Can't boot Armbian Ubuntu 24.10 on Amlogic S905M Game Stick – only green LED, no HDMI output

[MilanBauer]

Hello,

I'm trying to get Armbian (Ubuntu 24.10 XFCE Desktop) running on a retro game stick device with the following specs:

CPU: Amlogic S905M

RAM: 8 GB Samsung (2x K4B4G1646B)

Storage: Samsung 128 GB MicroSD (new, flashed via balenaEtcher)

Ports: 1x USB-A, 1x MicroSD slot, 1x MicroUSB power (possibly supports OTG), 1x HDMI male output

Original firmware: EmuELEC (working fine from factory SD card)

What I tried:

Flashed Armbian Ubuntu 24.10 (from debmfc GitHub) to the SD card

Tried box=s905_generic in the config file

Replaced dtb.img with several DTBs, including:

meson-gxbb-p200.dtb

meson-gxbb-p201.dtb

meson-gxbb-xtmqbox.dtb

Performed toothpick method to boot from SD card

Green LED turns on, but:

No HDMI output

CPU stays cold, no signs of booting

USB devices receive no power

No blinking, no UART logs (I don’t have serial access yet)

It feels like the CPU doesn’t even begin to initialize Linux – maybe it doesn't load the u-boot from the SD at all?

Any idea what else I can try?

Is there a minimal verified Armbian image known to boot on S905M-based TV sticks?

Do I need to trigger multiboot somehow?

Could this be a special bootloader variant?

Could I use the original EmuELEC SD and inject Armbian files into it?

Any help or known working image would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

[SteeMan]

51 minutes ago, MilanBauer said:

from debmfc GitHub

That is not an Armbian build, but a third party fork of Armbian.  These forums are for Armbian.  You need to direct your question to the provider of the software you are testing, as we can't answer questions for third party software.

[SteeMan]

Further, I can't find any reference to an Amlogic S905M cpu.  (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amlogic)

In a google search, I see reports of some people saying the actual cpu is an S905L while others report having an S905X2.  You might want to open up the stick to see what the actual CPU is.

[MilanBauer]

Thanks for your reply.

You're right — the image I initially used came from the debmfc GitHub fork. I understand now that it's not officially supported by Armbian. I now tried the image from Armbian itself: Armbian 25.8.0-trunk.90 Bookworm Gnome

However, I wanted to follow up on the CPU identification part, as you mentioned uncertainty about the S905M.

I’ve opened up the stick and inspected the hardware. The SoC is clearly labeled as:

Amlogic S905M Quad-Core

Additionally:

RAM: 2x Samsung K4B4G1646B (total 8GB DDR3)

Storage: no internal NAND/eMMC, boots entirely from MicroSD

Original SD card runs EmuELEC out-of-the-box

I’ve attached pictures of the board below (top and bottom views), including close-ups of the SoC and RAM chips and screenshots of the partitions of the normal EMUELEC Emulator.

I also tested your suggestion about verifying the CPU. It is definitely not an S905L or S905X2. This unit appears to be an Amlogic S905M

I now tried the image from Armbian itself: Armbian 25.8.0-trunk.90 Bookworm Gnome and it still does not give any display output. I opened up the Game Stick and on the CPU iteself it says "@mlogic S905M

[MilanBauer]

At this point anything like thoughts, clues and things you heard about would be helpful because I don't find any solutions online too