Liberelec on the Vero 4k+?

Have a read of https://wiki.libreelec.tv/hardware/amlogic .. there's a device-tree included in the AMLGX "box" image. Also read recent release notes to understand the current state of things. I'd have thought OSMC was the best OS to use on that device.

LE12 nightly box image works, with the known issues in the release notes. I have run LE, CE, Armbian, and OSMC on the Vero 4K+, the former three are via SD card (nothing installed to eMMC other than OSMC).

The only problem I have with OSMC (in terms of a media center OS) is they are a bit slow on the take up of Kodi releases. I think the other issue that is possibly looming in people's minds is now that they have their next device out how long will the 4K+ continue to be maintained.

Right now, I am just using it to run Armbian as a serial console terminal. Personally, I am sticking with RPi4 or moving on to x86 devices.

One other comment with the Vero 4K+ is you have to use the toothpick method to boot the SD card, and be warned if the SD card is not prepared properly then there is a bug in the bootloader that will wipe the instaboot partition and cause OSMC on the eMMC not to boot. This, in my opinion, is because they (OSMC) didn't modify the default bootloader script to remove the "wipeisb" & decided to use multiple Android partitions in an LVM group.

Hi frakkin64

Thanks for your comments.

I was only made aware of this post now.

I am going to support Vero 4K and 4K + for the v21 series at a minimum. See https://osmc.tv/2022/10/vero-4…turing-updates/.

It just won't get new features like Dolby Vision tonemapping which recently became available for Vero V (https://discourse.osmc.tv/t/testing-vero…onversion/96809).

>This, in my opinion, is because they (OSMC) didn't modify the default bootloader script to remove the "wipeisb" & decided to use multiple Android partitions in an LVM group.

Thanks for the report. This is fixed in this commit:

[package] [vero3-bootloader-osmc] Fix an issue where 'toothpicking' t… · osmc/osmc@4b64718

…he device renders the system unbootable due to instaboot partition being wiped. https://forum.libreelec.tv/thread/27727-liberelec-on-the-vero-4k/…

github.com

and will be part of the next stable update. We don't use LVM anymore on Vero V going forward.

I will have a chat with chewitt and ascertain what hardware he has and what to send him and see what is available. I know that he was responsible for upstreaming DTS support for Vero 4K + to the kernel.

Cheers

Sam

Quote from sam_nazarko

I will have a chat with chewitt and ascertain what hardware he has and what to send him and see what is available. I know that he was responsible for upstreaming DTS support for Vero 4K + to the kernel.

I don't have any Vero boxes in my collection. Existing support for 4K+ (upstream) and 4K (not-yet-upstream) was developed through educated guesswork from me and testing from frakkin64

Quote from sam_nazarko

I am going to support Vero 4K and 4K + for the v21 series at a minimum. See https://osmc.tv/2022/10/vero-4…turing-updates/.

I figured that would be coming, CE is ending support for S905x devices after 21 (at least that is the latest announcement, I think they were trying to end it with 20), so expecting it is coming to a close eventually on the OSMC side as well.

That's why part of my interest is in mainline and v4l2 video pipeline (unfortunately that's a slow road for Amlogic), but I boot Armbian as well on the device using the stock bootloader and modified boot scripts (similar to what LE does), just need some postinst triggers on the kernel to build a uImage (since they dropped that). The other part with CE is mainly to get access to bleeding edge Kodi with a fully working video playback. There are options for folks to repurpose the device, but would be nice to get mainline u-boot eventually (and then reformat the partition and install there). Chainloading mainline u-boot works fine, it's all the bl2 and bl3x bits.

Quote from sam_nazarko

>This, in my opinion, is because they (OSMC) didn't modify the default bootloader script to remove the "wipeisb" & decided to use multiple Android partitions in an LVM group.

Thanks for the report. This is fixed in this commit:

Hopefully that will help folks experimenting with the toothpick method from having their eMMC install corrupted, it's fairly easy to recover using the recovery media. It's never been a big deal for me.

Quote from frakkin64

I figured that would be coming, CE is ending support for S905x devices after 21 (at least that is the latest announcement, I think they were trying to end it with 20), so expecting it is coming to a close eventually on the OSMC side as well.

That's why part of my interest is in mainline and v4l2 video pipeline (unfortunately that's a slow road for Amlogic), but I boot Armbian as well on the device using the stock bootloader and modified boot scripts (similar to what LE does), just need some postinst triggers on the kernel to build a uImage (since they dropped that). The other part with CE is mainly to get access to bleeding edge Kodi with a fully working video playback. There are options for folks to repurpose the device, but would be nice to get mainline u-boot eventually (and then reformat the partition and install there). Chainloading mainline u-boot works fine, it's all the bl2 and bl3x bits.

Hopefully that will help folks experimenting with the toothpick method from having their eMMC install corrupted, it's fairly easy to recover using the recovery media. It's never been a big deal for me.

I'll try and keep things going for long as possible, but Kodi has become more resource hungry since we released the Vero 4K in 2017 and 7 years and counting of support is a good run, particularly as we only promised 5. Hopefully by the time we do stop supporting it the upstream state of the art will be in good shape for it to pick up.

The 6.6 AMLogic vendor kernel makes good progress with V4L2 but it is quite tightly coupled to GStreamer as that is the focus with RDK.

Thanks for the suggestion to improve the bootloader and corruption issue. I don't normally change environment variables on a working system on 4K/4K+, so the improvement will only be seen for those that conduct fresh installations. With that said, it's better than nothing

I will send some hardware to chewitt.