For me openFyde/FydeOS is the best operative system to have on a single board computer like this one so hail to FydeOS to be with Radxa ROCK 5B.
Installation process is quite basic since this last update you can pretty much run it from any microSD so just go to openFyde/FydeOS Rock 5B github grab the .img file from them and RPi imager or Balena flash it to your SD.
FydeOS for you Rock 5B
openFyde for Rock 5B
Just choose the version you prefer the most. You can now complete the full installation to your nvme directly and carry on!
Crosh Container - Gentoo Linux
To enable fan control:
Please follow the guide https://faq.fydeos.com/en/getting-started/shell-access/ to enter the shell and be root. (Open Chromium - Ctrl Alt T - Type Shell, type sudo su) Do line by line donât copy paste it all.
https://fydeos.io/docs/knowledge-base/recipes/enable-pwm-fan-on-rock-5b/
# FydeOS for you
# Chromium browser - ctrl alt t, shell, sudo su
mount -o remount,rw /
#For first-time use, create the fyde folder
mkdir -p /mnt/stateful_partition/fyde/
sudo nano /mnt/stateful_partition/fyde/Env.txt
overlays=pwm-fan
Then press Ctrl+X, then Y and enter.
cp /usr/share/rock5b/rock5-fan-control.conf /etc/init
--
sudo reboot
exit
# openFyde fan will start automatically. However you have options:
# Chromium browser - ctrl alt t, shell, sudo su
Turn off type: echo power_allocator > /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/policy
Turn on type: echo step_wise > /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/policy
Nonstop type: echo fair_share > /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/policy
# Set which method to stays always ctrl alt t, shell, sudo su
mount -o remount,rw /
sudo nano /etc/init/rock5-fan-control.conf
--
echo **fair_share** > /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/policy
--
Then press Ctrl+X, then Y and enter then sudo reboot
exit
To enable bluetooth on some modules for openFyde/FydeOS:
Please follow the guide https://faq.fydeos.com/en/getting-started/shell-access/ to enter the shell and be root. (Open Chromium - Ctrl Alt T - Type Shell, type sudo su) Do line by line donât copy paste it all.
mount -o remount,rw /
nano /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf
-- then add these lines somewhere (at the bottom of the file is fine):
blacklist pgdrv
blacklist btusb
blacklist btrtl
blacklist btbcm
blacklist btintel
Then press Ctrl+X, then Y and enter.
--
sudo reboot
exit
Android Container - Arch Hero
From OpenFyde version 108 We have Project ArcHero activated which mean that we can Install .apks Hurray! 
Now the good stuff about openFyde/FydeOS is that with ArcHero Android container we can play big time games from the app store:
- Install apkpure, aptoide, uptodown, aurora store any store you like.
- Install some some apks, xapk, apkm intallers like App Mirror, XAPK Installer, APK Installer.
For big titles these installers are required. For general purpose⌠apkpure is literally enough for most things.
The fun of being able to play this is amazing.
(dont mind the video stuttering its just that⌠the video recording doesnât do its justice it runs smooth).
Thatâs it all android issues resolved. You can now enjoy your hearthstone, diablo immortal, call of duty mobile etc⌠etc.
There is however only one last thing missing for perfection but not even google ChromeOS made this work yet:
-
There is no gamepad support yet for the Android container yet.
#arc-input-overlay-beta - can be turned on chrome://flags but what games supports it?
- We have now gamepad support for Chromium Browser! (Works great on geforce now!)
Linux Container - Thereâs a few perks I wanna share here too!
Give the Penguin Crostini a NALA boost! - Activate the Linux on the system and do the following:
#Lets start by giving our terminal a boost with nala the apt replacement!
sudo apt update && sudo apt install git make python3-pip python3-apt python3-debian pandoc -y
git clone https://gitlab.com/volian/nala.git
cd nala
sudo make install
sudo nala update && sudo nala upgrade -y
#It will take forever after you finish make a linux backup nala will make installations way better
After this dont do sudo apt install anymore do sudo nala install instead ex: sudo nala install neofetch. The terminal behaviour will not just be pretty but it will do more tasks and correct issues as well giving you better debug feedback.
