Problem Installing Linux on Rock64
#1
Hi,

I just purchased a Rock64 with 4GB RAM and 32GB emmc.

Have been trying to install and boot from a linux ubuntu .img  on a micro sd card.

I flash the .img image to the card using either Pine64 Installer or Etcher (Ive tried both). No problems or errors with these.

I then insert the card into the slot on the rock64. Then connect cables, including hdmi monitor, ethernet cable, then power supply (the official one from Pine). The lights appear, and after a few seconds I get what look like bios messages on the screen, about the usb, and a number of mmcblk error messages, i/o buffer error mmcblkp1, mmcblkp2, mmcblkp5, mmcblkp7, I assume these are the partitions on the micro sd device.

but it goes no further. No linux.


do I have to do anything else?

Ive tried several different images, see list below. all with similar results.

~/Downloads/rock64/extractedimages$ ls -l
total 16200292
-rw-rw-r-- 1  2282749952 Jan 17 17:36 stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img
-rw-rw-r-- 1  6797899264 Jan  4 21:31 xenial-mate-rock64-0.5.15-136-20180102-arm64-sd2emmc.img
-rw-rw-r-- 1  2282749952 Jan 17 19:06 xenial-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img
-rw-rw-r-- 1  2282749952 Jan 17 19:17 xenial-minimal-rock64-0.6.9-160-arm64.img
-rw-rw-r-- 1 7751073792 Jan 17 17:06 xubuntu-xenial-mate-20161215-longsleep-pine64-8GB.img

I´ve also tried removing the emmc chip and just using the micro sd, no difference,  I still get the same messages.

I have also tried 3 different micro sd cards, an 8gb, 16gb and a brand new toshiba class 10 64gb, also with no difference.

According to the Noob Pine64 instructions, I should receive a linux login prompt, but it does not seem to get that far and I cant find any information about this problem or what to do.

Would be great if someone could throw some light on this.

I have experience with installing images to raspberry pi, so I'm not a complete novice in this, but this is my first experience with rock64.   Is there some hardware issue which these  images do not take account of?
  Reply
#2
I wonder if the extracted images are the problem.

Can you try writing the image by piping the .xz file to disk while it extracts? Example:


Code:
xz -k -d -c -v stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz | dd of=/dev/<sdcard> bs=1M
  Reply
#3
Actually doing my first install as well, with a ROCK64 4GB 32GB emmc. 
 
I downloaded the bionic minimal development image. I used a free partition manager for windows called EaseUs. With this I  deleted all partitions and rebuilt the emmc mbr. Then created a full partition as a primary 32GB FAT32. Kept the minimal image in .xz format. Started etcher and loaded the image, then selected my emmc module, then wrote the image and verified. Plugged my emmc module into the ROCK64. Powered up and it loads right into bionic minimal. From there I have tried a few different desktops. 

Do note, I did use a sdcard to enable SPI flash before starting this process.


Hope this helps
  Reply
#4
(01-17-2018, 10:28 PM)a1w.ca Wrote: I wonder if the extracted images are the problem.

Can you try writing the image by piping the .xz file to disk while it extracts? Example:


Code:
xz -k -d -c -v stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz | dd of=/dev/<sdcard> bs=1M

Thanks for the tip, will give it a try.

Ive also tried  flashing the .xz archive file to the sd, in fact that was how I did it initially, but same result. I assumed I had to unpack it first to get to the .img file. But that hasn't made any difference either.

I'll try your suggestion next.
  Reply
#5
(01-17-2018, 11:35 PM)manwithaplan Wrote: Actually doing my first install as well, with a ROCK64 4GB 32GB emmc. 
 
I downloaded the bionic minimal development image. I used a free partition manager for windows called EaseUs. With this I  deleted all partitions and rebuilt the emmc mbr. Then created a full partition as a primary 32GB FAT32. Kept the minimal image in .xz format. Started etcher and loaded the image, then selected my emmc module, then wrote the image and verified. Plugged my emmc module into the ROCK64. Powered up and it loads right into bionic minimal. From there I have tried a few different desktops. 

