Install Pre-Built Image

From Neuvoo

This document is a generic guide on how to set up one of the pre-built images on an ARM device. This guide only guarantees accuracy for the supported images, and on the devices supported by those images. For everything else, there may be some differences in how to install an image, varying from slight to substantial.

Prerequisites

• You need a device supported by the image you downloaded.
• You need some computer to write the new image to the device with. It doesn't have to be Gentoo, or even Linux, but it has to be able to deal with the compressed format of the pre-built image, and it has to be able to communicate with whatever storage you're using in the device.
• A suitable sized SDHC card. 2 GB is barely enough; 4 GB or more will be better.
• Beer (unit size: case)

Instructions

Pick the device that best matches your own hardware.

If your device is not listed, you're not fully supported. The beagle is considered a generic installation, with the fewest features. As long as you're using a device with an armv7a processor, you'll be fine. This just means you'll have a bit more thinking to do.

Feel free to ask us for help if you need it.

Pandora

Formatting

Follow the instructions under /Generic Formatting.

Extracting the Rootfs

Follow the instructions under /Extracting the Rootfs.

Configuring Boot

Ah, yes, now things become interesting. Pandora uses a boot.txt u-boot script. This section will be all about the best way to set up boot.txt.

Wherever boot.txt lands, it needs to end up on the first partition of the SD card that you will insert into the left SD card slot on your Pandora.

If you followed our recommendations of using a single ext3 partition for the entire card, boot.txt is very simple to set up:

setenv bootargs root=/dev/mmcblk0p1 rw rootdelay=2 vram=6272K omapfb.vram=0:3000K quiet
ext2load mmc 0:1 0x80300000 /boot/uImage
bootm 0x80300000

However, if you decided to install Neuvoo somewhere besides the first partition on the left SD card, you will need to adjust "root=/dev/mmcblk0p1" to point to the correct partition. The "0" in "mmcblk0" refers to the first SD card, and "mmcblk1" refers to the second. After that, "p1" refers to the first partition of that card, "p2" to the second, and so on.

If you do not plan on putting uImage under "/boot/uImage" in the first partition on the left SD card, you will also need to adjust "mmc 0:1" and "/boot/uImage". The "0" in this also refers to the specific card, and the "1" refers to the partition. The "/boot/uImage" part should be changed to match the location of uImage within the specified partition.

Finally, if you'd rather have Neuvoo boot by default whenever the SD card is inserted properly, rename boot.txt to autoboot.txt. When you wish to temporarily return to the official operating system, you must first remove the card from the left slot before booting the Pandora, or rename autoboot.txt back to boot.txt.

Installing a Kernel

The rest of this section applies to you if you'd much rather just accept known working defaults, Ubuntu style. A big thanks goes out to Vitel from gp32x.com for his marvelous instructions, which we've reproduced here.

First, download the latest official firmware from [1] and extract it. Using the terminal, for example, you could do this:

Now, you need to copy the kernel bits into your Neuvoo installation. In the following commands, replace $STORAGE with the location where Neuvoo was extracted to.

Pre-Boot Configuration

Follow /Pre-Boot Configuration, with the following notes:

The official OS does not save time as UTC on shutdown, but as local. Gentoo needs to know about this. When you edit hwclock, change this:

clock="UTC"

...to this:

clock="local"

Post-Boot Configuration

Follow /Post-Boot Configuration.

You can also follow USB (Networking) if you wish. Use the mini-USB port if you want the Pandora to use another device's Internet connection, or use the full USB port if you want another device to use the Pandora's Internet connection.

TouchBook

TODO (/Squashfs needs refactoring too.)

BeagleBoard

TODO

Pre-Boot Configuration

Follow /Pre-Boot Configuration.

After that, inside /etc/inittab, change the line starting with "s2" (or add the line) if you've configured your bootargs to use ttyS2 as recommended:

s2:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty 115200 ttyS2 vt102