Armbian for Amlogic S805 and S802/S812

[RyanX]

Hello All,

 

I am currently in possession of a Minix Neo X8  (non-h variant) which appears to be a S802 chip. Some time ago I’ve successfully installed LibreELEC onto it VIA the SD Card (that was about 4 months ago, so I forgot almost everything I did), but currently I am thinking of repurposing it into an Armbian Machine that I could access remotely. My goal is that it would be a machine that would running 24x7 as a headless machine that I could access remotely through SSH or something similar. I am completely new to this, so I would require someone to devote a little bit of time to write down all the instructions in a reply (every single step). I am not sure if the device is multi-booted or not since it is basically the same as when it was bought, so I’d really appreciate if someone wrote down detailed instructions in a reply. Thanks 😁

[RaptorSDS]

vor 4 Stunden schrieb RyanX:

was about 4 months ago

wow very short memory

 

when you can boot from sdcard than a big step was finished

i have 3 diffirent box that run 24x7 in my home

get a new sd-card burn the armbian image on it

with old kernel (3.xx) than copy and rename your dtb from boot/dtb to dtb.img on /boot

with new kernel (5.xx) only rdit uEnv.txt and change there the name of dtb

( you have to test which dtb are work best with your box)

than boot and set up user password and tools ( you can use armbian-config for standart config like language wlan keyboard)

 

 

 

[RaptorSDS]

vor 20 Stunden schrieb armbian-mxq:

Working dtb is meson8b-odroidc1 and meson8b-ec100 others simply don't work

 

thanks for info , i need some days because weekend get very busy , i try to get work on dtb on tuesday

[george_1312]

17 hours ago, RaptorSDS said:

not this one's , mostly all are for Usb and SD-Card.

you can try but than you have to with manually edit some files and uboot and ....

(my box run now 4-5years with  sd-card without problem)

 

be aware this box are get deep brick with wrong uboot on emmc/nand

there is no maskrom mode or any restore function in uboot 

 

 

 

thank you for your reply! apologies for getting back to you late - the forum allowed me one post per day.

 

I have taken a binary backup of my bootloader chip (8-pin SOIC 2mb - I believe thats the one) so if I mess up Ill reprogram it outside the PCB using the programmer.

 

Can you please suggest a release for my M82 box?? I am a bit lost with all the versions I see around. I also remember trying in the past but failed to activate multiboot as the .zip was not accepted in recovery mode.

 

thank you in advance!

[RaptorSDS]

 

vor 15 Minuten schrieb george_1312:

one post per day

Yes that normal for new user (spam protection)

 

vor 15 Minuten schrieb george_1312:

release for my M82 box

You should start with the older ones with 3.10.108 kernel this are most compatible because there are near android kernel

but i do not know how to extract bootloader or uboot from image direct to ROM chip

 

vor 17 Minuten schrieb george_1312:

bootloader chip

thats the first time i read that this box have a seperate bootloader chip , normal all should be on the emmc/nand chip (boot / uboot, recovery, system,ext4)

 

[george_1312]

42 minutes ago, RaptorSDS said:

 

Yes that normal for new user (spam protection)

 

You should start with the older ones with 3.10.108 kernel this are most compatible because there are near android kernel

but i do not know how to extract bootloader or uboot from image direct to ROM chip

 

thats the first time i read that this box have a seperate bootloader chip , normal all should be on the emmc/nand chip (boot / uboot, recovery, system,ext4)

 

thanks again! Ill try to figure this out. I thought the small eeprom IC was the bootloader and the emmc was holding the rest of the information. I am not sure either - I uploaded the file for anyone interested..

eeprom.rar

[RaptorSDS]

22 часа назад, george_1312 сказал:

m IC was the bootloader

your box has spi boot

 

most of the box have emmc / nand boot but also spi is possible

[armbian-mxq]

On 10/22/2021 at 10:34 AM, RaptorSDS said:

 

thanks for info , i need some days because weekend get very busy , i try to get work on dtb on tuesday

looks like problem is not in the hdmi part. i add ifconfig wlan0 txqueuelen 2000000 (it doesn't allocate more memory  to this buffer) and updated some packages manually by apt install apt etc now it doesn't crash like that. in the meanwhile i also changed my usb wifi adapter...may be problem is with wifi drivers.

