Zero 3W: Install Armbian on eMMC

[ypopovych]

Hello. How can I install armbian to internal MMC storage instead of SD card? Do you have guide somewhere?

[Werner]

The easiest route is to simply flash it to a microsd card and boot from it.

Once booted issue "armbian-install" to move the OS and boot loader to eMMC.

eMMC should be accessible directly if tools like rkdeveltool or whatever that is called is used. Never used that personally, seems tricky to use. Prefer first path.

[dwarfman78]

Hi, you need the radxa dedicated tool to do it :

 

https://opensource.rock-chips.com/wiki_Rkdeveloptool

 

Once it is compiled and installed, you need to start the device in "maskrom mode", to do that, push the maskrom button located under the board near the hdmi output then power the device while holding the button. The led should turn and stays on.

 

To check if the device is ready, run the following command :

 

rkdeveloptool ld

 

it should print something like that :

DevNo=1 Vid=0x2207,Pid=0x350a,LocationID=302    Maskrom

 

it means the device is ready to receive data

 

then you need to upload the bootloader :

sudo rkdeveloptool db rk356x_spl_loader_ddr1056_v1.12.109_no_check_todly.bin

 

and finally you can upload the armbian img :

sudo rkdeveloptool wl 0 Armbian-XXX.img

 

make sure your device is properly cooled before doing those operations because heat can freeze the process.

 

you can find the loader and more info here : https://docs.radxa.com/en/zero/zero3/low-level-dev/rkdeveloptool

 

there's a  windows version of rkdeveloptool too you can find on their website.