Pretty much anything debian works on this terminal. So now Iâm gonna leave here some of the classic basic apps that every linux usually comes with.
Debian / XFCE minimal desktop - Optional stuff
It takes long to install and you might not need them skip this step if you want:
# Basic linux apps libre office pulse audio etc etc. - Optional
sudo nala update && sudo nala install task-xfce-desktop network-manager-gnome gparted pulseaudio pavucontrol pulseaudio-module-bluetooth gvfs gvfs-backends policykit-1 udisks2 catfish mousepad xarchiver gdebi gigolo v4l2loopback-dkms gedit g++ qtbase5-dev qttools5-dev-tools libqt5svg5-dev qttools5-dev libqt5dbus5 libqt5network5 libqt5core5a libqt5widgets5 libqt5gui5 libqt5svg5 python-setuptools python3-distutils -y && sudo nala upgrade -y && sudo nala autoremove
# Utilities gits makes curls etc - Important
sudo nala update && sudo nala install xfce4-terminal lshw git openssl ca-certificates squashfs-tools gcc-arm-linux-gnueabihf libc6-dev-armhf-cross coreutils ninja-build make cmake build-essential autoconf automake autopoint gettext autotools-dev cmake curl default-jre gawk gcc g++ cpp libflatbuffers-dev gdc gperf libasound2-dev libass-dev libavahi-client-dev libavahi-common-dev libbluetooth-dev libbluray-dev libbz2-dev libcdio-dev libcec-dev libp8-platform-dev libcrossguid-dev libcurl4-openssl-dev libcwiid-dev libdbus-1-dev libegl1-mesa-dev libenca-dev libflac-dev libfontconfig-dev libfmt-dev libfreetype6-dev libfribidi-dev libfstrcmp-dev libgcrypt20-dev libgif-dev libgles2-mesa-dev libglew-dev libglu1-mesa-dev libgnutls28-dev libgpg-error-dev libgtest-dev libiso9660-dev libjpeg-dev liblcms2-dev liblirc-dev libltdl-dev liblzo2-dev libmicrohttpd-dev libnfs-dev libogg-dev libomxil-bellagio-dev libpcre3-dev libplist-dev libpng-dev libpulse-dev libshairplay-dev libsmbclient-dev libspdlog-dev libsqlite3-dev libssl-dev libtag1-dev libtiff-dev libtinyxml-dev libtool libudev-dev libunistring-dev libva-dev libvdpau-dev libvorbis-dev libxkbcommon-dev libxmu-dev libxrandr-dev libxslt1-dev libxt-dev waylandpp-dev wayland-protocols wipe lsb-release meson nasm ninja-build python3-dev python3-pil python3-minimal rapidjson-dev swig unzip uuid-dev zip zlib1g-dev libdav1d-dev libdrm-dev ccache libclang-dev libiso9660++-dev libcap-dev clang-tools clang-tidy libpipewire-0.3-dev libsndio-dev libmariadb-dev cppcheck -y && sudo nala upgrade -y && sudo nala autoremove
# Yes it will take a while.
sudo reboot
exit
Replacing the penguin terminal from Debian with ArchLinux:
https://fydeos.io/docs/knowledge-base/linux-subsystem/archlinux
Cloud Gaming via Chromium Browser user-Agents bypass on GFN!
The way to do it its to open developer tools mode but not to detach it from the browser window.
In short you will have reload the page with the network condition for ChromeOS and as soon it opens without unsupported alert you can detach it to hide it from blocking the browser screen. But to do it with it detached it wont work.
If without widevine activated do this and refresh 2 times if it doesnt trigger on openFyde.
#Custom parameters:
--user-agent="Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux aarch64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/110.0.0.0 Safari/537.36" --accept-lang=en-US
You can now enjoy playing games on Geforce now with an huge quality on this tiny single board computer like a champ! Finally.
