It seems that If I use the mainline kernel Ethernet does not work, in the sense that it doesn't even get initialized. ip addr will only show the loopback interface, and the kernel log will show this regarding the ethernet  port. Could it be a device tree issue?

[    6.867997] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: PTP uses main clock
[    6.868097] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: Linked as a consumer to regulator.5
[    6.868103] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: clock input or output? (input).
[    6.868112] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: TX delay(0x25).
[    6.868118] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: RX delay(0x11).
[    6.868126] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: integrated PHY? (no).
[    6.868160] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: cannot get clock clk_mac_speed
[    6.868780] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: clock input from PHY
[    6.873799] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: init for RGMII
[    6.874265] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: User ID: 0x10, Synopsys ID: 0x35
[    6.874281] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet:         DWMAC1000
[    6.874287] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: DMA HW capability register supported
[    6.874292] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: RX Checksum Offload Engine supported
[    6.874295] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: COE Type 2
[    6.874298] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: TX Checksum insertion supported
[    6.874302] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: Wake-Up On Lan supported
[    6.874346] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: Normal descriptors
[    6.874349] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: Ring mode enabled
[    6.874356] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: Enable RX Mitigation via HW Watchdog Timer
[    6.888231] rockchip-drm display-subsystem: [drm:rockchip_drm_platform_probe [rockchipdrm]] *ERROR* No available vop found for display-subsystem.
[    6.892100] libphy: stmmac: probed
[    6.892123] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: No PHY found
[    6.892285] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: stmmac_dvr_probe: MDIO bus (id: 0) registration failed
[    6.907871] rk_gmac-dwmac ff540000.ethernet: Dropping the link to regulator.5

I tried 4.18 and 4.19, both the ArchlinuxARM package and the armbian packages in beta.armbian.com. I thank you guys for the automated kernel builds! At least I can be up to date on the 4.4 kernel. Shouldn't it be working in mainline after 4.14? Any ideas?

Interesting. Ethernet works with the new 4.19.1 kernel by the ArchLinuxARM folks, found here. Latest version will be in the page https://archlinuxarm.org/packages/aarch64/linux-aarch64. Apparently it's recognized as RTL8211E (!). Anyhow, large texts over ssh (like dmesg output) lag horribly and usb doesn't work so I'll still with 4.4.y for now, but maybe I could experiment some more later.

(Just in case someone stumbles upon this post after the heat death of the universe)

 

Update on this:

These 2 patches

https://patchwork.kernel.org/patch/10804863/

https://github.com/armbian/build/blob/master/patch/kernel/rockchip64-dev/renegade-enable-usb3.patch

fix the aforementioned issues with the upstream kernel. One is on it's way, can you guess which one, based on the url?

 

The reason USB3 is not in the mainline kernel: replug issues, apparently. We'll see in the future I guess

@jpegxguy, good find!
Have you been able to get a non-Arch distro going with a newer kernel than 4.4?

I wouldn't know, I'm mostly familiar with Arch, and I used Armbian a bit in the beginning

Cheers. Arch does seem pretty swift on getting fixes in and packages out.

Thanks for the update @jpegxguy,

 

As you're aware I've been haunting the lkml, I've been laying low on 64-bit Rockchip in general since it's been a complete and utter mess.  As it stands here I think 5.1 is going to be a good place to start trying to get mainline back into Armbian.  There was absolutely no sense running after a thousand patches to get basic hardware like HDMI and USB3 working up front, I went down that road before.

 

57 minutes ago, suberimakuri said:

Have you been able to get a non-Arch distro going with a newer kernel than 4.4?

 

You can build an image with kernel 4.20 right now (last I checked it still built, building it now actually to test), we just don't support it as the kernel itself is WIP and changes can be somewhat severe from revision to revision, especially where Ayufan/Armbian/whoever else has patched it to meet their needs.

Interesting to hear! (Sorry to side track post).

My previous building effort with armbian was smooth but turned out to be invalid because the specific rock64 was verifying on turned out to have a hardware issue. 1/6, unlucky. Look forward to your results, happy to test (new topic?)

No harm, and yes, I'll tag you in the rk3328 thread since this also impacts the Rock64 v1/v2/v3

I did want to include the usb3 patch for renegade in archlinuxARM but kevin won't have it! Maybe you guys can try?

https://github.com/archlinuxarm/PKGBUILDs/pull/1650

https://github.com/archlinuxarm/PKGBUILDs/pull/1661
 

We currently build with

 

https://github.com/armbian/build/blob/master/patch/kernel/rockchip64-dev/renegade-enable-usb3.patch

Indeed, that's where I "borrowed" the patch from, but Kevin is not having it at all! hahaha

I have to build the dtb with my patch and copy it to boot every time

47 minutes ago, jpegxguy said:

Indeed, that's where I "borrowed" the patch from, but Kevin is not having it at all! hahaha

Fascinating.  I wonder why...