Ubuntu 15.10 / 16.04 for Odroid U3 ?

Hadmut · Post by **Hadmut** » Sun Oct 11, 2015 6:26 am

Hi,

I wonder whether the U3 is still supported and how to get Ubuntu 15.10 (and soon 16.04 LTS) on the U3.

Ubuntu meanwhile makes OS Builders life easier and offers two options:

- Ubuntu Core is a minimal operating system, just enough to run, based on the well-known apt, and it just needs an apropriate kernel and boot code to be added.

- Ubuntu Snappy is like Ubuntu Core, but takes a diferent package installation method and structure, and again, needs a platform-related kernel and boot code to be added.

So a central question is:

Where would I find instructions about how to compile a kernel and the boot code for the U3?

And: Are U3 XU3 and XU4 software-compatible or do they differ?

regards

meveric · Post by **meveric** » Sun Oct 11, 2015 7:17 am

Hadmut wrote:Hi,

I wonder whether the U3 is still supported and how to get Ubuntu 15.10 (and soon 16.04 LTS) on the U3.

The U3 is one of the (if not THE) best board HardKernel had to offer, it would be a really bad choise NOT to keep supporting it, while there are still tenths if not hundredths of thousands of U3 out there.
The C1 can't compete with the U3 and the XU4 is still a little unstable, but on it's way to replace the U3.
Besides that it's rather easy to convert an image between all boards. If you have one working image (for example for the XU3/XU4) it's easy to convert this to an U3 image.
It basicly comes down to exchanging the Kernel and the libMali.so that's all that needs to be done.
So the moment for Any board there is a 15.10 or 16.04 image they can easily convert it for the U3.
Anyway.. Since HardKernel decided to create a 15.04 image they are forced to make a 15.10 and a 16.04 image for the XU3/XU4 series, since in Januar the support for 15.04 will end and by then the 16.04. image will not be available yet, so they have to move to 15.10 at some point, or else they leave their images wide open for bugs of all kind.

Hadmut wrote: Ubuntu meanwhile makes OS Builders life easier and offers two options:

- Ubuntu Core is a minimal operating system, just enough to run, based on the well-known apt, and it just needs an apropriate kernel and boot code to be added.

- Ubuntu Snappy is like Ubuntu Core, but takes a diferent package installation method and structure, and again, needs a platform-related kernel and boot code to be added.

I don't think this makes it any easier. In fact it's probably way more complicated.. Especially the Ubuntu Snappy is causing lots of issues, I don't think they gonna keep Snappy for ever, but will either replace it with something more solid, or just drop it completely in favor of Ubuntu Core.
Ubuntu Core, is too minimal to be any use as a Desktop Image, therefore is also not really a choise for ODROIDs.

Hadmut wrote:So a central question is:

Where would I find instructions about how to compile a kernel and the boot code for the U3?

On the ODROID Wiki: http://odroid.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id= ... ing_kernel

Hadmut wrote:And: Are U3 XU3 and XU4 software-compatible or do they differ?

Generally software compatible, but not IMAGE compatible.. Means you can't run an XU3 image on an U3, but you can run (nearly all) the same programs on all boards.

Hadmut · Post by **Hadmut** » Sun Oct 11, 2015 8:27 am

Ubuntu Core, is too minimal to be any use as a Desktop Image, therefore is also not really a choise for ODROIDs.

On the contrary.

Since the regular Ubuntu Core (not Snappy) uses the plain apt, you can install whatever you want, as long as packages are available in the repo, including any desktop you'd like to have.

meveric · Post by **meveric** » Sun Oct 11, 2015 9:09 am

that's the point.. the drivers for ODROID are not available and have to be compiled manually.. they have quite some dependencies and if certain packages change, they need to be recompiled every time (Xorg Server for example).
Others are precompiled binaries and have to be placed manually..

It's probably harder to keep track on changes in Ubuntu Core than on a standard Ubuntu release.. the LTS releases are normally much easier to handle and mostly well maintained.

Hadmut · Post by **Hadmut** » Sun Oct 11, 2015 6:19 pm

> It's probably harder to keep track on changes in Ubuntu Core than on a standard Ubuntu release.. the LTS releases are normally much easier to handle and mostly well maintained.

Yeah,

but I have to deal with several ARM platforms (Odroid, Raspberry, Banana, Cubie) , and I hate to download different private-brewn images from different (untrusted?) websites,...

I need to get some generic way to generate images. And it looks as if Ubuntu's way to separate the distribution from the platform-specific parts is a good way to achieve that.

