Linux on Vega (Ubuntu, meeGo)

[Guest vgrade]

Hi,

I just thought I would start a thread to report progress on getting Linux distributions up on the Vega.

I'm looking at meeGo but ubuntu has some support already on the Tegra 2 development board.

As a start see the following sites.

http://tegradeveloper.nvidia.com/tegra/for...-run-ubuntu-now

http://tegradeveloper.nvidia.com/tegra/downloads

vgrade

[Guest paulsmith]

Hi,

I just thought I would start a thread to report progress on getting Linux distributions up on the Vega.

I'm looking at meeGo but ubuntu has some support already on the Tegra 2 development board.

As a start see the following sites.

http://tegradeveloper.nvidia.com/tegra/for...-run-ubuntu-now

http://tegradeveloper.nvidia.com/tegra/downloads

vgrade

Id love to have ubuntu running on mine.

[Guest Drizz]

Duel booting would be awesome.

Dare I say it but could Windows 7, not be ported over too?

[Guest removed-14]

Duel booting would be awesome.

Dare I say it but could Windows 7, not be ported over too?

Nope. Windows uses x86 and Vega isn't.

[Guest emergant]

Nope. Windows uses x86 and Vega isn't.

One of the reasons I have the advent and not the archos is meego/ubuntu etc. The extra ram will likely be a very big deal here I suspect.

I'm no developer but heres my thoughts and I'd be interested in what others think.

Ideally we'd need dual boot and a way to be sure we wont brick the device. Booting off of sd card or usb would help here. No idea if the stock bootloader can be made to do that. If not perhaps kexec could be compiled into a new kernel but we need to be sure we can recover if anything goes wrong. Need to find out more about booting tegra.

I've been following the G tablet developments on xda. It seems that nvflash makes that one near unbrickable but I'm not sure about the advent.

I'm a bit concerned about the internal memory being only 512 MB. It's emmc I guess which I think means automatic wear levelling but I'm far from sure. I don't know how to confirm this? If it is just like an mmc card we dont need to use YAFFS. Switching to BRTFS gets compression which would be a big win but I dont want to mess up the flash. I think UBIFS? maybe an option but I know very little about it?

The final issue is drivers. Last I looked on the nvidia tegra site the latest xorg was not supported? Needs checking.

I'm sure theres others more skilled than me and hopefully this will receive some attention

Matbe useful info here?

[Guest vgrade]

I'm planning to fastboot the stock kernel with a meeGo rootfs on the an sdcard.

As usual we will have problems with xserver support, same as every other meeGo port I've done (joggler, nexus 1) but should be possible to get something up quickly, even if its software gl.

One of the reasons I have the advent and not the archos is meego/ubuntu etc. The extra ram will likely be a very big deal here I suspect.

I'm no developer but heres my thoughts and I'd be interested in what others think.

Ideally we'd need dual boot and a way to be sure we wont brick the device. Booting off of sd card or usb would help here. No idea if the stock bootloader can be made to do that. If not perhaps kexec could be compiled into a new kernel but we need to be sure we can recover if anything goes wrong. Need to find out more about booting tegra.

I've been following the G tablet developments on xda. It seems that nvflash makes that one near unbrickable but I'm not sure about the advent.

I'm a bit concerned about the internal memory being only 512 MB. It's emmc I guess which I think means automatic wear levelling but I'm far from sure. I don't know how to confirm this? If it is just like an mmc card we dont need to use YAFFS. Switching to BRTFS gets compression which would be a big win but I dont want to mess up the flash. I think UBIFS? maybe an option but I know very little about it?

The final issue is drivers. Last I looked on the nvidia tegra site the latest xorg was not supported? Needs checking.

I'm sure theres others more skilled than me and hopefully this will receive some attention

Matbe useful info here?

[Guest emergant]

I'm planning to fastboot the stock kernel with a meeGo rootfs on the an sdcard.

As usual we will have problems with xserver support, same as every other meeGo port I've done (joggler, nexus 1) but should be possible to get something up quickly, even if its software gl.

It would be great to see a full Linux on this device. I was hoping to use the microsd but then I saw the speeds of microsd and wasn't so sure. Then I thought of USB but it seems that thats likely not happening.

I just saw that I missed the link off my last post. I suspect you are aware of it but heres a site putting ubuntu on a tegra based ac100. Theres info which may help re the nvflash utility and the bootloader etc

http://tosh-ac100.wetpaint.com/page/Resources+on+the+Web

[Guest vgrade]

Thanks for the link

It would be great to see a full Linux on this device. I was hoping to use the microsd but then I saw the speeds of microsd and wasn't so sure. Then I thought of USB but it seems that thats likely not happening.

I just saw that I missed the link off my last post. I suspect you are aware of it but heres a site putting ubuntu on a tegra based ac100. Theres info which may help re the nvflash utility and the bootloader etc

http://tosh-ac100.wetpaint.com/page/Resources+on+the+Web

[Guest martinbrook]

Vega in tonight.

Let the hack begin

Thanks for the link

[Guest martinbrook]

MeeGo is not currently built for the particular version of ARM chip used in the Vega so this will be on hold until it is.

