Topic: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Hi all --

I have been trying (in vain) to get my infocast 8 to boot the "chumby-starter=image" referred to in the OpenEmbedded section on the wiki. I built the image without errors and dd'd it to a 2gb uSD card. *one time only* the Angstrom splash screen came up. I had a usb keyboard plugged in at the time. It has not worked since, although I have repeated the process several times.

What information can I give you to make it easier for you to help me with this? I have been over every thread I could find on the topic, especially those from mwalimu, pete_c, materdaddy and others. It doesn't seem that difficult, but I've not been able to 'get it'. Thanks in advance for any assistance.

PS if I ever get this running, of course the next thing I'd be interested in is getting opkg to work for me.

Brian

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

2 (edited by Joan Jett 2012-07-08 11:09:19)

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Joan Jett wrote:

Hi all --

Well, I have been plugging away at it. I'm sure I'm doing something simple wrong. It seems like something goes wrong with the boot loader partition. I backed up the original 2gb uSD to hard disk with dd. I've written that .img to another 2gb uSD which briefly shows the infocast logo for a few seconds and then the screen goes dark and it never boots. I understand that it may be creating partition 4 which contains 5 & 6, /psp & /mount/storage. I left it over night and it was still dark in the AM.

Could it be taking all those hours to make the 1.5gb partition?

With the OE 'chumby-starter-image' I built, I got the same behavior except with the Angstrom logo.

**NOTE, I only get the logo screens the first time I boot. It's like something is changing the boot loader on the first attempt. If I want to see the logo screens again, I have to re dd the uSD card.

I recall seeing somewhere about having a USB keyboard plugged in, and I've tried that. I don't need to have serial access do I?

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

3 (edited by Joan Jett 2012-07-14 03:12:33)

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

So, I think basically where I'm hung up is on the boot partition. The *first* time I write an image to a uSD card, I get the Angstrom logo for a while. Then never again, until I rewrite the image with dd. Unfortuately it never seems to complete booting either. It seems like the boot sector is being modified on that first boot. Or at least some partition is. Must I lay out the partitions ahead of time and copy over the different ones separately rather than just laying down the whole image?

Cheers, Brian

PS == In my first post I say I built the image without errors, but perhaps I still didn't configure it correctly somehow. Does anyone have a working image for the Infocast 8? As I say, I tried to get even the image from the infocast link written to a new card and even that failed.

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Please folks, has anyone gotten any Silvermoon image to work on the C8/I8 besides the one that came on the uSD card in the device? I'm sure someone has. I have followed the wiki faithfully, but all I get is what you see in my previous posts. I can't even get the rom-silvermoon_a0.img to work with this command:

sudo dd if=rom-silvermoon_a0.img of=/dev/sdX bs=8M

It copies over the image in about 3 or 4 minutes but nothing works. It goes to an Infocast Splash screen which remains for about 5 minutes and then the screen goes dark. If someone has an Silvermoon image that they know works on a C8/I8, I would be very grateful for assistance. I may be missing some step not in the wiki. What format/partition scheme should the uSD card have on it prior to using dd? It shouldn't matter really because dd is low level writing, but I'm grasping at straws. Writing out the .img file should do it, no? Do I have to place something in the boot partition separately? Thanks!

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

The only other thing I can think of is that my build environment is using Debian Squeeze as opposed to Ubuntu 10.04. The hardware is a VIA C7 processor @ 1GHz with 1 Gig of RAM. But this wouldn't explain why rom-silvermoon_a0.img won't boot. I really want to build it myself, but if anyone has some sort of working silvermoon image they'd like to share it would be appreciated. Thanks, Brian

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

I too have been hopeing for a response to this thread.  I dd ed off the working image from my Chumby 8, dd ed it to a new 2G micro SD, and could not boot it.  I've used dd before to copy bootable cards, so I figured there was something additional needed for the Chumby bootloader -- probably related to the undocumented, unmountable partition one.   Not being able to get a known workable image to boot is a showstopper.

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Yeh, KC. I'll keep muddling along. I'll let you know if I crack the big secret.

B

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

So, I finally found this.

http://forum.chumby.com/viewtopic.php?id=8186

Can anyone confirm that partition tweaking needs to be done in order to get an image file which has been dd'd onto a uSD card to boot?

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Not that anyone appears to be reading this thread, but this may help out. I'll post back when I get a chance to try it.

http://forum.chumby.com/viewtopic.php?id=6525

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Believe me, people are reading -- even if they don't have anything to add.  More than likely, those who may be able to help just aren't around at the moment, and the remainder are those who are silently following your progress, hoping you get further than they did wink

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Doktor Jones is right. Others are reading the thread. We just do not have anything constructive to add.

