Translation(s): none

Introduction

The Teres-I is a DIY open hardware laptop sold by Olimex. Olimex has stated that they intend the Teres-I to be very modular, allowing main boards built around different SoCs interchangeably. However the only main board available at the moment is based on the Allwinner A64 SoC with 2GB RAM and 16GB eMMC internal storage. The CPU is supported by the arm64 architecture in debian. armhf should work too, but is untested.

The laptop is sold with linux (ubuntu + vendor supplied kernel) preinstalled. There is not full source code available for the vendor kernel, which means that users of the preinstalled system are permanently stuck with an old version of linux. On the other hand since a linux system is available no external computer and no cross-compilation is required to bootstrap a debian system.

While debian should run fine from the eMMC internal storage, most people install debian to an external microSD card (there is one slot available) to have both systems available. That's also what is described in this guide. (This guide is still work in progress.)

Overall Status

To get an overview of mainline kernel support, see the status matrix of the linux sunxi community.

Legend :
= OK ; Unsupported(No Driver) ; = Error (Couldn't get it working); [?] Unknown, Not Test ; [-] Not-applicable
= Configuration Required; = Only works with a non-free driver and or firmware

Installation

The laptop is sold as a kit for self-assembly. Here we assume that it is completely assembled and confirmed working correctly with the preinstalled system.

The easy way: Using an image

There is a ready image available for directly writing to your microSD card. For links, further information and discussion see the dedicated thread at the olimex forum.

The manual way: Bootstraping

The debian kernel package (starting with 4.16) and arm64 userspace packages work out of the box, but you will need to get or compile yourself a custom device tree file and bootloader.

partitioning

There are no real requirements for disk layout other than that the bootloader is stored in an area close to the start of the disk but outside any partition. Most microSD cards already come with a compatible partition layout, so you only have to change the type of the existing partition from Windows to Linux and format it with your favorite filesystem.

device tree

Starting with 4.17 linux contains a DT file for the teres. Unfortunately pwm support (necessary for the backlight and thus the display) didn't make it in, so you will probably want to either edit the official DT or get one from somewhere else until linux 4.18 is available.

Here is the DT that was used for testing the code submitted to linux including PWM: http://friends.ccbib.org/harald/files/sun50i-a64-teres-i.dtb

arm trusted firmware (bootloader stage 2)

u-boot (bootloader stage 1 & 3)

mainline u-boot still misses a few bits like a pwm driver (to get display backlight up early), so you need to get this fork and then cherry-pick one more commit:

git clone https://github.com/anarsoul/u-boot-pine64.git
cd u-boot-pine64
git remote add icenowy https://github.com/Icenowy/u-boot/
git checkout -b teres origin/pinebook-wip-20180206
git cherry-pick icenowy/teres-i-mainline

You find information about compiling u-boot and writing the binaries to media in board/sunxi/README.sunxi64 - the basic steps are:

BL31=/path/to/atf/bl31.bin make teres_i_defconfig
BL31=/path/to/atf/bl31.bin make
dd if=spl/sunxi-spl.bin of=/dev/sdx bs=8k seek=1
dd if=u-boot.itb of=/dev/sdx bs=8k seek=5

The final files can also be downloaded:

• http://friends.ccbib.org/harald/files/sunxi-spl.bin

• http://friends.ccbib.org/harald/files/u-boot.itb

debootstrap

Using debian installer

There is no support in the official installer yet. However it might be possible to copy the arm64 installer files and a suitable device tree file onto a microSD card with a bootload from external sources. If you try that approach, please share your experience.

Troubleshooting

If the screen remains blank or the system doesn't boot (is stuck in u-boot or initramfs) you can connect a serial console. The serial console is multiplexed with the headphone output. Instructions how to make or buy a proper connector are at the olimex forum.

Configuration

Display

• (not covered yet)

Audio

• (not covered yet)

Mouse

• (not covered yet)

Power Management

• (not covered yet)

WiFi

• (not covered yet)

Modem

• (not covered yet)

System Summary

lsusb

lsusb -v | grep -E '\<(Bus|iProduct|bDeviceClass|bDeviceProtocol)' 2>/dev/null

Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         0 Full speed (or root) hub
  iProduct                2 Generic Platform OHCI controller
Bus 001 Device 005: ID 15ba:003c Olimex Ltd. 
  bDeviceClass            0 (Defined at Interface level)
  bDeviceProtocol         0 
  iProduct                2 TERES Keyboard+Touchpad
  (Bus Powered)
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 1908:2311 GEMBIRD 
  bDeviceClass          239 Miscellaneous Device
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Interface Association
  iProduct                2 USB2.0 PC CAMERA
      (Bus Powered)
  bDeviceClass          239 Miscellaneous Device
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Interface Association
  (Bus Powered)
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 05e3:0608 Genesys Logic, Inc. Hub
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Single TT
  iProduct                1 USB2.0 Hub
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         0 Full speed (or root) hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         0 Full speed (or root) hub
  iProduct                2 EHCI Host Controller

USB Host controllers entries (without OHCI, UHCI, EHCI) are removed too.

Resources

Attachments

Some configuration files and sample outputs.

Useful Links

Credits

CategoryLaptopComputer