Main Stream Debian on Pinebook Pro ?

[bcnaz]

Late one night last year :
I downloaded a copy of Debian arm from the Debian site.

I put the flashed sd card into my PBPro and it booted right up.    *( I did not try it for long, but the wifi connected and I did a little surfing )
    **( I no longer have the downloaded file or the micro sd card )

Fast forward,  NOW  August 19, 2021,  They just released Bullseye which I have heard has support now for the PBPro.

 I downloaded the correct version ( I think)  Bullseye arm64 from the Debian website,  flashed it to an sd card,  
put the sd card into my PBP and turn it on,   it just boots into the factory installation of mrfixit Debian  ?

Does the OS at the Debian site need to be reconfigured or is there someplace else to get  Bullseye for the PBP ?

Can we add Bullseye to the PBP wiki  ?

[KC9UDX]

It sure sounds like your SD card never booted. In that case, your U-Boot is not searching for it, or your card is not flashed properly.

[bcnaz]

I remember back when the PBP first released,  there was mention about part of the boot or preboot is stored on the eMMC.

So when someone put certain new OS'es on their eMMC,       their Pinebook Pro would no longer boot from an sd card.

Back then,  the OS'es that were  "offered in the Pine wiki had this 'bit' included",  so you could still boot from an sd card AND have a new OS
  installed to the eMMC.

I wonder if they still do ? 

Since both of my PBP's  (one iso + one ansi)  still have the original factory mrfixit Debian installed,  
     they should still be able to boot from an sd card..?

So,  even if the new Mainstream Debian will run on the PBP,     Say I install it using my Pine store eMMC to usb adapter,
  Will I lose the ability to auto-boot to an sd card ?
         
         

[KC9UDX]

It's all about U-Boot. U-Boot is what runs on your PBP when you turn it on, and what loads the operating system of your choice. U-Boot is independent of the operating system you use. Of course, every operating system bootable image we use comes with a U-Boot. And it seems that some distrus, notably Manjaro (I think) will "update" your U-Boot whether you like it or not. But otherwise, there's nothing stopping you from using the U-Boot that you have now, with a new operating system.

Now that you mention it, it does seem like the U-Boot that you have now does not allow you to boot from SD card. When I had it on my eMMC, I had to disable the eMMC to boot NetBSD.

[wdt]

One clue (there are others) is to run fdisk/cfdisk on emmc or an extracted image
There should 16M or more before 1st partition (32768 sectors)
If you want to be sure, open idbloader in hexeditor,, compare first 5+ bytes to
what is on sector 64
All idbloaders have the same byte signature
All uboot versions are not created equal, some are definately NOT universal