it via Putty, but I was not able to set it up correctly. What ended up happening was Debian got installed but not in the way I expected. The Orange Pi desktop still boots but I get system application error. The Orange Pi can see the micro sd. I used Etcher and I thought it was set to be boot able. Basically I want to start fresh and install fresh. The other thing since this botched upgrade of sorts I hear a clicking sound I did not hear previously. Any and all helping for a newbie appreciated. thank you.

Edited February 6, 2023 by Briandr73

[TRS-80]

I don't know about that hardware specifically, but general advice would be just to re-flash the sd card and start over?  Make sure you are testing it, that the card is good (name brand from reputable seller), sufficient power, etc. (essentially all the basic things repeated ad nauseum in documentation; there is a reason for it!).

[dochawk]

it seems that oranges are picky about distributions.

 

On a 4 LTS, I flashed both ubuntu and raspbian on multiple cards, to no avail.  They were all ignored, and it booted android from EMMC.  I used both the raspian tool and direct write with dd. 

 

Also, android was able to see the and manipulate the SD once it booted.

 

then I used balena etcher with armbian, and it booted--but I still can't see the ssd connected to the usbc connector.

 

 

[Briandr73]

Hello @dochawk While there is a SD card slot what I recall was when I attempted to use Putty the screen was not what I expecting to see. I need Debian for NUT Server. Granted I been able to run NUT Server in Ubuntu on a vm, but my goal is not leave my primary workhorse desktop on all times. I just picked up a cheap thin client to host Home Assistant and that has worked out well. With the Pi 400 shortage I might pick up another dirt cheap thin client. Just so weird especially with the sounds I heard on start up. Still holding out hope but the first phase in getting my Home Assistant off the vm has been accomplished.

 

[Briandr73]

I tried again to boot off a micro min SD card and it gets ignored when the Pi 800 boots. It is seen when the Pi 800 desktop loads. I have tried imaging with balena etcher. I just way I could re-install Ubuntu completely using sudo command.

Edited February 13, 2023 by Briandr73

[dochawk]

FWIW, I've found that armbian-install, booting off the SD armbian system, will copy over to the EMMC--but still isn't bootable.

 

Theres's another option to rewrite the boot loader for "SD/EMMC", but I'm really not sure which/how it will target, so I won't touch that until I find someone who knows it better.

 

I'm toying with the idea of somehow writing a different linux over the bootable armbian SD, but I haven't figured quite how.

 

In your case, that might lead to getting the workable pi SD, and then copying a live ubuntu over?