Debian Testing for the ROCK 4 SE

#1

If somebody is interested in a debian testing build for the rock 4 se i made one.
A command line edition so you can install the desktop of your choice. A xfce edition will follow:

#2

Iā€™ll give it a try, the official Debian CLI version has issues.

#3

If you find any issue please report it

#4

Sorry to say the image no longer works :frowning:

First, on boot with ethernet, the ntp service is not started, so an apt update is not possible to do. Normally the time is updated a few seconds after a boot. I had to set time manually to correct the clock which was 10 years wrong :slight_smile:

Then, running rsetup, the WiFi module and settings are not listed. No WiFi device and no WiFi networks. Also, trying to set the WiFi country crashes rsetup.
Same problem with trying to set the keyboard localization, it will not set the layout, even after a reboot. This issue also exist in the official version from Radxa. This is a rsetup bug.

After setting the date and time manually and doing an apt update, everything needs to be downloaded and installed, the base files in the image is now way to old now. After a reboot, there are many Failed messages showing up and then the system crashes with the last message saying ā€œPCIe linktraining gen1 timeout!ā€ Then itā€™s time to pull the power plug.

So, this image is no longer usable :frowning:

#5

ok thanks i will try to fix it

#6

i made a XFCE build of debian testing with NTP and some other fixes, but its only a image of the second partition of the disk image so zou can flash it over the second partition. here is the link to the .img file for the second partition https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yV-J1unqWCezf-bjNSTVdpddvevKtXok/view?usp=sharing

#7

Thanks for the new image, Iā€™ll give it a try.

#8

I forgot to edit the /boot/extlinux/extlinux.conf
After ā€˜appendā€™ you must add ā€˜root=LABEL=rootfsā€™ and change ā€˜roā€™ in ā€˜rwā€™

#9

Yes, Iā€™m a bit confused about the image. The image from Radxa has 3 partitions, config, boot and root. The testing image you made in May has only one ext4 partition, with a boot folder in the root partition. Does that work the same as a seperate FAT boot partition?

Also, the new image you made (for the second partiton is 16 GB when expanded). Iā€™m not sure how to combine the two ā€œpartitionsā€, boot and root? Can I simply write the new image you posted above and then change the extlinux.conf file?

#10

Use my Debian testing cli image, but yes thats the way you do it

#11

the line in /boot/extlinux/extlinux.conf must look like this:
ā€˜append root=LABEL=rootfs rw ā€¦ā€™

it is the kernel boot command line

#12

I have edited the line above, but the image will not boot :frowning:

#13

I will have a look on it later and upload a new Version

#14

i have uploaded an updated version which works, there is an error at boot time but everything works:
bluetooth, usb, wifi, ā€¦

#15

again this is the second partition, you must resize the root partition manually

#16

That is what is so strange, there is no boot partition on the SD card, only an ext4 root partition with a folder called boot with the boot files. Even a working image I have uses only one root partition, no boot partition at all, yet it still boots. I wonder if there need to be any boot flags set on the partition? The booting process on a ARM SBC is quite a bit different from a regular bios boot and Grubā€¦

#17

Iā€™ll check it out and do a full install :slight_smile:

#18

the boot loader is flashed on the disk befor the partition starts(first 16MB of the disk), and it loads the first bootable partition it will find. its also possible to set a boot and rootpartition but then their its complicated to update the kernel because of the boot partition. For this i think you must mount the boot partition in read/write mode. but its easier to use on root partition that includes the boot folder.
The Bootloader of the Rock Pi 4 SE uses the ā€˜u-bootā€™ bootconfig in /boot/extlinux/extlinux.conf

#19

Ah, I see, thanks for the explanation.

I tried making a root partition on the whole SD card, and putting all the files from the image there. But it would not boot, possibly because there were not 16MB free space on the card? Iā€™ll keep trying :slight_smile:

#20

Flah the debian testing cli image you from my github page, it includes the bootloader, then resize the root partition to the complete sd card and thenā€¦
I hope your on linuxā€¦
sudo dd if=testing.img of=/dev/sdX2 bs=1M
Replace sdX2 with the letter of th drive e.g. sdc2