Do note, I did use a sdcard to enable SPI flash before starting this process.


Hope this helps

But you have to have an emmc adapter device to flash directly to the emmc? I dont have that.
  Reply
#6
(01-18-2018, 06:15 AM)Rockfan Wrote:
(01-17-2018, 11:35 PM)manwithaplan Wrote: Actually doing my first install as well, with a ROCK64 4GB 32GB emmc. 
 
I downloaded the bionic minimal development image. I used a free partition manager for windows called EaseUs. With this I  deleted all partitions and rebuilt the emmc mbr. Then created a full partition as a primary 32GB FAT32. Kept the minimal image in .xz format. Started etcher and loaded the image, then selected my emmc module, then wrote the image and verified. Plugged my emmc module into the ROCK64. Powered up and it loads right into bionic minimal. From there I have tried a few different desktops. 

Do note, I did use a sdcard to enable SPI flash before starting this process.


Hope this helps

But you have to have an emmc adapter device to flash directly to the emmc? I dont have that.

Hello Rockfan,

To "flash" -> burn the unzipped file (.img) use the utility pine64_installer and follow the simple instructions.

In case you need further assistance, please let us know.
  Reply
#7
(01-18-2018, 06:15 AM)Rockfan Wrote:
(01-17-2018, 11:35 PM)manwithaplan Wrote: Actually doing my first install as well, with a ROCK64 4GB 32GB emmc. 
 
I downloaded the bionic minimal development image. I used a free partition manager for windows called EaseUs. With this I  deleted all partitions and rebuilt the emmc mbr. Then created a full partition as a primary 32GB FAT32. Kept the minimal image in .xz format. Started etcher and loaded the image, then selected my emmc module, then wrote the image and verified. Plugged my emmc module into the ROCK64. Powered up and it loads right into bionic minimal. From there I have tried a few different desktops. 

Do note, I did use a sdcard to enable SPI flash before starting this process.


Hope this helps

But you have to have an emmc adapter device to flash directly to the emmc? I dont have that.

Yes I do have the adapter, saves a bunch of confusion when testing different distros. Worth it
  Reply
#8
(01-17-2018, 10:28 PM)a1w.ca Wrote: I wonder if the extracted images are the problem.

Can you try writing the image by piping the .xz file to disk while it extracts? Example:


Code:
xz -k -d -c -v stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz | dd of=/dev/<sdcard> bs=1M

Well I've tried dd'ing the images to the micro sd cards. The imaging seems to be fine, no errors. To be double sure I used gparted beforehand to manually delete all the old partitions from the cds to make sure they are gone.




output from the dd commands below:

xz -k -d -c -v stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz | dd of=/dev/sdb bs=1M
stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz (1/1)
  100 %     216,1 MiB / 2.177,0 MiB = 0,099    18 MiB/s       2:02             
0+214435 records in
0+214435 records out
2282749952 bytes (2,3 GB, 2,1 GiB) copied, 279,79 s, 8,2 MB/s


xz -k -d -c -v xenial-mate-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz  | dd of=/dev/sdb bs=1M
xenial-mate-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz (1/1)
  100 %   1.103,3 MiB / 5.249,0 MiB = 0,210   4,7 MiB/s      18:45             
3+418854 records in
3+418854 records out
5503975424 bytes (5,5 GB, 5,1 GiB) copied, 1346,12 s, 4,1 MB/s


Same results as before:

The stretch image just gives mmcblk  i/o buffer error and stops.

the xenial image seems to get further, more information on the screen about mali, ALSA and other things, but doesnt get any further than that.


Ive tried with the emmc in the card and with it outside, no difference. I am trying to boot from the sd card.

