Proposal to create a Community Supported config for Amlogic based TV Boxes to pickup the work that was done previously by balbes150 but is no longer supported by him. This also provides a place where development can occur within the Armbian framework since others on the internet are producing builds called Armbian that are not done from within the Armbian community.

The strategy for Amlogic based TV Boxes has been to reuse the native u-boot that comes installed on the box on emmc. Through a process called 'multiboot enabling' a u-boot script is run to change the default u-boot environment to have the boot process look for a chain-loaded u-boot on either the sd card or usb. If found that 'u-boot.ext' file is loaded and the boot process continues on the armbian image on sd or usb via configs in the extlinux.conf file.

So currently the armbian build process creates and installs a u-boot in the image, but that isn't actually used (as the boxes emmc u-boot is what is used). The 'chain-loaded' u-boots (u-boot-* , different ones for different cpus) are currently pre-built and included as binary blobs.

The installation instructions currently exist in the forums.armbian.com TV Box forum and are the same as for the balbes150 builds that previously existed. (basically the user is requested to copy the appropriate u-boot-* binary to u-boot.ext for their boxes cpu and edit the extlinux.conf file with the appropriate dtb file for their box).

Things seem to work about as well as they did with balbes 5.9 kernel based builds, although I generally focus testing on server builds and don't do too much with desktop builds,

There is one issue that needs some sort of resolution however. On the s905x2 box I have (H96 Max X2) the armbian build kernel (meson64) can't read the sd card. However an unpatched mainline kernel works on this box. I have tracked down the offending patch to be: general-meson-gx-mmc-set-core-clock-phase-to-270-degres.patch Without this patch the box boots fine, with it it fails to boot. I'm not sure how to work around that.

All comments are welcome. I essentially cloned the lepotato config. I choose aml-s9xx-box for the name, as that kind of follows jock's naming convention for rk based tv boxes, but am open to any suggestions.

Changes to be committed: new file: config/boards/aml-s9xx-box.tvb modified: config/sources/families/include/meson64_common.inc modified: config/sources/families/meson-gxl.conf new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/boot/aml_autoscript new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/boot/emmc_autoscript new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/boot/extlinux/extlinux.conf new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/boot/s905_autoscript new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/boot/u-boot-readme.txt new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/boot/u-boot-s905 new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/boot/u-boot-s905x-s912 new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/boot/u-boot-s905x2-s922 new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/root/fstab.template new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/root/install-aml-s905-emmc.sh new file: packages/bsp/aml-s9xx-box/root/install-aml.sh

Description

Please include a summary of the change and which issue is fixed. Please also include relevant motivation and context. List any dependencies that are required for this change.

Jira reference number [AR-9999]

How Has This Been Tested?

Please describe the tests that you ran to verify your changes. Please also note any relevant details for your test configuration.

• [x] Built and installed on s905w (TX3 Mini), s905w (X96 Mini), s905x2 (H96 Max X2), s905x3 (TX3-X3)
• [x] Tested install to emmc

Checklist:

• [ ] My code follows the style guidelines of this project
• [ ] I have performed a self-review of my own code
• [ ] I have commented my code, particularly in hard-to-understand areas
• [ ] I have made corresponding changes to the documentation
• [ ] My changes generate no new warnings
• [ ] Any dependent changes have been merged and published in downstream modules

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