Tar, feathers, congress. Some assembly required.

12 (edited by mwalimu 2012-08-06 06:43:05)

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Here is what I found so far.  I was able to make a few images for the Infocast 8 on OE.  While they ran, they were buggy.  For instance, the console would print out on the display, but not scroll.  Worst was that I NEVER got wifi working, which was a deal breaker.  Expanding the size of the image past 2G returned cryptic messages about writing to locations that didn't exist.  In the long run I decided that I would keep the image to 2G and use the SD slot to add storage if need be.

Guy Carpenter has directions for expanding the SD  image at:
http://guy.carpenter.id.au/chumby-oe/bl … e-sd-card/

Eventually I gave up because the image that came with the machine was easier to work with.

I have been messing around with the falconwing OE image for 2 weeks.  You can follow last summers adventures here: http://forum.chumby.com/viewtopic.php?id=7939  (please note the title of this thread)

What I found is that OE is wonderful if it works, but it has issues most of the time.  For instance, my initial images would boot fine and wifi would work, but everytime I did  "opkg upgrade", my images would hang up.  Apparently on of the upgrades has the poor thing looking for a RTC that doesn't exist on a Chumby.  Things like this made me throw up my hands and learn to love the Chumby ROM.

13 (edited by Joan Jett 2012-08-06 11:52:45)

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Thanks for the info, mwalimu. And hi Bolo and Doktor. @mwalimu, did you ever have to fix the "overlapping partitions issue" referred to in my last post? I think that applies to falconwing as well as silvermoon. That's the only reason I can think that I can't seem to 'dd' even the OEM Infocast 8 image. Anyway, I'll stick with it a little longer and post back what I find.

Brian

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Did I ever fix the partition issue?  No.  However, the Rom images for the infocast 3.5 and 8 found at: http://files.chumby.com/firmware/infoca … ng.img.zip  and  http://files.chumby.com/firmware/infoca … a0.img.zip  don't seem to have the overlapping partition problem.

15 (edited by Joan Jett 2012-08-07 06:19:30)

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

mwalimu wrote:

Did I ever fix the partition issue?  No.  However, the Rom images for the infocast 3.5 and 8 found at: http://files.chumby.com/firmware/infoca … ng.img.zip  and  http://files.chumby.com/firmware/infoca … a0.img.zip  don't seem to have the overlapping partition problem.

I begin to see why the title of your post last year is appropriate. No, I didn't see any overlapping partitions either. Then why won't the bloody OEM (OEM meaning rom-silvermoon_ao.img) image boot for me? I get the infocast splash screen for about 10 minutes, then it goes dark. Can anyone post an fdisk print of the partition table for the Silvermoon? When I get home, I'll post mine. Thanks in advance.

Brian

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

I'm going to ask what is probably a dumb question.  Of course you unzipped the image, right?  And did you try rebooting the machine after it "went dark", right?

I used win32diskimager to write my image to my sd card.  I also used 'dd if="romfile" of=/dev/sdx bs=1M'  a smaller block size.  I don't quite know how the disk imager programs work, but when they have gone wrong, it seems to me that the boot file "gets it" and and I have had similar symptoms.

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Instructions on expanding the sd card image in OE:

http://guy.carpenter.id.au/chumby-oe/bl … e-sd-card/

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

The fdisk of a new chumby 8 micro sd (Silvermoon), never booted, shows no partition overlap:
Disk /dev/mmcblk0: 1977 MB, 1977614336 bytes
4 heads, 16 sectors/track, 60352 cylinders, total 3862528 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00000000

        Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/mmcblk0p1               4       18435        9216   83  Linux
Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/mmcblk0p2           18436      387075      184320   83  Linux
Partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/mmcblk0p3          387076      755715      184320   83  Linux
Partition 3 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/mmcblk0p4          755716     3846144     1545214+  83  Linux

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

mwalimu wrote:

I'm going to ask what is probably a dumb question.  Of course you unzipped the image, right?  And did you try rebooting the machine after it "went dark", right?

I used win32diskimager to write my image to my sd card.  I also used 'dd if="romfile" of=/dev/sdx bs=1M'  a smaller block size.  I don't quite know how the disk imager programs work, but when they have gone wrong, it seems to me that the boot file "gets it" and and I have had similar symptoms.

Yeh, I did both. Interestingly today, the Infocast splash screen never went off for 2 hours. Never finished booting either. Rebooting by killing power just got the same behavior. And this image was made through the windows method. All the others have been via 'dd'. It is /dev/sdc naturally because I can't get the infocast up!

