Ubuntu 12.04 on ODroid-X Development Board

Yesterday, Hardkernel released the first version of Ubuntu for ODroid-X development board based on Linux 3.6-rc1 and Linaro Ubuntu Desktop 12.07.

This is still early work, but here’s the current status:

Linux Kernel 3.6-rc1 with gcc 4.7.1 Linaro toolchain
SMP driven Quad-Core processing
PMIC device driver
USB 2.0 High-speed Host driver for Exynos-4412 HSIC interface
Ethernet + USB Hub device driver
LCD display driver
HDMI display driver (Very early version and it may have HDMI 1.4a compatibility issues with some monitors)

To do:

Audio codec driver
eMMC device driver
Clock control driver
3D HW-GPU X11 driver (This may need couple of months)
Power-off support
WiFi module is not working with Ubuntu GUI. Hardkernel Wi-Fi module is not working due to missing driver

There are 2 images: one for LCD display kits, one for HDMI output that can be downloaded via:

BitTorrent – One file with both images? Very slow for me.
HTTP preferably to be used if BitTorrent is blocked by your ISP.
- HDMI version
- LCD version

Once the download complete, uncompress the image and copy on a 8GB SD card or greater as follows:

sudo dd if=odroidx_20120807-linaro-precise-ubuntu-desktop_with_HDMI.img of=/dev/sdX

1	sudo dd if=odroidx_20120807-linaro-precise-ubuntu-desktop_with_HDMI.img of=/dev/sdX

where X is the letter of your SD card device on your system. If you’re using a 8GB SD card, there might be some slight differences in size, and you could see the following message:

dd: writing to '/dev/sdb': No space left on device

1	dd: writing to '/dev/sdb': No space left on device

If you still try to boot Ubuntu with this SD card, the boot will miserably fail to mount the rootfs:

[    3.935000] EXT4-fs (mmcblk0p3): bad geometry: block count 1955584 exceeds size of device (1895424 blocks)
[    3.985000] List of all partitions:
[    3.985000] b300         7639040 mmcblk0  driver: mmcblk
[    3.990000]   b301            4095 mmcblk0p1 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
[    4.000000]   b302           53248 mmcblk0p2 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
[    4.005000]   b303         7581696 mmcblk0p3 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
[    4.015000] No filesystem could mount root, tried:  ext4
[    4.020000] Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unknown-block(179,3)

[ 3.935000] EXT4-fs (mmcblk0p3): bad geometry: block count 1955584 exceeds size of device (1895424 blocks)

[ 3.985000] List of all partitions:

[ 3.985000] b300 7639040 mmcblk0 driver: mmcblk

[ 3.990000] b301 4095 mmcblk0p1 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000

[ 4.000000] b302 53248 mmcblk0p2 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000

[ 4.005000] b303 7581696 mmcblk0p3 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000

[ 4.015000] No filesystem could mount root, tried: ext4

[ 4.020000] Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unknown-block(179,3)

Run the following command to fix and resize the rootfs partition:

sudo fsck.ext4 /dev/sdb3
sudo resize2fs /dev/sdb3 7000M

1 2	sudo fsck.ext4 /dev/sdb3 sudo resize2fs /dev/sdb3 7000M

Now you’re ready to insert the SD card in the board. Make sure the Jumper to boot from SD card is inserted and start the board. After slightly over 1 minute the Ubuntu desktop should appear.

ODroid-X Linaro Ubuntu — Linaro Ubuntu on ODroid-X

Boot time would be greatly reduced with initramfs support and a Class 4 or 10 SD card. I’m using a cheap SD card and the system response is not that great at the moment, although it’s still usable. Hardkernel Wi-Fi module is using Ralink RT5370 chipset, and the driver was not included in this image. I’ve built the driver successfully, but memory allocation error at load time prevent it from working correctly. Without network, I’ve decided not to review Ubuntu just yet.

If you want to customize the kernel, Hardkernel made it available on github. If you don’t have it already installed the Linaro cross-toolchain in Ubuntu:

sudo apt-get install gcc-arm-linux-gnueabihf

1	sudo apt-get install gcc-arm-linux-gnueabihf

For other distributions, you can download the latest gcc-linaro binary image, and uncompress it to your system

Now you can retrieve the code and build it:

git clone https://github.com/hardkernel/linux.git
cd linux
git checkout odroidx-next -b odroidx-next
make ARCH=arm odroidx_defconfig
make ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-linux-gnueabihf- -j 18
make ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-linux-gnueabihf- modules -j 18
make ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-linux-gnueabihf- modules_install INSTALL_MOD_PATH=./ -j 18

git clone https://github.com/hardkernel/linux.git

cd linux

git checkout odroidx-next -b odroidx-next

make ARCH=arm odroidx_defconfig

make ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-linux-gnueabihf- -j 18

make ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-linux-gnueabihf- modules -j 18

make ARCH=arm CROSS_COMPILE=arm-linux-gnueabihf- modules_install INSTALL_MOD_PATH=./ -j 18

To copy arch/arm/boot/zImage to your SD-Card, use the following command in your host PC:

sudo dd iflag=dsync oflag=dsync if= ./arch/arm/boot/zImage of=/dev/sdX seek=1057

1	sudo dd iflag=dsync oflag=dsync if= ./arch/arm/boot/zImage of=/dev/sdX seek=1057

and copy the modules to the rootfs.

Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft)

Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.