 

by the way, is it possible to use internal wifi chip. modprobe dhd doesn't exist. modprobe wifi_dummy doesn't bring up any new interface.

[RaptorSDS]

vor 5 Stunden schrieb armbian-mxq:

changed my usb wifi adapter

i though you use the internal Wifi already

i cannot help witch external adapter

 

to internal adapter you have to 3 part

first dtb must set wifi to activate

secound dtb must have the right pins in wifi definition also the right state of pins (High ,Low, low pull down etc)

third the wifi driver have to be inside the image ( there are 3 or 4 diffirent adapter RT8723BS ,AP6220 and 1 or 2 others)

[george_1312]

On 10/22/2021 at 5:20 PM, RaptorSDS said:

your box has spi boot

 

most of the box have emmc / nand boot but also spi is possible

 

thank you Raptor! I think I managed to enable multiboot by running the aml script from the UPDATE program inside android.. it the rebooted but when I try various images including 5.44 it freezes with multiple colors all over the screen.. tried both SD and USB and a few dtb which I renamed to dtb.img and copied to root of the SD/USB... any suggestions?? would really like to resurrect this box, android is too slow and limited.

[armbian-mxq]

2 hours ago, RaptorSDS said:

i though you use the internal Wifi already

i cannot help witch external adapter

 

to internal adapter you have to 3 part

first dtb must set wifi to activate

secound dtb must have the right pins in wifi definition also the right state of pins (High ,Low, low pull down etc)

third the wifi driver have to be inside the image ( there are 3 or 4 diffirent adapter RT8723BS ,AP6220 and 1 or 2 others)

 

Thanks for all the information. i get it, dtb is the most crucial part of it and in my case it seems the correct dtb meson8b-mxq is not working for some reason. 

 

Is there a way to identify the correct wifi chip? may be from mxqbox android?

also, is there a way to force custom hdmi resolution. it gives slightly off modes that is the reason hdmi out works with monitor but not with tv..

 

in case of older version, with kernel 3.x, hdmi worked ok at 720/1080p. it was controlled through hdmi.sh. My TV is 1366x768p.

[RaptorSDS]

vor 21 Stunden schrieb george_1312:

root of the SD/USB

first  not root the dtb.img on /boot/ ( the fat32 500mb partition)

on old right rename your dtb to dtb.img

 

on newer image like armbian 20.01 edit uenv.txt

[RaptorSDS]

vor 20 Stunden schrieb armbian-mxq:

mxqbox android

yes maybe with cpu-z  , sometimes from mac-address

 

vor 20 Stunden schrieb armbian-mxq:

monitor but not with tv

sometimes its also the tv that make overscan or underscan or like samsung they call it "zoom"

only limit controll to hdmi maybe uenv.txt there possible to set to 720p but i cannot say that exactly because most of the time i use headless

[armbian-mxq]

2 hours ago, RaptorSDS said:

yes maybe with cpu-z  , sometimes from mac-address

 

sometimes its also the tv that make overscan or underscan or like samsung they call it "zoom"

only limit controll to hdmi maybe uenv.txt there possible to set to 720p but i cannot say that exactly because most of the time i use headless

doesn't work from uenv.txt or boot.ini. in facet, if tv is not detected it just doesn't boot. today, i explored linux kernel updates in synaptic. saw lots of meson8b dtb downloaded. unfortunately none worked. so i copied old /boot over these...for now it seems debian stretch with kernel 3.x is the only thing that works properly. but i have to say this box is much faster than my old raspberry pi 2 if only software support was there..

 

Neverthless, if it would be possible to run the latest kernel along with hdmi, in a stable manner (after this network tweak txqueue did not see much problems except for a few mmc freeze over a few days), that should be sufficient. Original idea was to keep it next to tv (its a tv stb after all ;-) and display useful information about the server/machine etc..looks like i've to be content with old kernel.

