[Ubuntu 25.05 Plucky - Armbian-unofficial 25.05.0-trunk] BPi-M7 blank display, gnome version issue

[AaronNGray]

@Igor@amazingfate Can someone look at this issue please ?

 

I am wondering if this is possibly affecting a large number targets or whether its just BananaPi-M7 / rockchip64 ?

 

I have tried on another monitor also and am getting a black screen.

 

On doing an `apt-get upgrade` on ssh terminal I happened to loose by HDMI display.

AFAICT It looks like Ubuntu 'backgraded' gnome v46 (in Nobel release, and also in my older unofficial image) to v44.

 

https://armbian.atlassian.net/jira/software/c/projects/AR/issues/AR-2702?jql=project %3D "AR" ORDER BY created DESC

[Werner]

Does this happen with Bookworm or Noble?

Plucky userspace is unsupported.

[AaronNGray]

@Werner - When the Armbian Official Nobel upgrades it has the same issue.

 

Will look at going back to Debian tomorrow.

 

Edited July 12 by AaronNGray

[AaronNGray]

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/postgresql/+bug/2116789

 

[AaronNGray]

Okay partially solved, its the Linux rockchip64 kernel version.

 

On 6.12.32-current-rockchip64 the display is failing, 6.12.22-current-rockchip64, and 6.12.17-current-rockchip64 the display is working fine. 

 

6.15.1-edge-rockchip64 is also working fine.

 

6.16.0-rc3-edge is not even booting, with BananaPi-M7.

 

@amazingfate Would it be possible to look into this please.

Edited Tuesday at 09:41 PM by AaronNGray

[AaronNGray]

not working on latest 6.12.y kernel 6.12.39-current-rockchip64 either.

 

 

[Werner]

Having non-working hw is kind of expected with current kernel. Support for rk3588 is basic at most in this version and will not receive further enhancements in that matter. Security fixes only. If you need stuff working Try edge or vendor.

On 7/15/2025 at 6:27 PM, AaronNGray said:

6.16.0-rc3-edge

Bleeding edge. May work, may not. https://debug.armbian.de

 

[AaronNGray]

The display was working fine on 6.12, but has now stopped. I have tried the other kernels, the vendor has issues with passwords as well for some strange reason its not recognising the set password.

 

I am going to look into the kernel, and kernel patches if I can work out what I am doing, but Armbian with its three fixed kernel versions is a nightmare and always has been. I have had exactly the same issue with BananaPi-M3. The fact Armbian will not build old versions is stupid.

 

I can select older kernels using armbian-config and these work. If armbian/build would allow the user to select the same kernel images as armbian-config can this would go some way to solving this issue.

 

  

Edited yesterday at 05:14 PM by AaronNGray

[AaronNGray]

I don't think 6.16 has rockchip64 support. The rockchip64 support seems to be in current 6.12.y. I really needed to get 6.12.22 building again but am getting problems getting it to build.

 

How do I build the kernel of my choice ?

 

I thought I could just create a `userpataches/config-test.conf` but thats does not seem to be working with `./compile.sh test EXPERT="yes"

 

Can someone please give me a working example of how to build a particular kernel please, because what I was using no longer seems to work.

 

 

 

[AaronNGray]

with

userpatches/config-test.conf
```

EXPERT="yes"
DEST_LANG="en_GB.UTF-8"

BOARD="bananapim7"
BRANCH="current"

KERNEL_VERSION_LEVEL="6.12"
KERNELSWITCHOBJ="tag:6.12.22"
KERNELBRANCH="tag:6.12.22"

```

I am getting the following 

```
[🌱] Producing new & caching [ GIT_INFO_KERNEL ]
[🌱] Fetching SHA1 of 'tag' 'refs/heads/6.12.22^{}' [ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git ]
[🌱] SHA1 of tag refs/heads/6.12.22^{} [ '' ]
[🌱] Failed to fetch SHA1 of 'tag' 'refs/heads/6.12.22^{}' [ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git ]
[🌱] Fetching SHA1 of 'tag' 'refs/heads/6.12.22' [ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git ]
[🌱] SHA1 of tag refs/heads/6.12.22 [ '' ]
[🌱] Failed to fetch SHA1 of 'tag' 'refs/heads/6.12.22' [ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git ]
[🌱] Fetching SHA1 of 'tag' '6.12.22^{}' [ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git ]
[🌱] SHA1 of tag 6.12.22^{} [ '' ]
[🌱] Failed to fetch SHA1 of 'tag' '6.12.22^{}' [ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git ]
[🌱] Fetching SHA1 of 'tag' '6.12.22' [ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git ]
[🌱] SHA1 of tag 6.12.22 [ '' ]
[🌱] Failed to fetch SHA1 of 'tag' '6.12.22' [ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git ]
[💥] error! [ Failed to fetch SHA1 of 'https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git' 'tag' '6.12.22' - make sure it's correct  ]
```

