I found the 'debian-8.7.1-amd64-DVD-1.iso' image here: http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/current/amd64/iso-dvd/, burned it to SD card in a USB reader with Rufus https://rufus.akeo.ie/, and booted it from USB on the Udoo X86 Advanced hardware with 32GB eMMC Storage. I selected the GUI Install from the menu, and all proceeded remarkably fast and smooth without a hitch (except the WiFi, but gigabit Ethernet enabled downloading all required additional files) until the last when it came to grub. The installer advised that it had detected another OS being installed, and presented me with a few choices to which I wasn't sure of the correct one, so I took the default. That must have been wrong, as now Debian won't boot with grub from the eMMC "Hard Drive." I'm not at all familiar with grub. I can boot into recovery mode though, and from the command line it appears the install was successful. So I'm close, but don't know exactly how to proceed to make it bootable. Any clues sincerely appreciated.
Update: When Debian boots, there is a brief flash of color, and perhaps a few lines of text, then an interminable black screen with no response to keyboard/mouse input. When I choose to boot into recovery mode from the grub menus, when the scrolling text stops, I'm left with what I thought was a frozen screen, but it turns out to be login, without a prompt, waiting for me to provide the root password. Once I submit the root password, I have a command line interface to a reasonably functional Debian system. What I have discovered thus far, is that Debian wants to launch X11, instead of the command line UI, by default. That appears to result in a black screen with a frozen system. At this point, I have no idea of the correct way to boot to the command line interface, so I temporarily renamed lightdm, and now it boots to the command line interface apparently after X11 fails to launch. So, it appears that it is X11 that has possible issues with the hardware or is misconfigured. Perhaps there is something in X11's /var/log file that will provide a clue about why it was failing to successfully launch. So, it appears that grub is correctly configured after all. What is the correct way to configure the system to boot to the command line UI? Do I need to edit things, or add files to, /etc/rc.d someplace? Or is there a higher-level way to tell systemd that I prefer to manually launch X11? I'm aware that running the startx script is a reasonable way to launch X11 when I want it, but I'll have to diagnose its issue(s) first. My past familiarity with AT&T Unix from the early '80s through the '90s was pre-X11, so I'm going to have to learn how to administrate X11 now I suppose.
When you install debian you may pick advanced install and choose the general kind usage for your computer (for example a server): so you might install basic system without graphical interface (X11) and add it later if needed.
Did you try Ctrl-Alt-F1 on blank screen? At least on my Debian, when X starts there are also console logins available at Ctrl-Alt-F1 .. F6 (with Ctrl-Alt-F7 getting back to X). (These are on my normal Debian computer, I havn't got my UDOO X86 yet.)
After the initial Debian install, when Debian boots from grub, there is a brief flash of color, and perhaps a few lines of text, then an interminable black screen with no response to keyboard/mouse input. I'm familiar with the dmesg output at boot time. I see that when I choose to boot into recovery mode from the grub menus. When the scrolling text stops, I'm left with what I thought was a frozen screen, but it turns out to be login, without a prompt (or with the login prompt buried amongst some other text), waiting for me to provide the root password. Once I submit the root password, I have a command line interface to a reasonably functional Debian system. What I have discovered thus far, is that Debian wants to launch X11 by default, instead of the command line UI. That appears to result in a black screen with a frozen system. At this point, I have no idea of the correct way to boot to the command line interface, so I temporarily renamed lightdm, and now it boots to the command line interface apparently after X11 fails to launch. So, it appears that it is X11 that has possible issues with the hardware or is misconfigured. Perhaps there is something in X11's /var/log file that will provide a clue about why it was failing to successfully launch. So, it appears that grub is correctly configured after all. What is the correct way to configure the system to boot to the command line UI instead of X11? Do I need to edit things, or add files to, /etc/rc.d someplace? Or is there a higher-level way to tell systemd that I prefer to manually launch X11? I'm aware that running the startx script is a reasonable way to launch X11 when I want it, but I'll have to diagnose its issue(s) first. My past familiarity with AT&T Unix from the early '80s through the '90s was pre-X11, so I'm going to have to learn how to administrate X11 now I suppose. I'm hoping the X11 logs in /var/logs will shed some light on the system-crash when that occurs when X11 launches. I'm also trying to figure out how to increase the number of lines/rows and columns on the text-based console display. 25 X 80 is a bit restrictive.
