installing OS from SD to eMMC methods for flashing SD

[PineHead7]

I run into few problems while trying installing e.g. 20.12 manjaro to eMMC on etched SD with osdn.net image. I had to go back to image 20.04 where image already contains script/way to select installation to eMMC.

Later will edit this post, so this will be complete and universal guide to dd of any OS distro with emmc-installer.

Please help with steps to be done on manjaro and ubuntu. thanks


There are two methods:

1. by Etching SD: Take your pick of desired OS distros with emmc-installer images. osdn.net offers booting form eMMC.
   • run your favorite Etcher and flash your SD (e.g. Balena Etcher) Note that only distros with explicit note in description will install OS to eMMC like here
     
   • Turn off pbp, insert Etched SD, power on, after about 15s press ESC, then pop up warning informs that all data will be lost -> Yes, later we are asked to pick our eMMC device: mmcblk2 is our pbp eMMC, so just press OK and Voila. All done.
     
     
2. Using dd if command: with this i would need some help how to make it.
   

[jiyong]

It should be possible to install recent Manjaro ARM releases from SD to eMMC by installing: manjaro-arm-flasher
https://forum.manjaro.org/t/pinebook-pro...ller/19244

[PineHead7]

unfortunetly it's still in development and not always works. In my case it doesn't work... Jiyong, do you know how to use the dd if command to copy image from sd to emmc? what script to add to make it automated install to emmc?

[jiyong]

unfortunetly it's still in development and not always works. In my case it doesn't work... Jiyong, do you know how to use the dd if command to copy image from sd to emmc? what script to add to make it automated install to emmc?

Yes, I also think it was a bad move they stopped with the install image, before the script is stable.
Anyway, when you install manjaro-arm-flasher with Pamac (the GUI package manager), you can also see where the script is installed.
I installed it with manjaro-arm-emmc-flasher, but that is old and broken too.
So I found the script here: /usr/share/manjaro-arm-emmc-flasher/

And this is the line to install:
xzcat $XZIMG | dd of=$EMMC bs=4M status=progress

$XZIMG should be replaced the name of the compressed image (ending with .xz).
$EMMC should be replaced with /dev/mmcblk2

So it should look similar to this: xzcat Manjaro-ARM-kde-plasma-pbpro-20.12.img.xz | dd of=/dev/mmcblk2 bs=4M status=progress
And sync just to be sure.