Minix NEO X7 (Cortex A9 RK3188) ?

Hi,

Post by Per Jessen
(newbie alert)
I've have just acquired one of these with the intention of running
openSUSE+mythtv on it. I have a c't article on how on to install
Debian on the X5, any other resources I should be studying?

AFAIK, there is no pre-built image for this device.
So, you have to download the root file system (rootfs) available at http://download.opensuse.org/ports/armv7hl/distribution/13.1/appliances/ (openSUSE-13.1-ARM-JeOS.armv7-rootfs.armv7l*.tbz). And make your own SD card to boot on, with first bootloader (manufacturer specific), U-Boot (configured for your board) and a kernel (configured for your board).

Guillaume

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Per Jessen

2014-03-26 09:03:06 UTC

AFAIK, there is no pre-built image for this device.
So, you have to download the root file system (rootfs) available at

http://download.opensuse.org/ports/armv7hl/distribution/13.1/appliances/

Post by Guillaume Gardet
(openSUSE-13.1-ARM-JeOS.armv7-rootfs.armv7l*.tbz). And make your own
SD card to boot on, with first bootloader (manufacturer specific),
U-Boot (configured for your board) and a kernel (configured for your
board).

Yeah, I saw this on http://en.opensuse.org/HCL:Chroot. It wasn't
really very helpful, but I'm making progress -

using qemu-arm, I've built a kernel based on the rk3088 sources (Neo
X5). Adding the somewhat iffy instructions from c't on how to build a
recovery image, and googling how to using the rkflashtool, I have just
now succeeded in booting up getting YaST started. Unfortunately my
wireless keyboard isn't working :-( but I'm sure I can get that sorted
out.

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Guillaume Gardet

2014-03-26 15:58:59 UTC

AFAIK, there is no pre-built image for this device.
So, you have to download the root file system (rootfs) available at

http://download.opensuse.org/ports/armv7hl/distribution/13.1/appliances/

Yeah, I saw this on http://en.opensuse.org/HCL:Chroot. It wasn't
really very helpful, but I'm making progress -
using qemu-arm, I've built a kernel based on the rk3088 sources (Neo
X5). Adding the somewhat iffy instructions from c't on how to build a
recovery image, and googling how to using the rkflashtool, I have just
now succeeded in booting up getting YaST started. Unfortunately my
wireless keyboard isn't working :-( but I'm sure I can get that sorted
out.

You should enable the right options in your kernel I guess. ;)
Probably in USB and in Input devices.

You may also try our kernel-default which should support Rockchip SoC.

Guillaume

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Per Jessen

2014-03-26 19:17:20 UTC

Post by Per Jessen

AFAIK, there is no pre-built image for this device.
So, you have to download the root file system (rootfs) available at

http://download.opensuse.org/ports/armv7hl/distribution/13.1/appliances/

Post by Per Jessen

Yeah, I saw this on http://en.opensuse.org/HCL:Chroot. It wasn't
really very helpful, but I'm making progress -
using qemu-arm, I've built a kernel based on the rk3088 sources (Neo
X5). Adding the somewhat iffy instructions from c't on how to build a
recovery image, and googling how to using the rkflashtool, I have
just now succeeded in booting up getting YaST started. Unfortunately
my wireless keyboard isn't working :-( but I'm sure I can get that
sorted out.

You should enable the right options in your kernel I guess. ;)
Probably in USB and in Input devices.

Yep, I've been working on that all day.

Post by Guillaume Gardet
You may also try our kernel-default which should support Rockchip SoC.

I think I looked at it yesterday, but I didn't see any option for
Rockchip. Instead I went with an older source package,

https://github.com/Galland/Linux3188.git

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Per Jessen

2014-03-26 19:24:35 UTC

Post by Per Jessen

Post by Guillaume Gardet
You should enable the right options in your kernel I guess. ;)
Probably in USB and in Input devices.

Yep, I've been working on that all day.

Post by Guillaume Gardet
You may also try our kernel-default which should support Rockchip SoC.

I think I looked at it yesterday, but I didn't see any option for
Rockchip. Instead I went with an older source package,
https://github.com/Galland/Linux3188.git

Success! I've got openSUSE 12.3 with a working xfce desktop now. I
don't have wifi nor ethernet, and sofar I haven't been able to hook up
an external harddrive. YaST looked quite different, is this something
I ought to report?
I'm very new to ARM, is there anything like an lspci to tell me what
hardware I have?

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Floris Groenendijk

2014-03-27 10:13:53 UTC

Hello guys.

Post by Per Jessen
Success! I've got openSUSE 12.3 with a working xfce desktop now. I
don't have wifi nor ethernet and sofar I haven't been able to hook up
an external harddrive.

I have a Neo Minix X7mini and I got wifi working.