I, btw., do not use my own, personal odroid as a desktop machine, but as a server. I'd prefer a stripped down minimum installation (like Ubuntu Server) instead of a desktop image.

memeka · Post by **memeka** » Sun Oct 11, 2015 9:01 pm

meveric wrote: It's probably harder to keep track on changes in Ubuntu Core than on a standard Ubuntu release.. the LTS releases are normally much easier to handle and mostly well maintained.

ubuntu core (not snappy), ubuntu server and desktop are all the same thing only package selection is different. core has the most minimum, server has more, desktop even more. server and desktop also come with kernel, useless for arm.
ubuntu core 14.04 is lts.

meveric · Post by **meveric** » Mon Oct 12, 2015 5:39 am

memeka wrote:ubuntu core (not snappy), ubuntu server and desktop are all the same thing only package selection is different. core has the most minimum, server has more, desktop even more. server and desktop also come with kernel, useless for arm.
ubuntu core 14.04 is lts.

Well, that's good to know, thanks for the Info.

memeka · Post by **memeka** » Mon Oct 12, 2015 7:14 am

memeka wrote:
meveric wrote: It's probably harder to keep track on changes in Ubuntu Core than on a standard Ubuntu release.. the LTS releases are normally much easier to handle and mostly well maintained.
ubuntu core (not snappy), ubuntu server and desktop are all the same thing only package selection is different. core has the most minimum, server has more, desktop even more. server and desktop also come with kernel, useless for arm.
ubuntu core 14.04 is lts.

by "package selection" i mean "pre-installed packages". the package sources are the same, so you can install exactly the same things on all versions. from core, doing "sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop" will get you with exactly the same thing as the ubuntu desktop image (minus the kernel).

Post by **odroid** » Tue Oct 13, 2015 9:22 am

We have a plan to release Ubuntu 16.04 for ODROID-U3/U2/X2 in Q2 2016.

halloween · Post by **halloween** » Wed Apr 27, 2016 2:29 am

Any news on 16.04 for u3?

Post by **odroid** » Wed Apr 27, 2016 10:29 am

I hope we can release it by end of May.

vbextreme · Post by **vbextreme** » Fri Apr 29, 2016 7:09 pm

I hope it's released with DE mate.

uDude · Post by **uDude** » Thu May 12, 2016 6:35 pm

Thanks @Odroid. The U3, for a dev board, has really been production quality. I appreciate the continued support to 16.04.

To those wishing to build a kernel -- if you build on the U3 a s you would any kernel it will run. The problem will be with any backports of drivers you might want (though the 4.2/4.4 kernels are pretty complete. Also a lot of exynos optimizations have been added up front. I find "server" quality builds easy. That said,on builds for the XU* series boards, I do have the same x-windows crash issues for desktop build issues and have had to use arora a s the browser until I decide to actually look at the cause of chromium and firefox crashing X. Not in my plans since I use the u3 for desktop and XU* for servier platforms.

uDude.

HiDeHo · Post by **HiDeHo** » Tue May 24, 2016 4:19 pm

vbextreme wrote:I hope it's released with DE mate.

while mate is a good desktop. Xfce is the best followed by Lxde if the Xfce problems still exist.

Post by **odroid** » Tue May 24, 2016 4:49 pm

Give us a few more weeks to make the Ubuntu 16.04 image for Exynos-4412 platforms.

nijhawank · Post by **nijhawank** » Fri May 27, 2016 3:07 pm

@odroid, could you use liquidacid latest 4.x kernels for the new images?

Xorg · Post by **Xorg** » Thu Jun 09, 2016 3:14 am

odroid wrote:Give us a few more weeks to make the Ubuntu 16.04 image for Exynos-4412 platforms.

any news? any "beta images"?

ating · Post by **ating** » Wed Jun 15, 2016 4:00 pm

I'm looking forward...

Post by **odroid** » Wed Jun 15, 2016 4:18 pm

Frankly speaking, it seems to be impossible in a month due to many pending issues.
It is really hard to estimate the release date at this moment.
Sorry about that.

safeman · Post by **safeman** » Wed Jun 15, 2016 8:12 pm

odroid wrote:Frankly speaking, it seems to be impossible in a month due to many pending issues.
It is really hard to estimate the release date at this moment.
Sorry about that.

Thanks for the update... so frustrating :-/

halloween · Post by **halloween** » Thu Jul 14, 2016 10:38 pm

Any news?

mdaur · Post by **mdaur** » Sat Jul 16, 2016 6:20 pm

Hi,
is is possible to get an update maybe once a quater which new images might become available (e.g. for the older platform like an u3)?

I appreciate your support, thanks martin

iggy_noob · Post by **iggy_noob** » Tue Jul 26, 2016 5:04 am

Anything new on this?

