Re: ODROID XU4 and UEFI - Re: Cautionary tale: how to kill an SDCard with one simple command
On Wednesday 25 July 2018 15:25:18 Brian Sammon wrote:
> On Wed, 25 Jul 2018 06:04:01 -0400
>
> Gene Heskett <gheskett@shentel.net> wrote:
> > They acknowledged it, and told me how to fix it, but the fix cost
> > more than the odroid, a jtag programmer and a special cable that
> > cost well over $125 is required. And someone else recently advised
> > me that UEFI bypassing in the bios was only legal on x86 stuffs. If
> > thats so, I'd
>
> ...
>
> > The only possible mention is at
> > <https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=138&t=20593>
>
> If we overlook the fact that that thread is about the ODROID C2 and
> not the XU4, there's still the problem that it makes no mention of
> UEFI.
>
I just went out and excavated it from a pile of junk on the table saw,
and you are correct, it is a C2. My mistake. When I went to their site,
I didn't think the pix of the XU4 was quite right, and should have dug
it out then. Its a C2, rev 0.2 20160226, so its pretty old now.
But I would certainly clarify with them that the XU4 doesn't have that
restriction and that something like armbian WILL install and run on it,
or if you are stuck with only their "signed" kernels. Their stuff is
still ubuntu based and linuxcnc will not run on the ubuntu kernels since
hardy/2008/10 lts expired. So linuxcnc's install images were then based
on debian, and both wheezy and jessie versions run very well. They now
have a new, stretch based image but I haven't tried it, stretch to me is
not yet "stable" with network setups being a flip the quarter to see if
it works in a static environment. This C2 has an empty eMMC socket on
the bottom. I might have ordered it too, but didn't know what it was for
at the time.
> It mentions a binary-only freedom-restricting firmware piece that
> ISN'T uefi. Which doesn't mean that there isn't UEFI on it, but that
> thread doesn't mention it.
Its a scary acronym. Get the suckers money before he finds out. :(
> I would expect that if the XU4 had a UEFI, there would be information
> (somewhere) about using EFI-supporting bootloaders on it, like
> grub-efi or refind.
refind? Whats it do?
> Are you sure that you're using the right term (UEFI) here to describe
> your problem?
Yes, it was in the refusal message from the bios when I tried to install
an early jessie on it. So I went into the bios looking for the switch,
but could only find a way to disable the Trusted Computing Chip, and
that bricked it. And it takes the jtag programmer to re-enable it. At
3x the cost of the C2.
> If ODROID is selling a ethically-questionable (or user-hostile) piece
> of hardware, the case against them is not helped by wrong/misleading
> terminology.
Its at least user hostile IMO.
> And as a past and potentially future customer of ODROID, I'd like to
> have an accurate understanding of this before I make future
> purchasing(/boycott) decisions.
So would I have appreciated it too. So get it in an email, and printout 2
or 3 copies for evidence before spending your money.
--
Cheers, Gene Heskett
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page <http://geneslinuxbox.net:6309/gene>
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