Vega in tonight.

Let the hack begin

[Guest martinbrook]

\o/ - kernel messages to framebuffer on #advent #vega #tegra2

I can see what's going on.

This will be a first for one of my MeeGo ports.

vgrade

MeeGo is not currently built for the particular version of ARM chip used in the Vega so this will be on hold until it is.

[Guest martinbrook]

From stock vega - dmesg > dmesg.log

mem=448M@0M nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb console=ttyS0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 tegraboot=nand mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata)

backup device using nvflash - http://tosh-ac100.wetpaint.com/page/Backup+and+Restore

split partition 7 (boot.img) to kernel and ramdisk using split_bootimg.pl - http://android-dls.com/wiki/index.php?titl...ack_Boot_Images

Change to use tty0 and try to point root to scdcard which has ubuntu fs, no need for initrd

./mkbootimg --kernel part-7.img-kernel --ramdisk part-7.img-ramdisk.gz --cmdline "root=/dev/mmcblk3p1 rootdelay=15 rw mem=448M@0M noinitrd nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb console=tty0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 debug tegraboot=nand mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata) " -o kernel100.img

nvflash --bl bootloader.bin --download 7 kernelxxx.img

Good (now have frame buffer output) but still boots from internal flash - stock kernel

Try /dev/block/mmcblk3p1

./mkbootimg --kernel part-7.img-kernel --ramdisk part-7.img-ramdisk.gz --cmdline "root=/dev/block/mmcblk3p1 rootdelay=15 rw mem=448M@0M noinitrd nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb console=tty0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 debug tegraboot=nand mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata) " -o kernel101.img

Seems to be booting from mmc even though I have a root=, is it the tegraboot=nand?

./mkbootimg --kernel part-7.img-kernel --ramdisk part-7.img-ramdisk.gz --cmdline "root=/dev/block/mmcblk3p1 rootdelay=15 rw mem=448M@0M noinitrd nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb console=tty0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 debug mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata) " -o kernel102.img

This did try to boot something other than internal flash initially but failed - last try before bed (2.35am) - point to init

./mkbootimg --kernel part-7.img-kernel --ramdisk part-7.img-ramdisk.gz --cmdline "root=/dev/block/mmcblk3p1 rootdelay=15 rw mem=448M@0M noinitrd nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb init=/sbin/init console=tty0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 debug mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata) " -o kernel103.img

no change - realy time for bed now. (2.50am)

happy hacking - vgrade

\o/ - kernel messages to framebuffer on #advent #vega #tegra2

I can see what's going on.

This will be a first for one of my MeeGo ports.

vgrade

[Guest Bobbler]

Nope. Windows uses x86 and Vega isn't.

As of yesterday that just changed:

http://www.dailytech.com/Microsofts+Ballme...rticle20580.htm

Demo'd Windows running on Tegra 2 :unsure:

[Guest emergant]

As of yesterday that just changed:

http://www.dailytech.com/Microsofts+Ballme...rticle20580.htm

Demo'd Windows running on Tegra 2 :unsure:

Unless you want to abandon your windows applications, I suggest you stick with Intel.

[Guest emergant]

From stock vega - dmesg > dmesg.log

mem=448M@0M nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb console=ttyS0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 tegraboot=nand mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata)

backup device using nvflash - http://tosh-ac100.wetpaint.com/page/Backup+and+Restore

split partition 7 (boot.img) to kernel and ramdisk using split_bootimg.pl - http://android-dls.com/wiki/index.php?titl...ack_Boot_Images

Change to use tty0 and try to point root to scdcard which has ubuntu fs, no need for initrd

./mkbootimg --kernel part-7.img-kernel --ramdisk part-7.img-ramdisk.gz --cmdline "root=/dev/mmcblk3p1 rootdelay=15 rw mem=448M@0M noinitrd nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb console=tty0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 debug tegraboot=nand mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata) " -o kernel100.img

nvflash --bl bootloader.bin --download 7 kernelxxx.img

Good (now have frame buffer output) but still boots from internal flash - stock kernel

Try /dev/block/mmcblk3p1

./mkbootimg --kernel part-7.img-kernel --ramdisk part-7.img-ramdisk.gz --cmdline "root=/dev/block/mmcblk3p1 rootdelay=15 rw mem=448M@0M noinitrd nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb console=tty0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 debug tegraboot=nand mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata) " -o kernel101.img

Seems to be booting from mmc even though I have a root=, is it the tegraboot=nand?

