Frequently Asked Questions

What boards are supported?

The list of the current supported boards are located on an external page at https://sd-card-images.johang.se/.

Where can I download images for my specific board?

Visit the external website at https://sd-card-images.johang.se/. Selecting your board on the page will take you to a page with a variety of downloads and instructions.

How do I get around an error saying the wget command isn't found on my computer?

Just grab the file using any download tool you prefer. Try using curl, which is more commonly preinstalled on machines:

curl -O https://dl.sd-card-images.johang.se/debians/YYYY-MM-DD/debian-buster-arm64-XXXXXX.img.bin.gz

Otherwise install wget using your package manager.

Debian based Linux systems:

apt install wget

RHEL based Linux systems:

yum install wget

How do I use zcat and dd commands for making a Linux image on a Windows computer?

The zcat and dd commands are Linux commands. zcat is available for Windows using Git Bash, mingw-w64, Cygwin, or MSYS2 which comes with a command line interface and C-libraries for Windows. But you can also extract the images using third party compression applications like 7zip or WinRAR.

Merge the extracted files into a card image like this:

copy /b tmp.img + ext4.img sd-card.img

Then use an image flasher software like balenaEtcher, Rufus, or ImageUSB to flash the image onto a memory card.

What is the password for the root user?

The root user password is defined lastly in the filename of the downloaded image. I.e. for debian-trixie-arm64-biexe4.bin.gz the root user password is "biexe4".

Why isn't WiFi or Bluetooth working?

The WiFi and Bluetooth libraries are not embedded with the releases for minimalistic reasons.

Find out which expected firmware files that failed to load with this command:

sudo dmesg | grep firmware

How do I connect to the internet without any WiFi networking?

Your onboard Ethernet cable adapter should be fully functioning. Plug a cable into it and the board should automatically take you online. From there you can work your way into installing additional drivers and software.

How do I backup my system to a new image file?

The dd command also work for creating images. Assuming the storage drive is /dev/mmcblk1, then type the following command:

sudo dd if=/dev/mmcblk1 bs=4M status=progress | gzip > /path/to/backup.img.gz