Post by **odroid** » Tue Jul 26, 2016 9:54 am

Once we release C1+/C0 Ubunut 16.04 end of this month, we will start to develop one for U2/U3.

safeman · Post by **safeman** » Thu Sep 08, 2016 11:26 pm

odroid wrote:Once we release C1+/C0 Ubunut 16.04 end of this month, we will start to develop one for U2/U3.

I see you released 16.04 for C1+/C0 end July, and have been handling some issues since... any progress on a build for U2/U3? Thanks.

Post by **odroid** » Fri Sep 09, 2016 9:39 am

We've spent very long to fix the Kodi issue on U3/U2 16.04 image development.
But there is no improvement yet.
So we will release it early next week if we can't fix it by this weekend.

meveric · Post by **meveric** » Fri Sep 09, 2016 2:35 pm

odroid wrote:We've spent very long to fix the Kodi issue on U3/U2 16.04 image development.
But there is no improvement yet.
So we will release it early next week if we can't fix it by this weekend.

What Kodi issue?

Post by **odroid** » Fri Sep 09, 2016 3:04 pm

Video output screen is shaking from time to time while GUI output is okay.

safeman · Post by **safeman** » Fri Sep 09, 2016 3:51 pm

odroid wrote:Video output screen is shaking from time to time while GUI output is okay.

Please don't hold this up for Kodi, not everyone uses it! I've been waiting months because I need this kernel update, tried arch but it doesn't work and have not had any response from that arch on ARM support website.

Please please this weekend!

meveric · Post by **meveric** » Fri Sep 09, 2016 6:27 pm

odroid wrote:Video output screen is shaking from time to time while GUI output is okay.

Hmm I've been using Kodi 16.1 for several months already (also on the U3) and haven't seen this issue.
But I haven't used the U3 very often lately.
I'll probably hook it up tonight and give Kodi a longer trail.
Is it happening randomly or with specific media?

tve · Post by **tve** » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:01 am

Please at least release the minimal image soon. Some of us don't have any form of display or video hooked to their U3's...

mikewhatever · Post by **mikewhatever** » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:04 am

How about the server edition? Is it ready yet?
I care nothing about Kodi, just the server with security patches, kernel included.
...almost given up waiting by now.

Xorg · Post by **Xorg** » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:17 am

As odroid said, they'll release it next week if they can't fix it this weekend. Don't be impatient. If you want an always-up-to-date server OS, I'd recommend meveric's Debian Jessie

Xorg · Post by **Xorg** » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:32 am

odroid wrote:We've spent very long to fix the Kodi issue on U3/U2 16.04 image development.
But there is no improvement yet.
So we will release it early next week if we can't fix it by this weekend.

What desktop environment are/will you use?

safeman · Post by **safeman** » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:46 am

Xorg wrote:As odroid said, they'll release it next week if they can't fix it this weekend. Don't be impatient. If you want an always-up-to-date server OS, I'd recommend meveric's Debian Jessie

Why not be impatient!?

Not that waiting months isn't patience

Anyway, thanks. I didn't know about meveric's Debian Jesse. Is there a wiki or somewhere that lists all the official and community images?

Post by **odroid** » Sat Sep 10, 2016 11:34 am

meveric wrote:Is it happening randomly or with specific media?

Randomly and frequently.

meveric · Post by **meveric** » Sat Sep 10, 2016 8:33 pm

odroid wrote:
meveric wrote:Is it happening randomly or with specific media?
Randomly and frequently.

I watched:

30mins of live stream from disneychannel.de Kodi Add-On (25 FPS @50Hz on TV)
zapped throug different episodes of "The Flash" on 1Channel Add-On for Kodi (@24Hz)
two full episode of "The Flash" on 1Channel Add-On for Kodi (@24Hz)
Sintel and Tears of Steel from network share

I never encounted any shaking neither on video nor menu.

Post by **odroid** » Mon Sep 12, 2016 9:42 am

Thank you for the feedback.
Did you use Oversun's repo to build the Kodi 16?
If yes, please share your build/configuration parameter?

meveric · Post by **meveric** » Mon Sep 12, 2016 2:23 pm

odroid wrote:Thank you for the feedback.
Did you use Oversun's repo to build the Kodi 16?
If yes, please share your build/configuration parameter?

I am using Oversuns repo.
I use one build for all armhf boards including both AmCodec as well as MFC support.
I'll drop you a PM.

nijhawank · Post by **nijhawank** » Tue Sep 13, 2016 8:58 am

So I'm assuming that you are not using LiquidAcid latest 4.x series kernels?

Post by **odroid** » Tue Sep 13, 2016 9:05 am

nijhawank wrote:So I'm assuming that you are not using LiquidAcid latest 4.x series kernels?

