PINE64 - Getting Started

Star64: All listed distros don't boot

Fri, 08 May 2026 14:56:37 +0000

Here an overview of what Star64 distros work or don't.
TL;DR: None listed in the wiki boot

Irradium 3.8, kernel 6.12:
Doesn't boot. The power light stays green forever, no HDMI signal.

Irradium 3.8, kernel 7.0:
Doesn't boot. The power light stays green forever, no HDMI signal.

DietPi Trixie:
Doesn't boot. The power light stays green forever, no HDMI signal.

Armbian:
They dropped the Star64 some time ago.

NixOS v2023.11.26:
This one doesn't decompress: "unexpected end of file"

NixOS 23.11.20230827:
Doesn't boot. The power light stays green forever, no HDMI signal.

NuttX RTOS:
Doesn't boot. The power light stays green forever, no HDMI signal.

What does boot:
1. I still have an ancient copy of Armbian from when it did support the Star64, which does boot (non-graphical).
2. I see that Fishwaldo's old images from 2023 are still available here: https://pine64.my-ho.st:8443/

Thus I think the "Software releases" section should be updated to remove the entries for the distros that don't even boot.

Of Fishwaldo's 3 images (version 2.1), I get the following results:

The minimal distro does not boot. I get the green light that never blinks blue. This is a pity because text-only could be useful.
The Weston distro boots and provides a fast GUI, however it doesn't provide anything else, like a menu or a way to launch apps or settings.
The Plasma distro boots and provides a fast but more laggy GUI, but it does almost fully work.

Just now, with the Fishwaldo Plasma distro I was able to do the following which is pretty impressive:

Boot up and log in as pine64 (password pine64).
Set up Wifi, which works fine.
Run Firefox, which is somewhat slow but it works.
Download a FOSS program, compile it and run it.
Su as root (password pine64) and run "apt update" but there are no new packages. (e.g. GCC is version 11 but the current version is 14).
Install ffmpeg. This runs fine, however ffplay crashes with a segmentation fault.
Mount a USB thumb drive from the command line (it wasn't seen by Dolphin file manager).
Convert an MP3 to WAV and play it with `aplay`, which sounded like there was interference.

Regarding Weston, when I tried to force a text-only startup (systemctl set-default multi-user), this was ignored.
I think for some people, the text-only startup option could be necessary for projects.

default login & password, Pinebook Pro?

Tue, 09 Dec 2025 01:17:35 +0000

Just received a gifted Pinebook Pro. Donor said "look in the forums" when I asked for the login & password.
May I please ask what are the default username and password?
TY.

UPDATE: rock/rock
--
73 & best regards de K7AAY CN85oj .pdx.social .bsky.social

Alpha One - no connectivity directly out of the box.

Sat, 06 Dec 2025 16:07:16 +0000

Purchased an Alpha One, took it out of the box, plugged in the Ethernet cord, inserted a blank SD Card, and plugged in the provided power cable. Noticed from the start, only one of the two ethernet port lights were lit, which indicates a faulty port. I created a brand new Cat6 Ethernet cable with shielded RJ45s, and tested it, to make sure the cable was not the issue. I then checked to see if the alpha one had acquired an IP Address, it indicated it did, but attempts to connect failed due to timing out. So then an ARP scan was performed to see if the board would respond to ARP, but it did not. I performed a ping test for redundancy, which timed out, then the Alpha One disappeared entirely from the network.

Repeated attempts to try to configure the network proved unsuccessful, until the decision to reflash the entire board with the official image was reached. This was performed to the letter as instructed by RockOS, here[url=https://docs.rockos.dev/en/docs/installation/][/url]. The result of which was fewer errors generated in syslog, but overall no change. Neither could the board obtain connectivity, nor could anything connect to it.

Current efforts are invested towards discovering whether the EMMC is defective, before moving on to other parts of the board itself. In my sixteen years of experience, I have yet to encounter a system I have been unable to get up and running, I do not plan for the AlphaOne to be the first, but there is little I can do when it appears the hardware itself arrives broken.

the self built bl602_boot2 is very different from pre-built one

Tue, 16 Sep 2025 15:58:44 +0000

Anyone is still playing PineCone? I am trying to build blsp_boot2 myself using the bl_iot_sdk tree.
However, the binary that I built is very different from the prebuilt image bl_iot_sdk/tools/flash_tool/bl602/builtin_imgs/blsp_boot2.elf

Here is how I did:
$ cd bl_iot_sdk
$ export BL60X_SDK_PATH=$(pwd)
$ export CONFIG_CHIP_NAME=BL602

$ cd bl_iot_sdk/customer_app/bl602_boot2
$make

The generated binary bl602_boot2.elf contains the main function like a dummy.
230002aa

:
230002aa: 8082 ret
230002ac: 0001 nop
230002ae: 0101 addi sp,sp,0

The pre-built blsp_boot2.elf seems to be a valid one, which matches the bl602_boot2 code.

Can anyone point out what I have missed here? thanks so much in advance.

Having trouble reading MPU6050 sensor via I²C on Pine64

Thu, 04 Sep 2025 07:46:14 +0000

Hello everyone,

I’m trying to read data from the MPU6050 6-axis sensor via I²C on my Pine64 board, but I’m running into some issues.

System: Armbian

I²C is already enabled, and I can see the device address 0x68 with i2cdetect -y 1

My Python script runs, but the data I get is unstable and often jumps around

Has anyone successfully driven the MPU6050 on Pine64? Do I need any additional configuration?

