I'm trying to use Armbian to flash my Lincstation E1 (great hardware, horrible software). I am trying to add a custom DTS file for the board (it's available in a few linux-related repos), but I can't get it to show up in the u-boot folder of the output image.

I used kernel-patch and u-boot-patch to generate the patches, copied them from the output/patch folder to userpatches. I've attached the patch files, just in case that helps someone. I'm really confused why the patches aren't getting picked up and new .dtb file isn't in the final image.

config-lincstation.conf add-lincstation-dtb.patch u-boot-rockchip64-current.patch

During the build, compile.sh should generate a build log. Would be helpful to post that.

On 11/1/2026 at 6:14 PM, tparys said:

During the build, compile.sh should generate a build log. Would be helpful to post that.

I'm not sure which one is going to be the most useful, so here's everything in the outut/log folder

summary-docker-5be2103c-d2b7-414e-ba03-19e87beec54b.md log-docker-5be2103c-d2b7-414e-ba03-19e87beec54b.log.ans summary-build-5be2103c-d2b7-414e-ba03-19e87beec54b.md log-build-5be2103c-d2b7-414e-ba03-19e87beec54b.log log-build-5be2103c-d2b7-414e-ba03-19e87beec54b.log.ans

From your logs:

~ $ grep PATCHDIR log-build-5be2103c-d2b7-414e-ba03-19e87beec54b.log
--> (2) CHANGE-TRACKING: change-tracking: after sourcing family config [ BOOTPATCHDIR='u-boot-rockchip64' ]
--> (3) INFO: KERNELPATCHDIR is unset; using 'archive/rockchip64-6.18' [ common_defaults_for_mainline ]
--> (3) CHANGE-TRACKING: change-tracking: after late_family_config hooks [ KERNELPATCHDIR='archive/rockchip64-6.18' ]

As your build has a RK3568, I think you should be using rockchip64, not rockchip. Not that it should matter, but you should be able to put your kernel patches in archive/rockchip64-6.18

And more than likely, it's using a rockchip specific u-boot, which needs its own patch directory.

Ok, that helped some. It's at least picking up the patches now, but it's throwing an error trying to apply them. The patch file was generated immediately before the run using the compile.sh kernel-patch command, and copied to userpatches/kernel/archive/rockchip64-6.18 from the output/patch directory.

I'm not entirely sure what the error is, or why a generated patch file would have the problem, but here's the error:

To be honest, I'm not sure offhand why your autogenerated patch isn't working.

But looking at that file, the tail end seems autogenerated from armbian/build/patch/kernel/archive/rockchip64-6.18/dt

At a glance, if you toss your .dts in that folder, looks like it'll pick it up.

dtb-$(CONFIG_ARCH_ROCKCHIP) += rk3588s-lubancat-4.dtb

dtb-$(CONFIG_ARCH_ROCKCHIP) += rk3328-nanopi-neo3-rev02.dtb

dtb-$(CONFIG_ARCH_ROCKCHIP) += rk3568-lincstation-e1.dtb

dtb-$(CONFIG_ARCH_ROCKCHIP) += rk3399-xc3399fr.dtb

dtb-$(CONFIG_ARCH_ROCKCHIP) += rk3576-dshanpi-a1-cm5-waveshare-cm5-to-pi5-adapter.dtb

Were I to wager, that's probably a newer feature, and you're looking at older documentation that hasn't been updated yet. Happy to be told otherwise if someone knows better.

If that's the case, file a bug.

Edited Sunday at 01:04 AM5 days by tparys

The patch is the added line to the makefile (which seems to be where it's failing) and also writing the new dts file.

Yes. And the patch is conflicting with a tool that is also touching that Makefile.

And it looks like you don't need the kernel patch at all if you put your .dts in the rockchip64-6.18/dt folder.

if you toss your .dts in that folder, looks like it'll pick it up.

You were correct - putting the dts file in that magic folder seems to have fixed it. I'm not sure where that would be documented, I wasn't able to find much about adding DTS files and what not. I'm also super new at this level of Linux, though I've been using it for 15 years as a developer.