Right. There are still some critical issues we can't solve.

memeka · Post by **memeka** » Wed Sep 14, 2016 2:34 pm

what are those critical issues?

safeman · Post by **safeman** » Sat Sep 17, 2016 2:57 am

odroid wrote:We've spent very long to fix the Kodi issue on U3/U2 16.04 image development.
But there is no improvement yet.
So we will release it early next week if we can't fix it by this weekend.

What's the latest please?

Xorg · Post by **Xorg** » Wed Sep 21, 2016 3:03 am

odroid wrote:We've spent very long to fix the Kodi issue on U3/U2 16.04 image development.
But there is no improvement yet.
So we will release it early next week if we can't fix it by this weekend.

Last week is over, so what problems are still getting fixed?

Post by **odroid** » Wed Sep 21, 2016 11:01 am

Give us a couple of days. Sorry for the delay.

Update :
Has been released.
http://odroid.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id= ... e_20160921

MartinvH · Post by **MartinvH** » Thu Sep 22, 2016 7:22 pm

Glad to see the new release. Will there be a minimal version for headless systems aswell?

hugolp · Post by **hugolp** » Fri Sep 23, 2016 5:39 am

MartinvH wrote:Glad to see the new release. Will there be a minimal version for headless systems aswell?

Also interested in a minimal version for headless system.

And thanks to hardkernel for supporting an old device for so long. This is one of the reasons why I keep buying your devices over other options (I got a C2 just yesterday).

safeman · Post by **safeman** » Fri Sep 23, 2016 6:27 am

odroid wrote:Give us a couple of days. Sorry for the delay.
Has been released.
http://odroid.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id= ... e_20160921

W00t! Thank you.

safeman · Post by **safeman** » Sat Sep 24, 2016 7:02 am

Thanks for the Ubuntu image. Can anyone help a none expert get this configured?

I have it booting fine on a U3 with USB keyboard and grotty HDMI TV.

### Config
There was no configuration wizard on first boot. The MATE desktop shows Odroid Home and BOOT, but I don't see a config command as in the original Ubuntu image shipped with my Odroids. Perhaps this is no longer supplied, but I think the config shipped with the original 14.04 Ubuntu dist from hardkernel addressed some of the issues I have here.

I temporarily edited /etc/hostname and rebooted, but having some issues I have restored it to "odroid" and rebooted. So I'm working with a pretty clean boot and still having problems.

### WIFi
Main issue is the WiFi because without this I have no internet.

I have the Hardkernel supplied WiFi dongle (Realtek RTL8188CUS) and sometimes when I plug it in it flashes, and I have seen a desktop notification showing it is being recognised. The MATE menu has no WiFi or Network Manager app that I can find or start from the command line.

Is there a recommended network configuration process?

EDIT: am I correct in thinking that the image lacks a driver for the Realtek WiFi dongle supplied by hardkernel, and that I need to download this and compile it in order to get it to work? I looked for Realtek RTL8188CUS drivers on the Realtek website but the page for RTL8188CUS Software is blank!

UPDATE: I have tried both Realtek WiFi Dongle and tether to my Samsung mobile to try and get internet (I have no ethernet here). Neither is working:

- WiFi I had no success with this and started looking for the driver but without success (see above)
- tethering: this is strange. I have had it working intermittently and tweaked various settings based on googling similar issues. I got it working well enough at the end of one evening to do a full Ubuntu update including d/l of 40MB for a Firefox update. Next morning I got almost nothing, literally a few seconds where pinging a numeric IP worked and then no more in several hours. I looked at syslog and dmesg but I can't post the details here (because no internet) but it looks like when I plug in the USB to phone, the usb i/f is recognised successfully. I then enable tethering on the phone and the USB shuts down and then tries to read the new USB device and fails with something about not being able to read config from the device. There are about four retries with incrementing device addresses, and the same error each time before it gives up.

I've spent a lot of time looking for things to try so giving up now. Next time I have access to ethernet I'll try that, or hope someone here has some bright idea or succeeds in getting tethering or WiFi working with Ubuntu 16.04 on Odroid-U3.

### Screen

The screen is also a little too large for my monitor which only allows me a little H/V displacement (no resizing) so I also want to change this somehow, but again can't see anything to help with this. This is much less important, but I can't see the menu at the top of the screen so may be missing useful UI information.

jleeca · Post by **jleeca** » Sun Sep 25, 2016 4:32 am

The new image works great. I'm using my U3 with Kodi but I found "Arial based" fonts are not correctly working as all Korean characters are displayed simply as boxes. It's working fine now after replacing the /usr/share/kodi/media/Fonts/arial.ttf file with one from old distribution. So it looks like the font is either not working with the latest Kodi or it's corrupted. Other than that it's working great!