Failed to Run LibreELEC on an S905D Box

Confire · April 16, 2018 at 9:07 AM

Hello, Everyone,

I'm a newbie on LibreELEC and really stuck in LibreELEC installation.

My android box brand is PhiComm N1. It's a S905D box with 2G RAM / 8G ROM / Giga Network / 2 USB 2.0 / 1 HDMI port, with NO reset button, NO SD card reader.

I tried to run LibreELEC on it but failed unfortunately.

Here is what I tried.

Downloaded LibreELEC 8.2.3.1 and created my USB drive by LivreELEC USB-SD Creator.
ADB connected my box, run cmd adb shell cat /proc/device-tree/amlogic-dt-id, the device tree is gxl_p230_2g
I didn't replace the dtd.img from USB drive as I opened the origin dtd.img by a HEX editor, it looks like support gxl_p230_2g by default.
Then inserted USB drive to my box (there are 2 USB ports, I tried both).
Giving there is no reset button, I restarted my box via cmd adb reboot update
It reboot, judge from the LED on USB drive, I could see it was reading USB. But after that, it just stopped at PhiComm splash screen (I waited for 10 mins, no lucky).
Then I download almost all device tree i can find for S905D, replaced dtd.img file of USB stick. They were either blank screen or stopped at PhiComm splash screen.
Tried 2 USB drives, same results.

I really have no clue now. Maybe I need to find the reset button? I attached the photo of circuit board here as well. Cant tell where the reset button is.

Would you please give me some hints? Thanks.

Front:

Back:

Pelican · April 16, 2018 at 9:56 AM

Have you tried any 1GB dtb? Some manufacturer faking RAM amount...

On the last picture you can see RX, TX, GND pads, you can solder a connector and watch debug info on it.

Confire · April 16, 2018 at 10:07 AM

Quote from Pelican

Have you tried any 1GB dtb? Some manufacturer faking RAM amount...

On the last picture you can see RX, TX, GND pads, you can solder a connector and watch debug info on it.

Hi, Pelican,

Thank you for your information.

Yeah, I tried 1G dtb. Unfortunately, same thing. There are not many selection for S905D device tree though.

The RX, TX, GND pads look like TTL interface for me. I don't have much TTL experience on that either.

I guess I need a USB-TTL line, and maybe software putty on my laptop?

If I run adb reboot update like what I did above, do you know if it supposedly to run LibreELEC? or do I have to use reset button?

Pelican · April 16, 2018 at 11:55 AM

You can use a USB-serial adapter like this for those pads.

reboot update or pressing reset should start LE install.

You can try another LE or CE versions too.

Confire · April 17, 2018 at 2:27 AM

Quote from Pelican

You can use a USB-serial adapter like this for those pads.

reboot update or pressing reset should start LE install.

You can try another LE or CE versions too.

Thanks.

My problem so far is I really can't find the reset though.

It should be somewhere on the board.

Pelican · April 17, 2018 at 7:43 AM

Some box has no reset button...

garcea · April 17, 2018 at 12:51 PM

Can you look for the reset button / switch in the AV or SPDIF port? Some boxes had this weird implementation. Do you have such thing on the board?

Try even in the power port, who knows? And this could be a solution: Reboot to LibreElec

**blueribb** · April 17, 2018 at 2:33 PM

Install USB drive AFTER booting to Android

Reboot to LibreELEC app from playstore:

details?id=me.thomastv.rebootupdate&hl=en

Confire · April 18, 2018 at 4:40 AM

Thanks, guys.

There is no AV or SPDIF on my box either. Tried to find if anything behind power port, no lucky.

I'll try the app - reboot to LibreELEC to see if it works. And another thing i'm going to try is run aml_autoscript.zip from backup&update, see if it could amend the uboot to multiple boot module. Hope they works.