Hi,

 

I received my new rock64 today and I downloaded this image https://dl.armbian.com/rock64/Debian_stretch_default_desktop.7z

 

I used Etcher as recommended to create the SD card and booted off of it with just power and network connected as I assumed it would boot, assign a dhcp address and bring up sshd so I could remote onto it.

 

I scanned my network to see if any new devices had been added with dhcp, but couldn't see anything new so I connected the rock64 up to a TV and then booted it up, connected up a keyboard and noticed it ran through an install process on first local login. I followed all the directions and a desktop appeared on screen. However, there was no network connectivity so I had a look at /etc/network/interfaces and could see that nothing at all had been set for eth0. Only the loopback interface was defined.

 

I manually edited /etc/network/interfaces and added my eth0 static IP config in there and rebooted and the eth0 network came up as expected.

source /etc/network/interfaces.d/*
# Network is managed by Network manager
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

allow-hotplug eth0
iface eth0 inet static
        address 10.0.0.42/24
        gateway 10.0.0.2
        dns-nameservers 10.0.0.2

 

Is this expected behaviour for the rock64 Debian image? In that, you have to manually configure eth0 after running through the install process or is this a bug?

 

Thanks very much for your help and for maintaining a distribution for the rock64.

 

nope isn't.. 

2 hours ago, adr3nal1n said:

source /etc/network/interfaces.d/* # Network is managed by Network manager

we don't use archaic /etc/network/interfaces by default anymore.. Instead we use NetworkManager. If you don't tell NM that he should now ignore this interface, chances are there that it will (try to) take control over it again..  But by default NM should work and DHCP should be the default behavior.. 

 

Can you sent the output of 'sudo armbianmonitor -u'  ?

Edited September 25, 20188 yr by chwe
oops.. that w was missing (and it's an important one)

Hi chwe,

 

Output is at http://ix.io/1nyf

 

Thanks ever so much for your help and guidance.

8 hours ago, adr3nal1n said:

Is this expected behaviour for the rock64 Debian image? In that, you have to manually configure eth0 after running through the install process or is this a bug?

According to our testings, there is no bug: https://github.com/armbian/testings 

On some boards, it can take a little longer that networks get initialized. Your logs show expected entry:
[ 13.398258] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 100Mbps/Full - flow control off

9 hours ago, adr3nal1n said:

Output is at http://ix.io/1nyf

 

Search for 'eth0: Link is Up' in there (doesn't appear for every boot since logging in Armbian is currently broken but nobody cares). The first occurrence shows only 100 MBits/sec negotiation w/o flow control and then no DHCP lease assigned. I would suspect cabling/contact problems on first boot 'magically' resolved later. There's no need to manually assign an IP address and please if you want to do so then keep the anachronistic /network/interfaces files blank and use nmtui instead.

 

That's the relevant log lines:

[   13.398258] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 100Mbps/Full - flow control off
[    7.441246] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 1Gbps/Full - flow control rx/tx
[    7.207272] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 1Gbps/Full - flow control rx/tx
[   15.023224] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 1Gbps/Full - flow control rx/tx

 

 

25 minutes ago, tkaiser said:

but nobody cares

 

@lanefu self-assigned this 7 days ago. I need to recharge.

1 hour ago, tkaiser said:

 

Search for 'eth0: Link is Up' in there (doesn't appear for every boot since logging in Armbian is currently broken but nobody cares). The first occurrence shows only 100 MBits/sec negotiation w/o flow control and then no DHCP lease assigned. I would suspect cabling/contact problems on first boot 'magically' resolved later. There's no need to manually assign an IP address and please if you want to do so then keep the anachronistic /network/interfaces files blank and use nmtui instead.

 

That's the relevant log lines:

[   13.398258] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 100Mbps/Full - flow control off
[    7.441246] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 1Gbps/Full - flow control rx/tx
[    7.207272] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 1Gbps/Full - flow control rx/tx
[   15.023224] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet eth0: Link is Up - 1Gbps/Full - flow control rx/tx

hi tkaiser,

Thanks very much for your guidance on this. I can explain the log entries above regarding ethernet connectivity. The first entry was me having had to connect the rock64 directly to one of the fast ethernet ports on my router downstairs, which is located near the TV, as I needed the TV and a keyboard hooked up to work through the initial install process via local login. The entires you see where the ethernet port negotiates at 1Gbps is where I have now moved the rock64 to my comms cupboard upstairs and have connected it to my server LAN switch which has 1Gbps ports.

 

Thanks for the tip regarding nmtui, I never knew this existed to be honest, as I have never really used NetworkManager as I do not run a desktop on any of my linux devices & servers, they all run headless and I manage them via ssh. I usually configure all my linux devices/servers with static IP addressing and if it is a debian based distro, then I set this via /etc/network/interfaces as suggested by the debian wiki.

 

One other quick query if I may, what is the most elegant way for me to remove the desktop and associated packages from my current rock64 armbian install? Am I best to simply autoremove a package in xserver-xorg and hope that it then removes all associated dependencies? (Am not experienced in linux desktop configuration so am not familar with the package dependencies etc)

 

Thanks again for all your help and support.

 

1 hour ago, tkaiser said:

 

 

3 minutes ago, adr3nal1n said:

One other quick query if I may, what is the most elegant way for me to remove the desktop and associated packages from my current rock64 armbian install?

Perhaps apt purge armbian-RELEASE-desktop ? You can also just temporally disable it in the armbian-config.

10 minutes ago, adr3nal1n said:

Thanks for the tip regarding nmtui, I never knew this existed to be honest, as I have never really used NetworkManager as I do not run a desktop on any of my linux devices & servers, they all run headless and I manage them via ssh. I usually configure all my linux devices/servers with static IP addressing and if it is a debian based distro, then I set this via /etc/network/interfaces as suggested by the debian wiki

 

NM works great in CLI only mode and other distros than 'everything outdated as hell' (AKA Debian) use it for some time especially in server environments. If you don't need a desktop environment switching to Ubuntu Bionic might also be an idea (depends on what you're doing -- more recent package versions built with a more recent compiler sometimes result in stuff being done faster)

Thanks again tkaiser for the advice,

 

I am now using the Ubuntu Bionic image and have used nmtui to configure eth0 from the cli ;-)

 

I definitely prefer the minimal package install Ubuntu Bionic image.