 

thanks for the tip for wifi. mac lookup tool online gives some fnlink as the vendor.

[RaptorSDS]

vor 10 Stunden schrieb armbian-mxq:

thanks for the tip for wifi. mac lookup tool online gives some fnlink as the vendor.

 

on fnlink webpage are only some for sdio and BT4 option

 

http://www.fn-link.com/product_list.html?designTemplateId=1&t=1566202507675&isPreview=true#w_common_text-1563534094486

 

it could be a rt8723BS clone or the SV6158

 

for RT8723BS , blacklist dhd than modprob 8723bs (in  modules, because you have to restart) on old kernel should be do the trick

[george_1312]

19 hours ago, RaptorSDS said:

first  not root the dtb.img on /boot/ ( the fat32 500mb partition)

on old right rename your dtb to dtb.img

 

on newer image like armbian 20.01 edit uenv.txt

 

it worked!!! thank you :DDD

I cant find Armbian_21.11.0-trunk_Aml-s812_focal_current_5.14.0.img with some GUI desktop though!

 

[RaptorSDS]

vor 3 Stunden schrieb george_1312:

I cant find Armbian

https://users.armbian.com/balbes150/s8xx/

thats the last ones

[george_1312]

5 hours ago, RaptorSDS said:

https://users.armbian.com/balbes150/s8xx/

thats the last ones

 

the only image what works for me (boots but no ethernet or wifi) is  Armbian_21.11.0-trunk_Aml-s812_focal_current_5.14.0.img with meson8_tronsmart_s82.dtb ... this image in not in https://users.armbian.com/balbes150/s8xx/ but I cant remember where I found it. The problem is that its only CLI and not GUI and also eth0, wlan dont work.

[RaptorSDS]

vor 18 Stunden schrieb george_1312:

I cant remember where

before armbian space -> balbes150 has used yandisk and mega disk share

you can also get GUI back, by manual install and config X11 and xfce or other GUI, but thats more difficult

also maybe use a usb wifi stick temporally

 

but when 21.11.0 work than also 21.02 with xfce should work 

[armbian-mxq]

On 10/25/2021 at 10:13 AM, RaptorSDS said:

 

on fnlink webpage are only some for sdio and BT4 option

 

http://www.fn-link.com/product_list.html?designTemplateId=1&t=1566202507675&isPreview=true#w_common_text-1563534094486

 

it could be a rt8723BS clone or the SV6158

 

for RT8723BS , blacklist dhd than modprob 8723bs (in  modules, because you have to restart) on old kernel should be do the trick

Thanks it works!!!!! 

 

i've another question, is it possible to set resolution other than 1080p & 720p on the old kernel 3.x? my tv is 1366x768p. With 720p text is blurred.

 

I run an Xserver/Xfce along with x11vnc (for remote control) and an openvpn client connected to openvpn server running on amazon ec2 cloud. My internet is behind NAT.

[RaptorSDS]

vor 17 Minuten schrieb armbian-mxq:

I run an Xserver/Xfce along with x11vnc

when x11 run

than maybe this

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/274506/how-to-set-persistent-resolution-in-xfce-on-debian

 

my box all run as headless server

[armbian-mxq]

On 11/1/2021 at 1:36 AM, RaptorSDS said:

when x11 run

than maybe this

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/274506/how-to-set-persistent-resolution-in-xfce-on-debian

 

my box all run as headless server

I've tried something similar, but it doesn't seem to make any changes to the TV resolution.

Quote

admin@aml:~$ gtf 1366 768 60

  # 1368x768 @ 60.00 Hz (GTF) hsync: 47.70 kHz; pclk: 85.86 MHz
  Modeline "1368x768_60.00"  85.86  1368 1440 1584 1800  768 769 772 795  -HSync +Vsync

admin@aml:~$ xrandr --newmode "1368x768_60.00"  85.86  1368 1440 1584 1800  768 769 772 795  -HSync +Vsync
xrandr: Failed to get size of gamma for output default

admin@aml:~$ xrandr --listmonitors 
xrandr: Failed to get size of gamma for output default
Monitors: 1
 0: +default 1280/339x720/190+0+0  default
admin@aml:~$ xrandr --addmode default "1368x768_60.00"
xrandr: Failed to get size of gamma for output default
admin@aml:~$ 

