View source for NixOS on ARM/PINE64 ROCKPro64

{{ARM/breadcrumb}}
<div class="infobox">
{|class="table"
!colspan="2" class="title"|PINE64 ROCKPro64
|-
|colspan="2"|[[File:ROCKPro64.jpg|frameless|256px|A PINE64 ROCKPro64.]]
|-
!Manufacturer
|PINE64 (Pine Microsystems Inc.)
|-
!Architecture
|AArch64
|-
!Bootloader
|Upstream U-Boot
|-
!Boot options
|microSD, eMMC, SPI NOR Flash
|}
</div>

The ROCKPro64 is a powerful single board computer built around the Rockchip RK3399 SoC.

There are two models of the board, with 2 or 4 GB of RAM. It can boot from an microSD card or an eMMC. It also has a 128 Mbit SPI flash that can be used to store the bootloader.

== Status ==

This board has upstream U-Boot and kernel support, although the mainline kernel may still be missing some features. NixOS can be installed using manual partitioning and <code>nixos-install</code> or by modifying the aarch64 installation image as described in the next section.

U-Boot for this board is packaged in nixpkgs, and Hydra builds can be found here: https://hydra.nixos.org/job/nixpkgs/trunk/ubootRockPro64.aarch64-linux

It can also be [[NixOS on ARM#Compiling through binfmt QEMU | cross compiled]] with
<syntaxhighlight lang="bash">
nix-build '<nixpkgs>' --argstr system aarch64-linux -A ubootRockPro64 --out-link ubootRockPro64
</syntaxhighlight>

== Board-specific installation notes ==

You can use [https://github.com/Mic92/nixos-aarch64-images nixos-aarch64-images] to get an rockpro64 compatible disk image or running the commands manually as described below:

U-Boot needs to be copied to specific sectors on the microSD card, eMMC or image with <code>dd</code>. Download/build U-Boot for the board, and write <code>idbloader.img</code> and <code>u-boot.itb</code> to the correct locations with (replace <code>/dev/mmcblkX</code> with the correct path to the card or image):

<syntaxhighlight lang="bash">
dd if=idbloader.img of=/dev/mmcblkX conv=fsync,notrunc bs=512 seek=64
dd if=u-boot.itb of=/dev/mmcblkX conv=fsync,notrunc bs=512 seek=16384
</syntaxhighlight>

{{note|Prior to NixOS 20.03, a downstream version of U-Boot 2017.09 was packaged, which placed U-Boot in a single <code>idbloader.img</code> file. If that version is used, simply disregard the second command above.}}

On many kernels, the ethernet driver cannot handle hardware check-summing of large packets, therefore this feature must be disabled for the ethernet to be stable. This can be done with the following NixOS configuration:
<syntaxhighlight lang="nix">
networking.localCommands = ''
  ${pkgs.ethtool}/bin/ethtool -K eth0 rx off tx off
'';
</syntaxhighlight>

== Serial console==

{{note|Do not connect RxD (pin 10) until the U-Boot SPL is running (see [RK3399 boot sequence|https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/RK3399_boot_sequence]) or the SPL will not start}}

The ROCKPro64 uses a GPIO pinout compatible with the Raspberry Pi 2 and newer. This means that the following pins can be used to connect a serial adapter:

{| class="table"
|-
!colspan="2" style="background: #fafafa"| Pi-2 Bus
|-
! Pin
! Function
|-
| 6
| GND
|-
| 8
| UART0_TX
|-
| 10
| UART0_RX
|}

See https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/ROCKPro64#GPIO_Pins for list of all pins

The serial console runs at 1500000 baud in the bootloader.

To connect check your <code>dmesg</code> for an identifier of the serial console:

<syntaxHighlight>
[78635.965459] usb 2-1: new full-speed USB device number 8 using xhci_hcd
[78636.119008] usb 2-1: New USB device found, idVendor=1a86, idProduct=7523, bcdDevice= 2.63
[78636.119017] usb 2-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=0, Product=2, SerialNumber=0
[78636.119022] usb 2-1: Product: USB2.0-Serial
[78636.127103] ch341 2-1:1.0: ch341-uart converter detected
[78636.142043] usb 2-1: ch341-uart converter now attached to ttyUSB0
</syntaxHighlight>

In our example that coresponds to the <code>ttyUSB0</code> which makes a new device available at <code>/dev/ttyUSB0</code> to which you can connect using for (example) <code>picocom</code>:

<syntaxHighlight lang=console>
# Connect to /dev/ttyUSB0 at baud 1500000
$ nix-shell -p picocom --run "picocom /dev/ttyUSB0 -b 1500000"
</syntaxHighlight>

See https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/ROCKPro64#Setup_a_Serial_Console_.28UART.29 for more information on setting up the serial console

== Resources ==

* [https://www.pine64.org/rockpro64/ Official product page]