Perhaps the images arent suitable for rock64 4GB with an emmc? Is there anything that has to be set manually on the rock64 board? I have also tried pressing the tiny reset and recovery switches on the board.

Ive attached a pic of the boot messages I get from the xenial-mate sd image.

(01-18-2018, 10:23 AM)soichiro Wrote:
(01-18-2018, 06:15 AM)Rockfan Wrote:
(01-17-2018, 11:35 PM)manwithaplan Wrote: Actually doing my first install as well, with a ROCK64 4GB 32GB emmc. 
 
I downloaded the bionic minimal development image. I used a free partition manager for windows called EaseUs. With this I  deleted all partitions and rebuilt the emmc mbr. Then created a full partition as a primary 32GB FAT32. Kept the minimal image in .xz format. Started etcher and loaded the image, then selected my emmc module, then wrote the image and verified. Plugged my emmc module into the ROCK64. Powered up and it loads right into bionic minimal. From there I have tried a few different desktops. 

Do note, I did use a sdcard to enable SPI flash before starting this process.


Hope this helps

But you have to have an emmc adapter device to flash directly to the emmc? I dont have that.

Hello Rockfan,

To "flash" -> burn the unzipped file (.img) use the utility pine64_installer and follow the simple instructions.

In case you need further assistance, please let us know.
OK, I did all that. No problem with the image flashing, and so far Ive tried pine64_installer, Etcher and dd.  No errors. It all seems to flash ok.

The trouble is it doesnt boot and I dont know why.

(01-18-2018, 01:32 PM)manwithaplan Wrote:
(01-18-2018, 06:15 AM)Rockfan Wrote:
(01-17-2018, 11:35 PM)manwithaplan Wrote: Actually doing my first install as well, with a ROCK64 4GB 32GB emmc. 
 
I downloaded the bionic minimal development image. I used a free partition manager for windows called EaseUs. With this I  deleted all partitions and rebuilt the emmc mbr. Then created a full partition as a primary 32GB FAT32. Kept the minimal image in .xz format. Started etcher and loaded the image, then selected my emmc module, then wrote the image and verified. Plugged my emmc module into the ROCK64. Powered up and it loads right into bionic minimal. From there I have tried a few different desktops. 

Do note, I did use a sdcard to enable SPI flash before starting this process.


Hope this helps

But you have to have an emmc adapter device to flash directly to the emmc? I dont have that.

Yes I do have the adapter, saves a bunch of confusion when testing different distros. Worth it

Well i am trying it via the micro sd card. With or without the emmc in the board. Ive tried both.  No difference.

I think the problem is with these images.
  Reply
#9
It's definitely a strange problem, however I'm certain it's _not_ the images, since I'm also using stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.

Can you compare the SHA256 hash of your image with the one I have?

shasum -a 256 stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz
54186f3eb2f2a0b2447f4be6ce57e1a334154b899c3160af105afd7c484be579 stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz

If the hashes match, then I would think there's a hardware issue somewhere..
  Reply
#10
(01-19-2018, 03:38 AM)a1w.ca Wrote: It's definitely a strange problem, however I'm certain it's _not_ the images, since I'm also using stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.

Can you compare the SHA256 hash of your image with the one I have?

shasum -a 256 stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz
54186f3eb2f2a0b2447f4be6ce57e1a334154b899c3160af105afd7c484be579  stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz

If the hashes match, then I would think there's a hardware issue somewhere..


shasum -a 256 stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz
54186f3eb2f2a0b2447f4be6ce57e1a334154b899c3160af105afd7c484be579  stretch-minimal-rock64-0.5.15-136-arm64.img.xz

looks identical.


I have the usb keyboard, ethernet cable and  mouse connected when I boot, should these not be connected at boot?

Have tried adding keyboard, mouse and ethernet cable after boot, but same result. It recognizes the devices but goes no further.

Perhaps its the 4GB RAM which causes problem with the images? Don't most Rock64s have 1 or 2GB?
  Reply


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