(05-07-2019, 04:34 PM)markb1 Wrote: I don't have my RockPro64, yet. (It's on its way!) I hope to do something similar. You should be able to put just the boot partition on the SD card, and then put your root partition on SATA drive. The best way to accomplish this may be to start with a complete Linux image on the SD card and boot up on it. Then setup the SATA drives as RAID1, create a partition, and copy the root partition files from the SD card over. Then configure your fstab to make the new partition root and update your bootloader configuration.

Note: The above is all speculation, and I haven't tried it!

But what I really want to do with my system is eliminate the SD card dependency entirely. I think this should be possible with u-boot, assuming u-boot has built-in support for SATA. Just flash u-boot the SPI and configure it to boot from SATA!  Probably easier said than done! But it seems like it should be possible.

1. Image an SD card with Armbian and boot up
   
2. SSH in to it, login as root, and follow the prompts to create a user account
   
3. Re-login via the user account (no strictly necessary, but I like a little protection from messing up the system as root)
   
4. Partition the disks
   
   1. sudo fdisk /dev/sda
      
   2. create a partition table
      
   3. create a new partition to fill the disk
      
   4. repeat for /dev/sdb
      
5. sudo nand-sata-install
   
   1. Select the option "Boot from SD - system on SATA..."
      
   2. Choose the partition /dev/sda1
      
   3. Choose the filesystem btrfs
      
   4. Allow it to complete and then reboot the system
      
6. Now that your root directory is on /dev/sda1, time to make it a RAID1
   
   1. sudo btrfs device add /dev/sdb1 / #adds /dev/sdb1 to the filesystem
      
   2. sudo btrfs balance start -dconvert=raid1 -mconvert=raid1 / #converts the two-drive filesystem to RAID1
      
7. VERY IMPORTANT: DO THIS BEFORE REBOOTING!!!
   
   1. As root (or with sudo), create a file "/etc/initramfs-tools/scripts/local-top/btrfs" with the following contents:
      
      Code:

      #!/bin/sh

PREREQ=""
prereqs()
{
    echo "$PREREQ"
}

case $1 in
prereqs)
    prereqs
    exit 0
    ;;
esac

. /scripts/functions
# Begin real processing below this line

if [ ! -x /bin/btrfs ]; then
    log_warning_msg "/bin/btrfs does not exist or is not executable"
fi

/bin/btrfs device scan
   2. Make the file executable: "sudo chmod a+x /etc/initramfs-tools/scripts/local-top/btrfs"
      
   3. Rebuild the initramfs image: "sudo update-initramfs -u"
      
8. Reboot
   

(05-10-2019, 11:19 AM)Thatoo Wrote: I asked for help on #rock64:matrix.org matrix room chat but couldn't get any help there.
If I understand well, you setup the RAID1 correctly, then you partition and format it, and finally you installed armbian script to install it in order to boot on SD and have the system on SATA/
Am I correct?

Quote:And after all that, when you reboot it, it didn't work.
What didn't work?
It didn't boot at all? or does it boot from SD but don't reach system on the RAID1 SATA?
Are both of your drive correctly powered? I could read many people talking about power problem, need of external power supply and stuff, a button to push to power SATA drives... [I can't find back these threads...].

Quote:Right now I found that thread : https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=6932&highlight=raid1

I hope you'll manage to make it work and do a beautiful tutorial for other newbies.
Thank you.