Some newbie queries:

I need to boot smartbook MX from SDCard or USB pendrive so that i can test some software without the danger of installed system getting corrupt.

Is it correct that I can take this image ( http://www.powerdeveloper.org/platforms/efikamx/linux - maverick-20110722.img.xz )

dd it to a SDCard and on putting the SDCard in smartbook it will boot to the SDCard system ?

Can i dd the image to a USB pen/flash drive ?

And a slightly unrelated query: where do i get the serial cable so that i can get a console ?

Hi.
Yes, it will, BUT it will go to the installer script and will re-image your system if you press 'y' to the question if you wanted to do so.
You can check this post: http://www.powerdeveloper.org/forums/vi ... php?t=2031 to find a bootable desktop system running straight from SD card.
The EfikaMX book and top do not support booting from USB. SD card is the way you want to go.
We sadly cannot offer the serial cable anymore. We completely ran out of debug board stock and won't be producing more.


Best regards,
Johan

_________________
Johan Dams, Genesi USA Inc.
Director, Software Engineering

Yep, I have a blog... PurpleAlienPlanet

It is possible to run the operating system from the sd card, I have an old version of the OS on SD card at http://steubentech.com/~talon/Efika-MX (if its multimedia stuff you want to test from sd card that image might not be too useful)

I could roll an update to that live sd image using the most recent OS if you think it could help you.

I was going to wait until the next OS image was released to do that since there would be a big improvement in multimedia performance in that release.

the 07-22-2011 image (mine is older than that one) does have some improvements though.

if you want a bootable 07-22-2011 sd card just let me know and I can update my current image to that. (I would like one myself for testing purposes anyway)

The basic process for making one yourself is fairly simple. you want to copy the entire boot partition off of the installer image, and then mount the root partion on the installer image and copy off a tar file located inside /home/oem which contains the root filesystem that the installer puts on the internal SSD. You make that the new root FS for the sd card and it should come right up.

Theres other steps to be taken but thats basically it. Just let me know if you want me to make an updated image or not.

Thanks a lot Johan & William.

@Johan: Am downloading the image and will get back if i face any problems.

@William: Great Readme on your site - cleared up some confusion i had about efika boot. Have worked with linux a lot but never on arm earlier - so was confused about the boot process.

I don't really need multimedia right now - just need to install libNFC and nfc-list on the efika along with some scripts. Thanks for the offer anyway.


Am awaiting replacement smartbook being sent by Andre (excellent customer service - i must say)

Current one doesn't boot and just blinks the power button LED - bluish white, every 1sec.

I want to check if it can boot to SDCard in this stage or if there's any way to specify the boot /device/partiton/path/etc like one can do with Grub command line ?

Hi,
Yes, you can specify the device to boot from, but this requires editing the startup script. I wouldn't really recommend doing that at this point. When a properly prepared SD card is inserted, it will boot from that one automatically. The root partition etc. is set in UBoot, which has a config file which is used for it to figure out what to do.

See this thread for a little more info:

http://www.powerdeveloper.org/forums/vi ... hp?p=15024

The script in question is the boot.scr in the first partition (where the kernel is also located).


Best regards,
Johan

_________________
Johan Dams, Genesi USA Inc.
Director, Software Engineering

Yep, I have a blog... PurpleAlienPlanet

Or, image the card, and go to /etc/rc.local and delete everything in it except "exit 0". That'll make it stop running the installer script.

Then you can install whatever you like on top; just make sure you connect to the internet first (ifconfig eth0 up && dhclient eth0) and apt-get update before you try and apt-get install anything (that'll solve most of the "it won't let me install any packages!" problems).

For the next Ubuntu release we're going to move to a LiveSD which will give you a desktop and a UI (and a clicky button and a progress bar for reinstalling systems), but that's a little bit far down the road.

_________________
Matt Sealey

Thanks guys for such quick responses. Efika seems to have a great community & company behind it.


Now I have done a dd of the image onto the SDCard and i can see all 3 partitions and mount 2 of them (3rd is swap).

While the replacement smartbook has arrived in customs, it'll probably take a few days to reach me, while i need to urgently check some software on the efika for an upcoming demo.

So i am trying to get the current smartbook to boot with the SDCard but it still just blinks its power LED.

I have the following queries:

1. Do i need to run something to make the SDCard bootable like we do for grub or ntldr ?

2. I understand the blinking blue means system can not find the bootdevice. Since there are no bios settings in smartbook, do i need to specify somewhere whether it should try to boot from SDCard instead of its internal flash disk ?