 

 

And i am not sure how Xorg works, but

Quote

 

root@aml#X -configure :1

X.Org X Server 1.19.2
Release Date: 2017-03-02
X Protocol Version 11, Revision 0
Build Operating System: Linux 5.10.0-5-armmp-lpae armv7l Debian
Current Operating System: Linux aml 3.10.108 #15 SMP PREEMPT Fri Dec 7 15:32:49 MSK 2018 armv7l
Kernel command line: root=LABEL=ROOTFS rootflags=data=writeback rw console=ttyS0,115200n8 console=tty0 no_console_suspend consoleblank=0 fsck.repair=yes net.ifnames=0 cvbsdrv=0 vdaccfg=0xa000 logo=osd1,loaded,0x7900000,${hdmimode},full cvbsmode=576cvbs
Build Date: 15 April 2021  10:42:51AM
xorg-server 2:1.19.2-1+deb9u8 (https://www.debian.org/support)
Current version of pixman: 0.34.0
        Before reporting problems, check http://wiki.x.org
        to make sure that you have the latest version.
Markers: (--) probed, (**) from config file, (==) default setting,
        (++) from command line, (!!) notice, (II) informational,
        (WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown.
(==) Log file: "/var/log/Xorg.1.log", Time: Wed Nov  3 19:09:44 2021
List of video drivers:
        modesetting
        fbdev
No devices to configure.  Configuration failed.
(EE) Server terminated with error (2). Closing log file.

 

root@aml:~# cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/*.conf
Section "Monitor"
        Identifier              "Monitor0"
        Option                  "DPMS" "false"
EndSection
Section "ServerFlags"
        Option                  "BlankTime" "0"
        Option                  "StandbyTime" "0"
        Option                  "SuspendTime" "0"
        Option                  "OffTime" "0"
EndSection

 

[armbian-mxq]

For kernel 3.x based images, how to get kernel headers? i tried it from armbian-config but looks like there is no effect.. i am trying to follow this series here, just for killing my time -->

 

[RaptorSDS]

vor 47 Minuten schrieb armbian-mxq:

kernel headers

this box are not official supported by armbian thats why balbes150 use a fork of torvald linux from xdarklight on github (xdarklight has made many modification on linux for amlogic and rockchip base chipsets )

you have to use github https://github.com/xdarklight/linux  (change on upper left "master" to " meson-mx...5.11  or newer " or maybe the header already in image from balbes150

 

[armbian-mxq]

7 minutes ago, RaptorSDS said:

this box are not official supported by armbian thats why balbes150 use a fork of torvald linux from xdarklight on github (xdarklight has made many modification on linux for amlogic and rockchip base chipsets )

you have to use github https://github.com/xdarklight/linux  (change on upper left "master" to " meson-mx...5.11  or newer " or maybe the header already in image from balbes150

 

ok, thanks for being so helpful. today i tried https://disk.yandex.com/d/8vNYuuxynz1L0w/20210505-s8xx?w=1 librelec for my box..with the ec100 dtb it recognises my tv (tv says 1358x768 instead of 1366x768) but the point is that it boots. Also, from this page https://linux-meson.com/doku.php?id=hardware it seems the TRONFY MXQ S805 mentioned there is different from the mxq i have looks similar to this one https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32388429592.html (but the remote is slightly different).

 

Is it possible to use the dtb from libreelec to debian based image? 

