Installation Instructions for TV Boxes with Amlogic CPUs

[Maurizio Finesso]

Hi @John Taylor, @SteeMan,

unfortunatly it takes me time because I was not at home. I found that I can use the minimal or server version and only using Rufus. If I use Balena Etcher it doesn't create the fat32 partition named Boot. now I'm struggling because I would like to use the system on SD card but after that I do any changing for example IP from dynamic to static using armbian-config a lot of messages comes saying that EXT4FS is in read-only mode and I can use the system but not to install programs. I'm a little afraid to install on eemc because I have no android image. It is an old MXQ pro mini from leelbox.

[2mg]

@Maurizio Finesso@John Taylor@SteeMan

 

I've had success using USB stick instead of SD Card (see my post on 1st page), however now the BOOT Fat32 partition was hidden for some reason, I used DiskGenius to unhide it.

I didn't test this on the tv box yet.

 

 

This also goes against what is being said in this thread (that there are no more Fat32 paritions visible in Windows) from this thread:

EDIT2: USB stick works, however I'm having trouble with "USB device not recognized" on Windows, and I can' seem to be able to fix it with gparted for example, as it keeps disconnecting, so YMMW.

Edited December 3, 2025 by 2mg

[John Taylor]

10 hours ago, 2mg said:

I've had success using USB stick instead of SD Card (see my post on 1st page), however now the BOOT Fat32 partition was hidden for some reason, I used DiskGenius to unhide it.

I didn't test this on the tv box yet.

Disk genius in my case reveals there is NO FAT32 boot partition, hidden or otherwise, only a root partition.

[John Taylor]

Furthermore, today I built an Ubuntu desktop PC, and flashed a build onto an SD Card. The resultant installation has only ONE partition. No Windows involvement whatsoever  Same with a USB flash drive (to eliminate the SD card adapter). 

So where do we go from here?

Edited December 5, 2025 by John Taylor

[John Taylor]

Thanks to Nick Alilovic for the solution to this issue. You need to add "BOOTFS_TYPE=fat to the board config. If you are on Windows and using an image created by someone else, it's possible you may need to install a utility to show .ext partitions. The you can edit /boot/armbianEnv.txt or extlinux to config to point to a different dtb etc. 

[SteeMan]

7 hours ago, John Taylor said:

You need to add "BOOTFS_TYPE=fat to the board config

BOOTFS_TYPE=fat is part of the aml-s9xx-box.tvb config file and has always been.  So I'm not sure what your comment is referring to, but it seems to be off topic for this thread which is about instructions for using the aml-s9xx-box Armbian builds.

[Maurizio Finesso]

Hi guys and Happy Christmas. I found something that could be useful. I had trouble due to fake sd card that report fake capacity. Capacity declared 64 Gb real capacity 3.7 GB. H2testw (windows) will show you the real capacity. Don't trust if it is a known brand because there are companies with machine to fake SD card. After another problem that I found is not to see the boot partition after imaging SD card. I don't know why but you must be sure that your imaging program (balena etcher o pi imager or rufus) are run in admin mode. after that in any case if it doesn't appear you have to assign a letter drive (sometimes it is not assigned) I used aomei partition manager)