Bricked my Rock64
#1
I just got my Rock 64, loaded ubuntu mate and it was working fine.  I was wanting to add storage (i boot from the micro sd).  I read a post that you could load u-boot onto a micro sd, put it into the Rock64, power it up, and wait for the lights to start blinking steadily.  Then you were to shut down, remove the sd card, and attached an ssd via usb.  I did so, but now it powers up and nothing whatsoever happens visually on the screen.  I tried loading the sd card with a fresh version of ubuntu mate and nothing happens.  I'm a total novice to this, but it seems that I've altered the firmware or something so that my machine won't work.  Can anyone help?  Can I restore the board to factory settings and pretend this never happened?  Have I ruined my board?
#2
You need to flash an OS Image to your HDD. The reason your board does not boot from HDD is because there is no OS on it. 
You can remove u-boot from SPI flash using this image - this will allow you to boot from SD again.

Its impossible to brick this device.
You can find me on IRC, Discord and Twitter


#3
(02-16-2018, 12:50 AM)Luke Wrote: You need to flash an OS Image to your HDD. The reason your board does not boot from HDD is because there is no OS on it. 
You can remove u-boot from SPI flash using this image - this will allow you to boot from SD again.

Its impossible to brick this device.

Thanks so much for the reply.  Can you recommend an image for the HDD that will work well?  Also, I clicked the link you provided to remove u-boot and it said there was an error.
#4
What do you want to use your Rock64 for? Headless, mediaplayer, NAS ... ?  

Sorry, indeed that link does not work - try this.
You can find me on IRC, Discord and Twitter


#5
(02-16-2018, 07:29 AM)Luke Wrote: What do you want to use your Rock64 for? Headless, mediaplayer, NAS ... ?  

Sorry, indeed that link does not work - try this.

I want to use it for as much of a desktop as possible.  Not sure what the best OS for that is, but it seemed from my choices that Ubuntu mate was the best.  I want to move away from the micro we boot volume to a spare 2.5” ssd that I have inside of a usb 3.0 enclosure.  Can this be done?  The reason is that I don’t want my 32 go sd to fill up with files, e-mails, etc. and I would imagine the speed from the ssd would be good.  Is there an OS image that I can flash to the ssd, using my enclosure, and run it without the ssd?  I understand that I’d have to re-flash the u-boot, which caused my problem in the first place, but thanks to your link, I was able to erase the u-not and got my Rock64 working again running the Ubuntu mate image that I had on my ssd.
#6
If you want to run from an external drive (your SSD):
1) flash u-boot to SPI as you've done previously
2) write the desired OS to your SSD (as you would to a SD card)
3) Plug in the SSD into the USB 3.0 port
4) boot.

For more detailed instructions read the relevant NOOB section(s) of the wiki.
You can find me on IRC, Discord and Twitter


#7
(02-16-2018, 07:29 AM)Luke Wrote: What do you want to use your Rock64 for? Headless, mediaplayer, NAS ... ?  

Sorry, indeed that link does not work - try this.

CJM, did everything end up working out for you?  I did the same thing to mine, but no amount of flash-spi/flash-erase in any form worked to revive my Rock64.  At this point I've pretty much concluded that I did something so stupid it shouldn't have been possible...and ordered an Odroid XU4....even though I hear the C2's are much better....quieter, more stable....

...anyhow....if someone can point me to the precise image that should recover my device....I will be beyond grateful.  I went so far as to trying to set up a dev environment in Ubuntu to communicate directly with the Rock64 via USB....but I got nowhere.

The next possible stage would be to try something like what is described on this site :
http://ugoos.net/blog/reflashing-in-mask...ce-bricked

...but I have no idea if that's even relevant...

Thanks for reading.
#8
(05-06-2018, 01:57 PM)SoLost003 Wrote: ...anyhow....if someone can point me to the precise image that should recover my device....I will be beyond grateful.  I went so far as to trying to set up a dev environment in Ubuntu to communicate directly with the Rock64 via USB....but I got nowhere.

On the raspberry pi header, link pin 20 to 21. In other words, connect pin 21 to ground. If you have corrupted the SPI Flash bootloader, this will let you boot from the microSD card again. If you boot from eMMC, this will not be needed, as eMMC has the highest boot priority (eMMC -> SPI Flash -> SD).

If you are then able to boot your rock64 again, you can either erase the flash and forget about this, or write the flash bootloader again, and hopefully write it properly this time.

