From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Robert Moskowitz Date: Thu, 22 Jan 2015 08:46:22 -0500 Subject: [U-Boot] Announcing easy Linux installation on Allwinner devices for non-geek users In-Reply-To: <20150122144903.7c272d39@i7> References: <20150122144903.7c272d39@i7> Message-ID: <54C0FF2E.6040509@htt-consult.com> List-Id: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To: u-boot@lists.denx.de On 01/22/2015 07:49 AM, Siarhei Siamashka wrote: > Hello, > > This is a somewhat long e-mail. Yes it is. Thank you for this detailed introduction to the problem and solutions. As a semi-skilled user and proponent of armv7, I really welcome all the work you and others have done. Just wish it was done 6 months ago! :) > > 2. A possible solution > > ===================================================================== > == 2. A possible solution > ===================================================================== > > > > For example, the UART serial console is not really used by BROM, and > this was a kind of hack in the previous demo. At that time it looked > like the serial console could be configured correctly according to > some heuristic rules. However later it turned out that the heuristics > does not really work on some A13 devices and they may have mutually > incompatible UART configurations: ... > Anyway, the really missing part was the user friendly output and user > friendly input for generic u-boot binaries. HDMI is widely used in > Allwinner hardware and it supports autoconfiguration. USB host ports > use dedicated pins and only enabling/disabling power can be device > specific. The missing USB power can be solved by using a powered USB > hub, which is not very convenient, but still a workable solution. ... > It is a demo of a universal SD card image, which should be bootable > on any Allwinner A10/A10s/A20 device. With an installer of u-boot > v2015.01-rc3 as the initial demo simple payload. By using a > HDMI monitor for output and a USB keyboard or FEL button for input, > it offers a menu based user interface. The menu allows to select > the exact type of the user's Allwinner device and install the > right bootloader for it. This is all great with one possible exception: server setups with no monitor/kybd. Take a look at: http://medon.htt-consult.com/~rgm/cubieboard/ You will see 5 cubieboard2 + drives in a nice tower arrangement. These are powered by one Anker 40W 5-port USB power supply. Note that every board has a 'dedicated' UART/USB serial console. These are < $2 each compared to the cost of HDMI cables and an HDMI KVM switch (cheapest 4 porter I have found is $100; no cheap 8 porter). All I need to do is connect my USB extension cable to one, connect to a notebook and run 'screen /dev/ttyUSB0 115200' and I have the console for booting/configs. So I would want the option of a serial console menu. I suspect that screen supports VT-100 style menu controls, just have not had a situation to tried it. I am excited about the prospect that installing your Linux distro of choice on your Allwinner board of choice for a desktop system will soon be achievable. In May I will be visiting my parents for their 70th wedding anniversary, and would love to set them up with a system on their TV. But please consider the server use and the serial console.