Thank you for your response. I did try that, but nothing I could do from the keyboard or mouse had any effect. On the text console, I see a lot of noise (display anomalies) usually when the eMMC is being scanned with 'find' or when editing the command line I'm about to submit. Because Windows runs without display issues from the m.2 SSD, I've ruled out the display controller/system. The source of the issue is probably Debian's display driver, or perhaps a hardware-timing issue related to the eMMC. If you install Debian, it will be interesting to see how if behaves for you. I chose to load Debian because it is a very stable platform.
You could try the Linux Mint Distro, based on Debian: https://www.linuxmint.com/download_lmde.php Maybe this will work out of the box because of a different window manager.
In the Debian Users forum debian-user@lists.debian.org David Wright kindly provided some valuable insight into that issue. To see whether the system is configured to launch X11 at boot time: systemctl status To boot X11 on the next boot: systemctl graphical target To boot to the text command line interface: systemctl multi-user.target Apparently 'vidcontrol' will facilitate setting the number of lines and columns on the console, however that package appears to be unavailable at this time.
I was able to install Debian Jessie to 32 GB eMMC so that it starts to X (Xfce), but it's not really working - I'm getting a lot of I/O errors from eMMC. What I did: install Ubuntu 16.10 temporarily, then update BIOS to 1.02 from within Ubuntu install Debian Jessie using debian-8.7.1-amd64-CD-1.iso flashed to USB stick with Etcher when starting installation, I see USB stick in Boot manager both under "EFI Boot Devices" and "Legacy USB" select it under "EFI Boot Devices" during installation select Yes when asked to force UEFI installation EDIT: After reboot and new try it now seems to be working ... EDIT2: ... nope, still getting I/O errors, see followup thread
Debian Stretch (debian-stretch-DI-rc3-amd64-xfce-CD-1.iso from here) is working much better for me than Jessie, so you could try that if possible. Stretch release is so close that I had already decided that it will be my OS for UDOO X86, even before I got UDOO X86.
Below is the lightdm log, and attached th Xorg log, from my Debian Jessie install that crashes when attempting to launch X11. In particular, the "[ 1983.306] (II) VESA(0): Bad V_BIOS checksum" message in the Xorg log is troubling. Is this canonical evidence of hardware corruption? ============== LIGHTDM LOG ========================== [+0.00s] DEBUG: Logging to /var/log/lightdm/lightdm.log [+0.00s] DEBUG: Starting Light Display Manager 1.10.3, UID=0 PID=3271 [+0.00s] DEBUG: Loading configuration dirs from /usr/share/lightdm/lightdm.conf.d [+0.00s] DEBUG: Loading configuration from /usr/share/lightdm/lightdm.conf.d/01_debian.conf [+0.00s] DEBUG: Loading configuration dirs from /usr/local/share/lightdm/lightdm.conf.d [+0.00s] DEBUG: Loading configuration dirs from /etc/xdg/lightdm/lightdm.conf.d [+0.00s] DEBUG: Loading configuration from /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf [+0.00s] DEBUG: Using D-Bus name org.freedesktop.DisplayManager [+0.00s] DEBUG: Registered seat module xlocal [+0.01s] DEBUG: Registered seat module xremote [+0.01s] DEBUG: Registered seat module unity [+0.01s] DEBUG: Registered seat module surfaceflinger [+0.03s] DEBUG: Adding default seat [+0.03s] DEBUG: Seat: Starting [+0.03s] DEBUG: Seat: Creating greeter session [+0.03s] DEBUG: Seat: Creating display server of type x [+0.04s] DEBUG: Using VT 7 [+0.04s] DEBUG: Seat: Starting local X display on VT 7 [+0.04s] DEBUG: DisplayServer x-0: Logging to /var/log/lightdm/x-0.log [+0.05s] DEBUG: DisplayServer x-0: Writing X server authority to /var/run/lightdm/root/:0 [+0.05s] DEBUG: DisplayServer x-0: Launching X Server [+0.05s] DEBUG: Launching process 3275: /usr/bin/X :0 -seat seat0 -auth /var/run/lightdm/root/:0 -nolisten tcp vt7 -novtswitch [+0.05s] DEBUG: DisplayServer x-0: Waiting for ready signal from X server :0 [+0.05s] DEBUG: Acquired bus name org.freedesktop.DisplayManager [+0.05s] DEBUG: Registering seat with bus path /org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Seat0 [+0.06s] WARNING: Error getting user list from org.freedesktop.Accounts: GDBus.Errorrg.freedesktop.DBus.Error.ServiceUnknown: The name org.freedesktop.Accounts was not provided by any .service files [+0.06s] DEBUG: Loading user config from /etc/lightdm/users.conf [+0.13s] DEBUG: User larry added ==============================================================