Here is a screen cap of fdisk on the uSD card:

http://www.tiikoni.com/tis/view/?id=b2d7de3

or pasted:

Disk /dev/sdc: 7964 MB, 7964983296 bytes
246 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1019 cylinders, total 15556608 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00000000

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdc1               4       18439        9218   83  Linux
/dev/sdc2           18440      387079      184320   83  Linux
/dev/sdc3          387080      755719      184320   83  Linux

Command (m for help): x

Expert command (m for help): p

Disk /dev/sdc: 246 heads, 62 sectors, 1019 cylinders

Nr AF  Hd Sec  Cyl  Hd Sec  Cyl     Start      Size ID
1 00   0   5    0  51  26    1          4      18436 83
2 00  51  27    1  93  14   25      18440     368640 83
3 00  93  15   25 135   2   49     387080     368640 83
4 00   0   0    0   0   0    0          0          0 00

Expert command (m for help): v
Partition 1: previous sectors 18439 disagrees with total 21453
Partition 2: previous sectors 387079 disagrees with total 384591
Partition 3: previous sectors 755719 disagrees with total 747729
Remaining 14800891 unallocated 512-byte sectors

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

kcsaychum wrote:

The fdisk of a new chumby 8 micro sd (Silvermoon), never booted, shows no partition overlap:

Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/mmcblk0p2           18436      387075      184320   83  Linux
Partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/mmcblk0p3          387076      755715      184320   83  Linux
Partition 3 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/mmcblk0p4          755716     3846144     1545214+  83  Linux

Interesting kcsaychum. I don't get the partition end/cylinder mismatch errors. And my sector numbers are a bit different. What happens when you use the 'v' command in fdisk?

Thanks for the input guys. I was afraid no one was reading the forum anymore.....

Brian

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Here's the fdisk from a copy of the Chumby 8 micro SD card -- note same partitioning, but no errors with the 62,62 heads,sec/tracks.  There's a difference I hadn't thought was signicant.  The 4,16 h,s/t setup is what I typically use when I optmize the layout in the partitions, so unless I messed up and did something I forgot I did, maybe the original sd had started optimization, then gave up to avoid wasting even a little space. e.g. I'd normally start the first partition at block 8192 instead of 4, and ensure all partitions start at 4M boundaries.
6
Disk /dev/sdb: 2002 MB, 2002780160 bytes
62 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1017 cylinders, total 3911680 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00000000

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1               4       18435        9216   83  Linux
/dev/sdb2           18436      387075      184320   83  Linux
/dev/sdb3          387076      755715      184320   83  Linux
/dev/sdb4          755716     3846144     1545214+  83  Linux

Command (m for help): v
Partition 1: previous sectors 18435 disagrees with total 6299
Partition 2: previous sectors 387075 disagrees with total 92466
Partition 3: previous sectors 755715 disagrees with total 182538
Partitions 4: cylinder 1024 greater than maximum 1017
Partition 4: previous sectors 3846144 disagrees with total 3933345
Remaining 65538 unallocated 512-byte sectors

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

@mwalimu

I know that I am resuming a dead thread (and a little off topic), but I thought that now, more than ever, this information is needed.  I was poking around today and stumbled accross a page with a possible fix to the wifi problem:

http://edsiper.linuxchile.cl/blog/2011/ … ux-kernel/

The links for the ROM image are dead, but the information about the wifi setup seems sane, and I thought that at least a few of those "silent readers" could use it.

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Sadly, my infocast 8 died suddenly and unexpectedly.  I've been playing around with Raspberry Pi ever since.

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

Hi Mark005 --

I had emailed Eduardo after I ran across that link last June. He replied that he'd look around for the files and let me know if he found them. Never heard back. Interesting that you should look at this thread just now. I haven't given up yet. I just put together a bootable uSD card with the original Debian version provided by Marvell for the Guruplug-D, which uses the PXA168 processor. When I get home later, I'm going to give it a whirl on the I8 and will post back if I get anywhere.

Brian

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan

Re: OpenEmbedded/chumby-starter-image

{gong, gong, buzz, buzz}
Thank you for playing!
No luck with the Marvell images.
In the interim since the thread has been quiet, has anyone made any progress on getting *something* working on a C8/I8? Even my original card has become corrupted. I set it aside and used blank uSD cards to play, but it will no longer boot the device. I've tried the OEM I8 image available from Insignia as well.

Brian, #1 Joan Jett Fan