3. Any other idea on what i could try to get it to boot

4. Based on similar problem in this thread: ( http://www.powerdeveloper.org/forums/vi ... =15016#top ) I assume that the issue is software related like wrong bootsector or boot device being set up somewhere. Is that correct or is it something to do with the hardware ?

Incidentally, My SDCard is 4GB and dd gives me error about out of disk space towards the very end.

However, the first two partitions seem perfectly ok on mounting so the swap partition image may have the error. Once it start going into boot stages i can always recreate/format the swap and this should not affect the boot.

The blinking power led thing is a hardware issue. It means that the system can't find a boot device, let alone able to boot from one. It is possible to repair, but it's not trivial.
There are DIP switches inside the system which allow for that kind of selection. Your system right now is at the state where it even can't find the 'bios'.
You can't make any changes to the DIP switches without invalidating your warranty.
That's strange. Are you 100% sure it's 4GB? Which image did you try to write to it?


Best regards,
Johan

_________________
Johan Dams, Genesi USA Inc.
Director, Software Engineering

Yep, I have a blog... PurpleAlienPlanet

Thanks Johan.

Yes, its a 4GB Transcend SD/SDHC Card. fdisk shows 4GB but i am anyway going to try with an 8gb sdcard also.

Actually since we let people swap the keyboards and flicking DIPs isn't much harder I think we vetoed that.. however, I think we might not be paying for shipping to send it back if we have to repair it.. :)
For William's image or the installer image?

I don't think William's image or the "demo" image is capped to below 4GB, so some cards might not work so well.. they're not actually 4GB (no 4GB SD card is actually 4GB, they can differ by up to 64MB)

I would recommend with fixing the power LED blinking issue - which we can walk you through - that you get a SMALLER SD card and not a bigger one. SDHC cards are less reliable for some reason. You want to try a 1GB or 2GB one (but you only need a 4MB one)

_________________
Matt Sealey

Thanks a lot for the offer to talk me through, Neko.

That would be extremely helpful as we have a demo scheduled in 2 days for NFC based micro kiosks for a cash card company here in Mumbai. Even though we have got another efika shipped through express shipping, for some reason its stuck in Indian Customs since last 4 days and DHL is unable to commit when its getting delivered :(

To help you take me through the steps to fix the boot issue, I am outlining what i have already tried today (without success):-

- I have tried removing the 3G & WiFi cards and booting - no go.
- Then I have tried toggling the dip switches (ie 0001/1110) - no go
- I have williams image as well as the demo image. You are correct the images are 4GB while the SDCards are a little less so i imaged 8GB SDCard where there were no 'out of space' errors from dd and tried booting with that - but no go.
- Finally i just wrote the uboot update image efikamx-updater.img.xz so that at least it starts booting but still no go.
- This image was written to 4GB/8GB SDHC and also to 2GB microSD with SD adaptor.

(Pl note that I don't have the debug board/serial cable and i understand its no longer available.
However, if absolutely essential I can get a ribbon cable which fits the serial port on the mobo and then if you can give the pinouts I'll get it soldered to a serial cable or usb-serial convertor etc. - don't know if that would work or you need some circuit etc)

Tell me if you need to use IM/BBM etc to talk me through it.

Okay, you need to do something drastic to get the SD card booting on a system that has a flashing power light. Get the U-Boot updater image and find the file on it called
Or something similar. DD it to an SD card like this;
Plugging this into the SD slot or MicroSD slot and setting the DIP switches will get you past the flashing light (I am not sure which one 0001 or 1110 actually selects.. but that last switch swaps it) - it will allow you to get to firmware.

You can actually boot it using the other SD slot using the installer card..

After that, did you say you had a debug board or not? Because fixing it without a serial port is ridiculously difficult.. the latest latest kernel (git head, compiled yesterday..) will allow you to flash U-Boot from inside Linux as the SPI NOR issue is finally fixed... I can walk you through that if you get there..

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Matt Sealey

Thanks Matt, that looks logical - should work.
Will get back after trying it.


BTW, can i just get a ribbon cable matching with your serial port and solder it to a serial-usb pcb to get a serial terminal on my laptop/pc ?
Or does it need some circuit etc ?
Can i get the pin outs for the serial port of efika ?

Tried that. Found ubootsb.bin on the update image and checked on your thread here ( http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.linux.linaro.devel/1747 ) that it can be used.

Had some problems in dd never completing till i renamed the ubootsb.bin to just ubootsb ; then dd writes ok (with seek=1 skip=1 bs=1024)

Tried booting with dip switch combinations mentioned in your above post and also with reversed (1110, 0001, 0000, 1111) but i still keep getting the power switch led blinking blueish white.

Am going to try with a micro SD card now (slot behind the battery) as a last measure.