I do have to lookup which git repo I've been using for the kernel if you're interested.
Currently I have Picuntu running on the minix so will have to put the suse rootfs on there first to be helpful otherwise.
Picuntu is setup on the nand in stead of the sdcard.

With kind regards,

Floris Groenendijk

Guillaume Gardet

2014-03-27 10:21:06 UTC

Hi,

Post by Floris Groenendijk
Hello guys.

Post by Per Jessen
Success! I've got openSUSE 12.3 with a working xfce desktop now. I
don't have wifi nor ethernet and sofar I haven't been able to hook up
an external harddrive.

I have a Neo Minix X7mini and I got wifi working.
I do have to lookup which git repo I've been using for the kernel if you're interested.
Currently I have Picuntu running on the minix so will have to put the suse rootfs on there first to be helpful otherwise.
Picuntu is setup on the nand in stead of the sdcard.

Would be nice to make a new image supporting this device.

Could you provide us information on how you setup your SD card, which u-boot/kernel sources you used in order to build a proper openSUSE image?
At least, it could help other people to get openSUSE (or other Linux flavours) on this device.

Guillaume

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Floris Groenendijk

2014-03-27 10:29:28 UTC

Post by Floris Groenendijk
Hello guys.

Success! I've got openSUSE 12.3 with a working xfce desktop now. I
don't have wifi nor ethernet and sofar I haven't been able to hook up
an external harddrive.

I have a Neo Minix X7mini and I got wifi working.
I do have to lookup which git repo I've been using for the kernel if you're interested.
Currently I have Picuntu running on the minix so will have to put the suse rootfs on there first to be helpful otherwise.
Picuntu is setup on the nand in stead of the sdcard.

At first I would need to get the rootfs working on the device.
I will look up the kernel sources I used this evening.
Don't know nothing about u-boot yet, though.
And I did not setup my sdcard at all as I'm using nand voor the kernel and the system as well, but should be fairly trivial I guess.

Post by Guillaume Gardet
At least, it could help other people to get openSUSE (or other Linux flavours) on this device.

That would be great, the only stumbling block I found is that wifi is working, which is great, but ethernet not at all.
I was hoping to get wifi and ethernet up and running.

Floris Groenendijk

Floris Groenendijk

2014-03-28 23:32:03 UTC

Post by Floris Groenendijk
At first I would need to get the rootfs working on the device.
I will look up the kernel sources I used this evening.
Don't know nothing about u-boot yet, though.
And I did not setup my sdcard at all as I'm using nand voor the kernel and the system as well, but should be fairly trivial I guess.

Post by Guillaume Gardet
At least, it could help other people to get openSUSE (or other Linux flavours) on this device.

That would be great, the only stumbling block I found is that wifi is working, which is great, but ethernet not at all.
I was hoping to get wifi and ethernet up and running.

I'm using this kernel: https://github.com/phjanderson/Kernel-3188-X7 which seems to be specific for the Neo x7.

To flash the kernel to the Neo minix X7mini I had to pad the kernel with a strange character to 16MB.
Otherwise the kernel would not boot.

I've added the script for that as well.

-------------------------------------------
#!/bin/bash
if [ $# != 0 ]; then
    FILE=$1
else
    FILE='kernel.img'
fi
SIZE=`dc -e '16 1024 * 1024 * p'`
IMG_SIZE=`wc -c < $FILE`
CHAR=`echo | xxd | sed 's/0a/ff/' | xxd -r`
echo $CHAR
DIFF=`dc -e "$SIZE $IMG_SIZE - p"`
echo $DIFF;

for (( i=0; i<$DIFF; i++ ))
do
    echo -n $CHAR>> $FILE
done
-------------------------------------------

I've used the linux flash tool to flash to the minix, windows 8 was giving me a hard time...

Floris Groenendijk

Per Jessen

2014-03-27 11:06:46 UTC

Post by Floris Groenendijk
Hello guys.

Post by Per Jessen
Success! I've got openSUSE 12.3 with a working xfce desktop now. I
don't have wifi nor ethernet and sofar I haven't been able to hook
up an external harddrive.

I have a Neo Minix X7mini and I got wifi working.
I do have to lookup which git repo I've been using for the kernel if
you're interested. Currently I have Picuntu running on the minix so
will have to put the suse rootfs on there first to be helpful
otherwise. Picuntu is setup on the nand in stead of the sdcard.

Would be nice to make a new image supporting this device.
Could you provide us information on how you setup your SD card, which
u-boot/kernel sources you used in order to build a proper openSUSE
image? At least, it could help other people to get openSUSE (or other
Linux flavours) on this device.

Here is what I did yesterday - the rootfs is

openSUSE-12.3-ARM-XFCE-rootfs.armv7l-1.12.1-Build49.tbz

The kernel sources I used:

Linux3188-master.zip from https://github.com/Galland

I did make quite a few changes to the config, I can submit mine if
that's useful.

/Per

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Per Jessen

2014-03-27 10:56:45 UTC