Thanks!

PINETAB-V doesn't boot.

Mon, 04 Aug 2025 09:38:51 +0000

Hello,
I recently got my PINETAB-V. I connected the USB-C power cable and pressed the power button for exactly 2 seconds, as instructed in the manual.

It looked like the OS was about to boot, but the following message has been repeating for over 4 hours:

`[21966.202233] [WARNING][BB]Skip gain error setting in scan status`

According to the documentation at [https://pine64.org/documentation/PineTab-V/\_full/]
> The 2nd batch of PineTab-V devices ship with a Debian Bookworm image from StarFive.

So I was expecting the OS to be pre-installed — is that not the case?

StarPro64 Irradium (based on crux linux) riscv64, aarch64

Mon, 14 Jul 2025 21:20:46 +0000

irradium - source based Linux distribution CRUX adhering to ideology keep it simple, has its own package system, also supports the port system.

irradium development

packages aarch64
packages riscv64

installation README.TXT
kernel 6.6.88

mirror 1, mirror 2, mirror 3

irradium-3.8-riscv64-core-starpro64-6.6.88-build-20250714.img.zst
irradium-3.8-riscv64-core-starpro64-6.6.88-build-20250714.img.zst.sha256
irradium-3.8-riscv64-xfce-starpro64-6.6.88-build-20250714.img.zst
irradium-3.8-riscv64-xfce-starpro64-6.6.88-build-20250714.img.zst.sha256

invalid signatures

Thu, 03 Jul 2025 14:56:46 +0000

Hello, first time user,

The UI in settings does not seem to work, because the packages to be updated are always the same.

Particularly firmware is brcm80211 20240709 and it seems it expects to be updated to 20250410 even if it does not work

So I tried to update using the terminal
sudo apt update

, but I get an error regarding invalid signature: EXPKEYSIG 447D9EBF6B6F552D Maximilian Weigang

May you help?

Best

Case for Star64?

Tue, 22 Apr 2025 18:41:45 +0000

Hi,

I've been using a Star64 SBC since before the pro model came out... Has anyone created a printable enclosure for this board? If not, does anyone make one? Also, for anyone finding this random post I have found DietPi to have excellent support for this hardware and highly recommend it for novices and advanced Linux nerds alike. Keep in mind that I'm only using it as a headless server for DHCP, ntp, and dnscrypt-proxy so be sure to check the release notes if you're curious about a specific application.

-Gary

Pinephone pro explorer edition

Mon, 31 Mar 2025 21:35:29 +0000

Hy man. I am glad to bye this phone for test nethunter or kali linux, but gsm modem sleep and phone dont working also nmap and something base function. Maybe human who sell me this phone install bad image or this product dont working in russia.. if you have information on this issue, give link, for decide problem, thanks)

How multi core run simultaneously

Thu, 27 Mar 2025 06:30:20 +0000

Ox64 has single 64-bit 480MHz RV64 C906 core and two 32-bit 320MHz RV32 E907 + 150MHz E902 cores
How multi core run simultaneously

Regards
Jags

Running Linux on Pinebook Pro with External Monitor

Mon, 24 Mar 2025 07:13:24 +0000

I’m new to the PINE64 community and just got my hands on a Pinebook Pro. Super excited to dive into the world of ARM-based Linux laptops, but I’m running into some issues when trying to use an external monitor via USB-C.

I installed Manjaro KDE, which I read is one of the more supported distros for the Pinebook Pro. However, when I connect my USB-C to HDMI adapter, nothing happen - no output, and the display settings don’t seem to recognize the second screen. I’ve checked a few things:

The adapter works fine on another laptop, so it’s not faulty.

Tried different distros (Armbian and Debian) with similar results.

Running xrandr only shows the internal display (eDP-1), no external monitor detected.

Looked at dmesg logs after plugging in the adapter, but I don’t see any clear indication that the system recognizes it.

Does the Pinebook Pro’s USB-C port natively support video output, or does it require extra configuration?

How to create a valid firmware packet to update

Mon, 20 Jan 2025 18:10:21 +0000

Hello everybody here,

This is my first time developing for pineTime, this is my code (over 1.10.0)
https://github.com/MiguelIrusta/InfiniTi...leezScreen

I have tried with this https://github.com/InfiniTimeOrg/InfiniT.../README.md

But when I try to update siglo or nrfConnect in android starts and then it disconnects or puts my pineTime blocked in Firmware update 0%.

Can you help me? is something I am missing out?

Many thaks and sorry for the disturbances,
Miguel.

Wifi dongle issues

Thu, 09 Jan 2025 19:29:19 +0000

Hello, All

I tried connecting my wifi dongle to a USBC adapter before plugging into the pinetab2. No results. The dongle came with drivers but I have no way to use a cdrom disk. Should I get a plug n play dongle? Is it a problem w the USBC adapter?

Your thoughts will be greatly appreciated.

Deckard

PineTime brand new, battery dead

Wed, 27 Nov 2024 07:06:14 +0000

I just received my PineTime Pine64 yesterday.

Upon arrival, the battery was at 0%, 3.10V.
I charged it yesterday, and the battery indicator went from 0% to 18% after 50 minutes, then to 54% and stuck.

Today, it dropped back to 0% this morning and won’t charge.
What are my options to get a working watch?
Thank you.