• From: Napa, CA USA
  • Registered: 2010-09-16
  • Posts: 100

Topic: I need an idiot's guide to creating a boot SD

I am an idiot.  Mostly when it comes to Linux (though I'm sure in other areas).

I bought a Chumby Hacker board without an adequate knowledge of Linux.  I put it away for a while so that I could educate myself on Linux enough to follow the discussion.  When I returned to the CHB, I discovered that my cat had had his way with it and the SD card is now gone.  He is an idiot also. 

Now, while the Adafruit tutorial on the subject does a fine job of explaining how to clone the card in the CHB, it does not explain how to GET the image onto an SD card (while I am an idiot, I know that copying an IMG file onto an SD card does not result in a bootable card).

How does one make a bootable SD card from ROM-Falconwing.img?  I have a XP machine and Ubuntu machine available.  Refer to the first sentence when explaining.

  • Registered: 2010-09-16
  • Posts: 6

Re: I need an idiot's guide to creating a boot SD

You can use the win32diskimager when using Windows or use the dd utility on Linux.

win32diskimager:
1.  Download the application https://launchpad.net/win32-image-writer/+download
2.  Run Win32DiskImager.exe
3.  Select the "rom-falconwing.img" file for the "Image File"
4.  Select the SD card for the "Device"
5.  Click the "Write" button and wait.

dd utility:
1.  Assuming you have dd installed on your Linux computer.
2.  Insert the SD card into the card reader.
3.  If the OS automatically mounts the card you need to unmount it.
4.  Write the image to the SD card where "if" (input file) is the rom-falconwing.img file and the output file is the SD card device (in this example it is /dev/sdb)

dd if=rom-falconwing.img of=/dev/sdb

When you first boot from this card the Chumby will repartition the card to expand to the new size.

More information:
http://forum.chumby.com/viewtopic.php?id=5439
http://forum.chumby.com/viewtopic.php?id=4338

3 Reply by mwalimu (edited by mwalimu 2010-12-31 09:38:34)

  • From: Napa, CA USA
  • Registered: 2010-09-16
  • Posts: 100

Re: I need an idiot's guide to creating a boot SD

That worked.  I feel smarter already.

  • Registered: 2011-01-21
  • Posts: 2

Re: I need an idiot's guide to creating a boot SD

Hello

I have followed the above instuctions win32diskimager to create a news SD imgae on a 2G card using the .img file found in rom-hackerboard-3320. When I first insert SD card back in the CHB it boots fine but the prompt now reads chumby-8b-aa-1e:/ # not sure if that helps with my real problem. Once up I cannot reboot because when I do the following message scrolls instead booting -

Go!

Data Abort
r14_abt: 0x408082e0Loading SD image...
Reading 0x00000800 bytes from offset 0x0000b800 to destination 0x45a00000
Skipping 2944 chunks
Failed to read after 1000 tries!  Aborting read.
Jumping to address 0x40808000:
0x00000000  00 00 00 00 80 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x00000010  80 40 00 48 00 00 00 80  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |.@.H............|
0x00000020  00 00 00 08 00 02 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x00000030  00 00 10 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 40 00 00 00 00 00  |..........@.....|
0x00000040  00 00 00 00 00 00 40 80  00 10 00 00 00 00 00 00  |......@.........|
0x00000050  00 20 00 04 80 00 00 00  00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00  |. ..............|
0x00000060  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  20 02 00 00 00 01 00 00  |........ .......|
0x00000070  00 00 00 02 00 00 00 08  00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00  |................|
0x00000080  09 00 00 00 00 00 80 00  00 00 40 00 40 00 00 00  |..........@.@...|
0x00000090  08 00 00 02 00 01 00 00  00 00 08 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x000000a0  00 00 00 00 00 80 00 00  00 04 00 00 00 01 00 00  |................|
0x000000b0  40 00 08 10 00 00 00 00  40 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |@.......@.......|
0x000000c0  10 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x000000d0  00 00 00 10 00 10 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 28 00 00  |.............(..|
0x000000e0  80 40 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |.@..............|
0x000000f0  00 00 04 00 04 00 00 20  80 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |....... ........|
0x00000100  00 00 00 10 00 00 00 00  10 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x00000110  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 10 00 00  |................|
0x00000120  00 00 80 00 00 02 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 01 10  |................|
0x00000130  04 00 00 00 08 00 02 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 40 01  |..............@.|
0x00000140  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 10  00 00 20 01 40 00 00 00  |.......... .@...|
0x00000150  00 00 00 10 00 11 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x00000160  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 80 01 00 02 00 00  |................|
0x00000170  00 00 82 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x00000180  00 00 40 00 00 82 00 10  00 00 00 00 05 00 00 00  |..@.............|
0x00000190  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x000001a0  01 00 02 00 00 00 00 00  02 00 00 00 04 00 00 00  |................|
0x000001b0  00 00 00 08 01 00 81 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
0x000001c0  02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 40 40 00 00  |............@@..|
0x000001d0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00  |..............@.|
0x000001e0  00 00 20 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |.. .............|
0x000001f0  00 04 00 00 00 00 00 20  40 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |....... @.......|

Go!

Not sure if there is any addtional information needed, I would need to reformat at start it up again but I am hoping either I am just missing a step or possibly do not have the right image file loaded. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

  • Registered: 2008-06-27
  • Posts: 518

Re: I need an idiot's guide to creating a boot SD

That information it's printing is the code it's about to jump to.  And that code doesn't look like valid ARM instructions, so it's erroring out and rebooting.

I'd try starting over again, for now.

  • Registered: 2011-01-21
  • Posts: 2

Re: I need an idiot's guide to creating a boot SD

Thank you, I have tried several times more but same issue. Do not have a problem on the initial boot of the new SD card, once up the CHB functions normally. My issue does not occur till I reboot and the CHB comes up the second time which leads me to believe I am either missing a step or the zip file I have does not have the proper image. Sorry for the confusion and please tell me if I am a total idiot and doing something wrong. Thanks.