[SteeMan]

You would also need to rollback all the patches that armbian applies to the point in time that Armbian built with that particular kernel version.  And likely all the outside repositories that Armbian pulls in that have source code for the various drivers and other code that is also built into the kernel.

[AaronNGray]

How do I go about doing that ? It more looks like its to do with the `.github` repo tag contents itself ?

 

But if its not is there a 101 or HOWTO on this please ?

 

 

[AaronNGray]

Thought I got it, but not worked !
```
cd cache/sources/linux-kernel-worktree/6.12__rockchip64__arm64/

git checkout v6.12.22 --force

```

Edited 22 hours ago by AaronNGray

[AaronNGray]

Its not working on a cleanly installed repo of Armbian/build !
 

userpatches/config-test.conf
```

EXPERT="yes"
DEST_LANG="en_GB.UTF-8"

BOARD="bananapim7"
BRANCH="current"

KERNEL_VERSION_LEVEL="6.12"
KERNELBRANCH="tag:6.12.22"

```

 

https://paste.armbian.com/zoheruvemi

Edited 22 hours ago by AaronNGray

[AaronNGray]

Same problem when I put `KERNELBRANCH="tag:6.12.22"` in userpatches/lib.config

 

[SteeMan]

There are no instructions to do this because it isn't supported and it is really, really, really hard because there are many, many, many dependencies across many different repositories all changing over time.  While you may be able to get something to work in some cases, you have to deal with tracking down build errors and figure out what changed and what to roll that source back to.

[AaronNGray]

Armbian has become a total nightmare. Things keep breaking and theres no way to get a proper build of a past state anymore, so if I loose a copy of the original image I used for a machine then I am stuck again. Stuck with hardware that will not work again. And this hardware costs a lot of money, and its a lot of time too. Why Armbian was not written with this in mind I really don't know ??? The tree kernel lines supported seem to change randomly and are not in alignment with the linux kernel versions or seem to change randomly just at the wrong times.

 

Edited 20 hours ago by AaronNGray

[laibsch]

No, Armbian has not become a total nightmare.  But your posting all over the place, in several threads here and even Ubuntu ustream trackers with a bunch of unsubstantiated and obviously nonsensical claims IS absolutely a nightmare.  PLEASE STOP!

You make bogus claims faster than anybody can look into them.  What made you think this was related to postgres?  What makes you think Ubuntu downgraded their Gnome in Noble?  Slow down, take a deep breath and stop being all over the place.

[AaronNGray]

>PLEASE STOP!

This is both a time and money nightmare for me.
 

I am giving as much information as I can in order to give feedback in order to get support. What I am posting is not all nonsense ! Okay the Gnome downgrade was incorrect and was based on what ifnformation I could get at the time. Why the issue system put up the postgres tag I really don't know I removed it.

It is now repeatedly demostratably kernel dependant. 

 

On 6.12.32-current-rockchip64 and 6.12.39-current-rockchip64 the display is failing, 6.12.22-current-rockchip64, and 6.12.17-current-rockchip64 the display is working fine. 

 

6.15.1-edge-rockchip64 is also working fine. No sure about 6.15.7

 

6.16.0-rc3-edge and 6.16.1-edge are not even booting, with BananaPi-M7.

 

I am going to get kernel output using USB UART for all these boots.

Edited 2 hours ago by AaronNGray

[MaxT]

18 часов назад, AaronNGray сказал:

this hardware costs a lot of money, and its a lot of time too

 

yeah, frustration is quite clear, but probably it is manufacturer who should be most/only interested in that.

 

1 час назад, AaronNGray сказал:

giving as much information as I can in order to ... get support

 

that also cost quite a lot, so it is probably better to demand where money were paid to, i guess.