BPI M2 Berry + Armbian 13 M2U = unable to reboot/poweroff

[Mykeul]

Armbianmonitor:

https://paste.armbian.com/uwisuyazid

Hello,

 

Thanks for armbian on Banana PI, it is really wonderful compared to official releases.

I installed the image "Armbian_community_26.2.0-trunk.904_Bananapim2ultra_trixie_current_6.18.29_minimal.img.xz" on my Banana PI M2 Berry (there is no image for this type), and all is working wonderfully well ... except rebooting or shutting down the Banana PI.

When typing reboot, all services stop but the screen blocks on

systemd-shutdown[1]: Rebooting.

and it never reboots.

It does the same for shutdown, stuck on same kind of message.

 

Could you help me please ?

 

Regards

[Werner]

In the world of cheap ARM sbcs you cannot simply use image for board X and assume it works for board Y. It may up to a certain point, even boot, but you have to live with regressions.

https://docs.armbian.com/User-Guide_FAQ/#why-no-universal-image

If there is no pre-made image for a specific board, then you can DIY if it is even supported by the framework. keep in mind, boards in eos or csc status may or may not work. We don't know, we don't pay attention, we don't support.

[Mykeul]

Hello

 

Thanks for you answer, I understand the point that if even though M2B & M2U are very close, it does not mean it will work.

I really thought it was a simple thing to change "just" to turn off/on the board, as all the rest is perfect.

 

I had a look to https://docs.armbian.com/Developer-Guide_Build-Preparation/

but honestly I am not skilled enough to to this, I did not understand how building it on my PC will make it work on the BananaPi, and the config 

 

./compile.sh build \
BOARD=uefi-x86 \  #bananapim2b does not seem to exist
BRANCH=current \
BUILD_DESKTOP=no \
BUILD_MINIMAL=yes \
KERNEL_CONFIGURE=no \
RELEASE=trixie

 

does not help on which string using for my board.

 

Regards

 

[Werner]

https://github.com/armbian/build/tree/main/config/boards

BOARD equals filename (without file extension) from above

[SteeMan]

I think that the comment by @werner was mostly intended to set your expectations.  Based on what you have said, you have a board that Armbian doesn't support at all.  Second, you have found a similar board (Bpi M2 Ultra) that exists within Armbian.  But that board is a csc board (Community Support).  Which means it also isnt' supported by Armbian.  But some developer in the community has as some point in the past contributed some work on it.  Likely that developer no longer is around and that board doesn't get any meaningful maintenance.

 

So you are doing the proper thing in using these forums to post your observation and question.  But unless either you or some other volunteer in the community wants to work on this, it is unlikely to ever get much if any attention.

 

That is the reality of a SBC world where the manufacturers don't support the software on their boards and the volunteers at Armbian can only work to support a few boards directly while providing the tools and framework for other community volunteers to add in partial support for some other boards.

 

[Mykeul]

Hello,

 

Thanks for your answer, in fact I chose this M2U image because the hardware between M2B & M2U is almost the same : same CPU & arch, just a difference in RAM size & ports number (see image below)

Maybe it is a "noob" way of thinking anyway, so I will try to adapt and find a solution around watchdog & sysrq, and if it does not work I will go back to raspberry pi.

 

Have a nice day

Regards

[Mykeul]

Hello,

 

After more research it seems that despite the Wikipedia screenshot, M2 Ultra & M2 Berry do not really have the same CPU : M2U uses R40 and M2B uses V40

This is most probably why it does not work.

 

After checking watchdog & sysrq, I almost rebooted with :

echo 1 > /proc/sys/kernel/sysrq
echo b > /proc/sysrq-trigger

but still hung in the end.

 

I was about to throw the Banana PI away, and I finally found this website which provides a (very) raw debian image for the M2 Berry, and it works correcty including reboot.

Sharing the link in case it helps other people with M2B : https://sd-card-images.johang.se/boards/banana_pi_m2_berry.html

 

Thanks for your help

Regards