./mkbootimg --kernel part-7.img-kernel --ramdisk part-7.img-ramdisk.gz --cmdline "root=/dev/block/mmcblk3p1 rootdelay=15 rw mem=448M@0M noinitrd nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb console=tty0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 debug mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata) " -o kernel102.img

This did try to boot something other than internal flash initially but failed - last try before bed (2.35am) - point to init

./mkbootimg --kernel part-7.img-kernel --ramdisk part-7.img-ramdisk.gz --cmdline "root=/dev/block/mmcblk3p1 rootdelay=15 rw mem=448M@0M noinitrd nvmem=64M@448M vmalloc=192M video=tegrafb init=/sbin/init console=tty0,115200n8 usbcore.old_scheme_first=1 debug mtdparts=tegra_nand:2048K@6784K(misc),5120K@9344K(recovery),8192K@14976K(boot),1

2496K@23680K(system),32768K@146688K(cache),4096K@179968K(staging),339200K@184576

(userdata) " -o kernel103.img

no change - realy time for bed now. (2.50am)

happy hacking - vgrade

You may need to use the nvidia fastboot.stock.bin bootloader? More general info here. Good luck

http://tegradeveloper.nvidia.com/tegra/for...-run-ubuntu-now

[Guest rpmccormick]

I'd love to see Google ChromiumOS beta running on this thing!

(or even try GoogleTV ...without tuner, unless a PC-Tuner on LAN could stream to it, that would be awesome) -probably much more difficult then ChromiumOS though, so lets stick with that :unsure:

Edited January 6, 2011 by rpmccormick

[Guest martinbrook]

I've been thinking about this overnight and looking at the logs.

Seems the ramdisk is still being loaded and init run from there even though I have a noinitrd in the boot line.

You may need to use the nvidia fastboot.stock.bin bootloader? More general info here. Good luck

http://tegradeveloper.nvidia.com/tegra/for...-run-ubuntu-now

[Guest NS_nix]

Hi,

Advent Vega is exactly same device with Malata and Viewsonic G Tablet.

Hacking of Vega and Viewsonic ROMS.

http://www.androidpolice.com/2010/12/29/vi...a-great-tablet/

Vgrade, you can downlload the kernel source of the Viewsonic G tablet from here.

http://www.viewsonic.com/gtablet/news.htm

It is a dff file for the stock tegra 2 kernel.

I hope you can run Meego on this device soon.

NS_nix

Edited January 6, 2011 by NS_nix

[Guest emergant]

Hi,

Advent Vega is exactly same device with Malata and Viewsonic G Tablet.

Hacking of Vega and Viewsonic ROMS.

http://www.androidpolice.com/2010/12/29/vi...a-great-tablet/

Vgrade, you can downlload the kernel source of the Viewsonic G tablet from here.

http://www.viewsonic.com/gtablet/news.htm

It is a dff file for the stock tegra 2 kernel.

I hope you can run Meego on this device soon.

NS_nix

The gtab is certainly similar but not identical. The Roms are not drop in replacements and the kernel isn't the same

Meego would certainly be great

[Guest emergant]

I've been thinking about this overnight and looking at the logs.

Seems the ramdisk is still being loaded and init run from there even though I have a noinitrd in the boot line.

Interesting. Perhaps the initdrd is hard coded into the bootloader. I imagine you either need to remove the ramdisk from the image. Or replace it?

[Guest martinbrook]

This might be it.

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.p...mp;postcount=28

Interesting. Perhaps the initdrd is hard coded into the bootloader. I imagine you either need to remove the ramdisk from the image. Or replace it?

[Guest martinbrook]

Also this patch http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.p...mp;postcount=29

This might be it.

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.p...mp;postcount=28

[Guest emergant]

Also this patch http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.p...mp;postcount=29

So is this source code for grub on tetra or am I an idiot.

http://nv-tegra.nvidia.com/gitweb/

Edited January 6, 2011 by emergant

[Guest NS_nix]

The gtab is certainly similar but not identical. The Roms are not drop in replacements and the kernel isn't the same

Meego would certainly be great

If I understand correctly what you are implying that the ROM and Kernel Images are seperate things in this device. When you can flash the ROM, you don't replace the kernel, is the right?

Advent Vega kernel source available already?

However, I think G tab kernel source is still a place to start rather than just using the stock tegra 2 kernel source code. It has driver for the component sthat probably the same in Vega.

I am not reality saying that the devices are identical in appearance. I thought that most of the forums says that they are the same, I thought that the guts and components are the same in these devices.

If you read this forum --- VEGAn-Tab Build, based off Advent Vega firmware BETA 5.1 (updated again 12/31/2010

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=10170776

It is using the G-tablet kernel for Vega.

veganb4-kernel-patch-2.zip (2.93 MB) - this just boot.img

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.p...p;postcount=112

Edited January 6, 2011 by NS_nix

[Guest emergant]

If I understand correctly what you are implying that the ROM and Kernel Images are seperate things in this device. When you can flash the ROM, you don't replace the kernel, is the right?

Advent Vega kernel source available already?

However, I think G tab kernel source is still a place to start rather than just using the stock tegra 2 kernel source code. It has driver for the component sthat probably the same in Vega.

I am not reality saying that the devices are identical in appearance. I thought that most of the forums says that they are the same, I thought that the guts and components are the same in these devices.

What I'm saying is that whilst both tablets are based on the tegra chipset they are not identical inside or out and you cannot take a rom from one and flash it to the other and get a functioning device. People have have extracted the system image from a gtab rom and used it on a Vega. They lost wireless though because the wireless drivers are different. I don't believe a gtab kernel will boot at all and the bootloader from the gtab will not boot our vega rom. We're still awaiting kernel sources which will hopefully be available soon.