Dear Ldighera I have read with very interest your post because I'm a "Debian user" since I have erased Windows partition on my HP hardware and used very Linux distributions. I will buy (I hope soon) my Udoox86 then actually I don't have a specific experience, but in my precedent installation on various hardware I have often succesfully used the non free firmware version of Debian Jessie xfce. https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/...ncluding-firmware/8.7.1+nonfree/amd64/iso-cd/ All the firmware is automatically installed. Particularly: https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/...ncluding-firmware/8.7.1+nonfree/amd64/iso-cd/ Generally with "netinst version" the installation is more interactive with hardware than also more reliable. Obviously Debian strecth version is more updated but not again stable. I hope that this information will be useful for you
Debian Stretch has been in "full freeze" (final stage before release, fixing remaining RC bugs) since February 5th, so it is getting quite stable. If anyone wants to follow on this, see remaining release-critical bugs in Stretch or graph of all release-critical bugs.
Thank you for this information. I gave up on Jessie, and installed Stretch as you and others in the debian-users mailing list advised. Installing Debian Stretch (testing) from this link: <https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/...md64/iso-dvd/firmware-testing-amd64-DVD-1.iso> on the Udoo X86 required placing the rtl8168g-2.fw driver in the root directory of the USB ISO installation medium to support the Edimax Nano 150Mbps Wireless 802.11b/g/n USB Adapter. The driver was downloaded from this page: https://packages.debian.org/source/stretch/firmware-nonfree http://http.debian.net/debian/pool/non-free/f/firmware-nonfree/firmware-nonfree_20161130.orig.tar.xz The specific 'rtl8168g-2.fw' driver required was extracted from the compressed tar archive with 7-Zip. It runs great!
I have installed Linux Mint on the eMMC chip. The only thing to remember is that you will need to download and install a later kernel, as Mint only comes with 4.4 and to get the WiFi and Bluetooth functioning without too much hassle you need to install kernel 4.6 or later. I'm running 4.10. The only thing where I went wrong was choosing the boot manger, so I now have to use Grub instead of the Windows 10 manager.
The good news is, that installing Debian Stretch from this image 'firmware-testing-amd64-DVD-1.iso' from this page worked perfectly. I chose the Graphical Custom Install option, and was able to specify an unallocated partition on my 256GB m.2 SSD for Stretch, and the installer was smart enough to use the swap partition on internal EMMC drive used by an earlier Jessie installation. What a joy to have a dual-boot, fast Linux system again. Here's hoping that this testing release is stable enough until Stretch is formally released as stable. Best regards, Larry
Dear LDighera I am very happy because of this good news. My only doubt is that you have set swap on EMMC: I think the swap is better on SSD for hardware reasons. Stecolumna
I agree, it may be that it runs under stress a little bit faster, but it would be safer in any case on the SSD.
Hi, unless you use all your ram, edit massive files, or, compute big (or important) datas you don't need swap. i would suggest you save the size on the ssd for your operating system or your data depending your usecase.
In most cases, the swapspace is not so large that it would play a significant role in storage. Therefore, the SSD is the right place for this, and data security is always more important.