[RaptorSDS]

vor 2 Stunden schrieb armbian-mxq:

today i tried https://disk.yandex.com/d/8vNYuuxynz1L0w/20210505-s8xx?w=1 librelec for my box.

its looks like that this also some of balbes150 image or from his group ( he share many many informatiom from librelec )

vor 2 Stunden schrieb armbian-mxq:

Is it possible to use the dtb from libreelec to debian based image?

maybe

first

use only dtb for same Kernel

librelec 3.10. Kernel dtb to armbian 3.10.  Kernel

and same at kernel 5.xx with 5.xx

 

secound

libreelec use no x11 , its use direct the driver for graphics maybe you have edit x11

 

third

hope the best and try maybe review the db with decompile it

 

[armbian-mxq]

10 hours ago, RaptorSDS said:

its looks like that this also some of balbes150 image or from his group ( he share many many informatiom from librelec )

maybe

first

use only dtb for same Kernel

librelec 3.10. Kernel dtb to armbian 3.10.  Kernel

and same at kernel 5.xx with 5.xx

 

secound

libreelec use no x11 , its use direct the driver for graphics maybe you have edit x11

 

third

hope the best and try maybe review the db with decompile it

 

1. Doesn't seem to work if I paste dtb from libreelec /boot to the bulleseye Debian image.

2.not an expert here. Not sure why x11 gives no devices found error with -configure

3.not even a slightest idea on how to decompile/compile dtb

 

 

In the meanwhile I don't know what happened to my other sdcard with kernel3 based Debian stretch. Now even this is showing no video. Earlier I thought maybe HDMI port has gone bad, but I could see mxq logo and the android mbox is ok. Then I SSH' d into this thing, ran /boot/hdmi.sh with mode=1080p  and 720p at two places and it worked. Not sure why is that..

 

[RaptorSDS]

vor 54 Minuten schrieb armbian-mxq:

Doesn't seem to work if I paste dtb from libreelec /boot to the bulleseye Debian image.

maybe still some more diffirence between them

 

 

vor 56 Minuten schrieb armbian-mxq:

not an expert here. Not sure why x11 gives no devices found error with -configure

 

i can only speak from other rockchip box topic there are 2 diffrent driver for Graphic one MESA(MALI)  and GLAMOR ( newer Kernel also LIMA)

on Amlogic there is GLX driver and MALI Driver

 

 

from rockchip

Zitat

Full GPU acceleration on legacy kernel, mainline kernel has lima driver compiled in but X11 is very slow - you are still free to compile and install mali kernel driver on mainline yourself.

 

Can't remember if the upstream image has lima enabled in X11 or not.

Anyway check /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/40-serverflags.conf and in case Option "AccelMethod" is set to "none" change it to "glamor".

maybe you have also change setting in x11

 

 

 

vor einer Stunde schrieb armbian-mxq:

not even a slightest idea on how to decompile/compile dtb

copy your dtb to a seperate folder use dtc -o dts -i dtb -I /folder/file.dtb

please google is very easy

but than you have dts without any comment / shorted struckture

 

when we get source you can see inside dts  comments and better struckture

[armbian-mxq]

On 11/8/2021 at 11:57 AM, RaptorSDS said:

maybe still some more diffirence between them

 

 

 

i can only speak from other rockchip box topic there are 2 diffrent driver for Graphic one MESA(MALI)  and GLAMOR ( newer Kernel also LIMA)

on Amlogic there is GLX driver and MALI Driver

 

 

from rockchip

maybe you have also change setting in x11

 

 

 

copy your dtb to a seperate folder use dtc -o dts -i dtb -I /folder/file.dtb

please google is very easy

but than you have dts without any comment / shorted struckture

 

when we get source you can see inside dts  comments and better struckture

Ok, now i have dts on my PC which i can open in text editor. If i compare meson8b-ec100  with meson8b-mxq i can see some additional phandle statements inside the hdmi block..

 

If i were to use meson8b-mxq.dtb from kernel 3 to kernel 5, what would be the steps?

 

anyway, thanks for replying.

meson8b_mxq.dts

[RaptorSDS]

vor einer Stunde schrieb armbian-mxq:

If i were to use meson8b-mxq.dtb from kernel 3 to kernel 5, what would be the steps?

take the menson8b-mxq from Kernel 5 and compare with the one from Kernel3 and ec100 and look for timing/config and pins used

maybe you find the diffirence why no picture , dtb not work   --> all other problem should be from driver or linux itself ( Resolution or device not found)

 

Phandle is more like a device description/number that not 2 device share same resource at same time