How recently did you try this? I've had problems with images made in the last two weeks..., so won't use anything newer than 0.6.27.
#9
(05-06-2018, 05:37 PM)pfeerick Wrote:
(05-06-2018, 01:57 PM)SoLost003 Wrote: ...anyhow....if someone can point me to the precise image tThat should recover my device....I will be beyond grateful.  I went so far as to trying to set up a dev environment in Ubuntu to communicate directly with the Rock64 via USB....but I got nowhere.

On the raspberry pi header, link pin 20 to 21. In other words, connect pin 21 to ground. If you have corrupted the SPI Flash bootloader, this will let you boot from the microSD card again. If you boot from eMMC, this will not be needed, as eMMC has the highest boot priority (eMMC -> SPI Flash -> SD).

If you are then able to boot your rock64 again, you can either erase the flash and forget about this, or write the flash bootloader again, and hopefully write it properly this time.

How recently did you try this? I've had problems with images made in the last two weeks..., so won't use anything newer than 0.6.27.

Thanks for the info!  I'll give it a shot.  It's been a long time since my Rock64 worked....late February?  I was foolishly trying to roll an Armbian-Jessie build for myself....and anyhow...I have a habit of messing tech-related things up lately....just spent more than a few hours building a full Debian Jessie Desktop for the Odroid XU4...using very detailed instructions...and a nap in between..heh....only to find out that I could log in....but when I created my root password.....I somehow typed it incorrectly.....twice!!!     omg...they have to make idiot proof systems....more idiot proof...LOL.  No clue about grounding pins, but I'll look around....


Thank again!
#10
(05-06-2018, 06:38 PM)SoLost003 Wrote:
(05-06-2018, 05:37 PM)pfeerick Wrote:
(05-06-2018, 01:57 PM)SoLost003 Wrote: ...anyhow....if someone can point me to the precise image tThat should recover my device....I will be beyond grateful.  I went so far as to trying to set up a dev environment in Ubuntu to communicate directly with the Rock64 via USB....but I got nowhere.

On the raspberry pi header, link pin 20 to 21. In other words, connect pin 21 to ground. If you have corrupted the SPI Flash bootloader, this will let you boot from the microSD card again. If you boot from eMMC, this will not be needed, as eMMC has the highest boot priority (eMMC -> SPI Flash -> SD).

If you are then able to boot your rock64 again, you can either erase the flash and forget about this, or write the flash bootloader again, and hopefully write it properly this time.

How recently did you try this? I've had problems with images made in the last two weeks..., so won't use anything newer than 0.6.27.

Thanks for the info!  I'll give it a shot.  It's been a long time since my Rock64 worked....late February?  I was foolishly trying to roll an Armbian-Jessie build for myself....and anyhow...I have a habit of messing tech-related things up lately....just spent more than a few hours building a full Debian Jessie Desktop for the Odroid XU4...using very detailed instructions...and a nap in between..heh....only to find out that I could log in....but when I created my root password.....I somehow typed it incorrectly.....twice!!!     omg...they have to make idiot proof systems....more idiot proof...LOL.  No clue about grounding pins, but I'll look around....


Thank again!

Most password reset instructions for linux involve using Grub or a Live Session or Recovery CD/DVD/USB to boot the system into single user or root mode.

These won't work for SBC's but hopfully the old standby method of mounting the microSD or eMMC in a card reader on another Linux box will let you recover.

The Linux machine doesn't have to be anything fancy, a Raspberry Pi will do.

Just plug in the reader and mount your main EXT4 partition (this may happen automatically) then edit the passwd and shadow files in the  folder on your mounted media, which will me mounted under something like /media/pi/my_disk_name/etc (depending on your user and linux version on the box doing the editing)

Just make sure you are editing relative to the /etc on your mounted media and not the root /etc on the machine you are doing the editing on ! (otherwise you will erase the root password on that machine, which is a HUGE security risk).

You may need to login or su to root on the system doing the editing before it will let you access the passwd and shadow files in the /etc folder of the externally mounted media, but that won't hurt anything as long as you make sure you are in the right folder as noted above, but it may be safer to just edit the files by opening a terminal and editing the files with a sudo nano command like:

sudo nano /media/pi/my_disk_name/etc/passwd or sudo nano /media/pi/my_disk_name/etc/shadow

(substituting in the terminal command the actual path to where the mounted files are on your system)

Then just edit the root entry line in the /etc/passwd file for your mounted media to look like:

root::0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash


And then also edit the root entry of the /etc/shadow file on you mounted media to be:

root::::


Then properly save the files, unmount the meda from the card reader, and replace it in your Odroid, and reboot, and you should be able to log in as root with no password.


After logging in as root you will IMMEDIATELY want to run:

passwd

... which will ask for and set an initial root password.

Hope this helps.


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