Steam Installation Tutorial
Installing Dependencies
First we need to install some dependencies that are required by Steam. Use the following lines:
sudo dpkg --add-architecture armhf
sudo nala update && sudo nala install build-essential git cmake gcc-arm-linux-gnueabihf libc6-dev-armhf-cross libappindicator1 libnm0 libtcmalloc-minimal4 binfmt-support liblttng-ust-dev libcairo2:armhf libgmp10:armhf libvulkan1:armhf libudev-dev:armhf -y
Next weâre going to install Box64. Paste the following lines in your terminal:
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/ptitSeb/box64
mkdir -p box64/build; cd box64/build
cmake .. -DRK3588=1 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RelWithDebInfo
make -j4
sudo make install
We also need Box86:
cd ~
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/ptitSeb/box86
mkdir -p box86/build; cd box86/build
cmake .. -DRK3588=1 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RelWithDebInfo
make -j4
sudo make install
Fixing missing packages:
sudo nala install libsdl2-dev libpng-dev:armhf libncurses6:armhf libncurses6 libcups2:armhf libcups2 -y
cd /usr/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/
sudo ln -s libpng16.so libpng12.so.0
Thatâs it for the dependencies! Before you continue you should reboot the device with:
sudo reboot
Starting Steam
First we need to configure the environment for Steam. Use the following lines to add two environment variables to your Linux environment:
echo 'export STEAMOS=1
export STEAM_RUNTIME=1
export DOTNET_SYSTEM_GLOBALIZATION_INVARIANT=1' | sudo tee /etc/profile.d/steam.sh
#if you have a high resolution screen use this instead
#echo 'export GDK_SCALE=2' | sudo tee -a /etc/profile.d/steam.sh
source /etc/profile.d/steam.sh
Next weâre going to use Box86âs install_steam.sh script like this:
cd ~/box86
./install_steam.sh
steam #just wait.
Installation is now finished!
Always make sure your terminal has internet by doing sudo ping google.com and Ctrl C to stop at each reboot before typing instructions.
More useful stuff on Linux:
#--OBS--
sudo nala install xcb obs-studio obs-gstreamer obs-plugins xdg-desktop-portal pipewire qtwayland5 -y
#RESTART here and then run OBS with:
export QT_QPA_PLATFORM="xcb"
MESA_GL_VERSION_OVERRIDE=3.3 MESA_GLSL_VERSION_OVERRIDE=330 obs
#--this is the way it works on armbian not sure if needs changed for FydeOS
sudo nala install htop -y
sudo nala install bpytop -y
sudo nala install neofetch -y
sudo nala install snapd -y
sudo nala install kodi -y
sudo nala install inkscape -y
sudo nala install flatpak gnome-software-plugin-flatpak squashfs-tools && sudo flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
sudo nala install gnome-software gnome-packagekit -y
# or all at once and correctly
sudo nala update && sudo nala install htop neofetch bpytop snapd flatpak xcb obs-studio obs-plugins xdg-desktop-portal pipewire qtwayland5 gnome-software-plugin-flatpak squashfs-tools gnome-software gnome-packagekit kodi inkscape -y && sudo flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo && sudo nala upgrade -y && sudo nala autoremove
sudo reboot
exit
Terminal Troubleshoot
Sometimes when the linux terminal jams a sudo reboot or a father stop start termina fixes it.
- sudo ping google.com doesnât work or⌠wierd launch error messages⌠etcâŚ
#Open Chromium Browser - Ctrl Alt T
vmc stop termina
vmc start termina or vmc launch termina #ChromeOS is start FydeOS is Launch
Installing the Google Store is easy!
Run GApps installation stucks at 20% for a long while but you can see the log showing information rolling.
List of Debian Packages: https://debian.pkgs.org/10/debian-main-arm64/
Make pages into webapps: applicationize.me/now
Follow some of the community issues as well here
Have lots of fun enjoy! Discord here for a more direct approach: https://discord.gg/vX4UhRPT9A
