ROCK Pi S Ubuntu | Work with ROCK Pi S Ubuntu

Recently ROCK Pi S Ubuntu Bionic system image is released. Rock Pi is best alternative of Raspberry Pi. Nowadays Rock Pi 4 is popular and used in embedded and IoT Development. In this we learn how to work with Rock Pi S Ubuntu. Rock Pi is a small board by Radxa. Size of this board is only 1.7 inch.

What is ROCK Pi S ?

You may like also: Rock Pi 4 Tutorials | Getting Started with Rock Pi 4

Work with ROCK Pi S Ubuntu

What is ROCK Pi S Ubuntu

ROCK Pi S Ubuntu is an easy to use system. While working with ROCK Pi S Ubuntu, you will find it do well on playing music, Internet, Bluetooth and so on.

Access from the Host PC/Laptop

Option 1: USB access(adb)

By default, the ROCK Pi S Linux image enables adbd services, which is a debug bridge from Android now ported on Linux. With one USB A to C cable you can power and access the board, very handy.

To use adb, you need to install adb tool on the PC/Laptop. Check instructions for Windows and Linux.

After you have adb installed successfully, run the following command on console to login the shell of ROCK Pi S:

   adb shell

Check Using adb.

Option 2: Serial console

Check Serial Console

Option 3: SSH

SSH server is enabled on port 22 of ROCK Pi S default image.

Please use angryip to find your board IP address.

To access ROCK Pi S by SSH, try

   ping rockpis.local
   ssh [email protected]

or if your router/network doesn’t support Local Domain, you need to check your network/router administrator page and look for the ROCK Pi S ip address.

   ping ip-of-device
   ssh rock@ip-of-device

Note: You can also get the IP of ROCK Pi S from option 1 or option 2 if you can not access network administrator page.

Debian Default User Account

Non-root User:

   User Name : rock
   Password  : rock

Install and update necessary packages

Add Radxa APT, see Radxa APT.

Install packages;

 $ sudo apt-get update
 $ sudo apt-get install -y rockchip-overlay
 $ sudo apt-get install -y linux-4.4-rockpis-latest rockpis-dtbo

Network Connection

There are two methods for network connection. One is Ethernet and the other is WIFI.

Ethernet Connection

You can use a network cable (one end connected to the external network port or route) to connect your ROCK Pi S to the network. The ROCK Pi S will automatically configure the network for your surfing on the Internet.

To test the Ethernet, we need to follow the steps:

• Switch to super user mode by command

 $ sudo su

• Check whether the Ethernet is normal by command, ifconfig, which would show us a network card, eth0, and the Ethernet IP address. Also, use tool, ping, to connect to a normal domain.

 $ ifconfig
 $ ping www.baidu.com

• If failed to connect to a normal domain. , try

 $ sudo dhclient eth0

WIFI Connection

When there is not a network cable for your ROCK Pi S the WIFI connection is another good choice. ROCK Pi S supports 2.4G WIFI wireless network.

To test the WIFI performance, we need to follow the steps:

• Switch to super user mode

 $ sudo su

• Open the WIFI

 $ nmcli r wifi on

• Scan WIFI

 $ nmcli dev wifi

• Connect to WIFI network

 $ nmcli dev wifi connect "wifi_name" password "wifi_password"

• Test WIFI perpormance by tool iperf.

Bluetooth

Update necessary packages

 $ sudo apt-get update
 $ sudp apt-get install -y rockchip-overlay
 $ sudo apt-get install -y linux-4.4-rockpis-latest # kernel version(>=4.4.143.27)
 $ sudo apt-get install -y rtl8723ds-firmware bluez

Check Bluetooth service

 $ systemctl status bluetooth

Run Bluetooth service if the Bluetooth service is inactive.

 $ systemctl start bluetooth

Check Bluetooth device

 $ hciconfig
 hci0:   Type: Primary  Bus: UART
         BD Address: 22:22:AA:25:49:1E  ACL MTU: 1021:8  SCO MTU: 255:12
         UP RUNNING 
         RX bytes:4424 acl:0 sco:0 events:81 errors:0
         TX bytes:3820 acl:0 sco:0 commands:52 errors:0

Example: Connect to Bluetooth Speaker.

Change to root mode.

 $ sudo su

Install pulseaudio packages

 # apt-get install -y pulseaudio-module-bluetooth pulseaudio

Run pulseaudio

 # pulseaudio --start

Connect using bluetoothctl

 # bluetoothctl
 [bluetooth]# default-agent 
 [bluetooth]# power on
 [bluetooth]# scan on
 [bluetooth]# trust 77:EC:79:4F:6B:AC
 [bluetooth]# pair 77:EC:79:4F:6B:AC
 [bluetooth]# connect 77:EC:79:4F:6B:AC

Play songs and enjoy it.

Storage device

• uSD Card: /dev/mmcblk0

• SD Nand: /dev/mmcblk1

Boot device order

SD Nand -> uSD Card

Changelogs

2019.12.19

rockpis_ubuntu_bionic_minimal_arm64_191219_0410-gpt.img

• U-boot version: 2017.09-02370-g6d65a50f1e
• Kernel version: 4.4.143-34-rockchip-g3c9d2019dba7
• System partitions: boot and rootfs
• Default serial console: UART0
• Default non-root user: rock (password: rock)
• Hostname: rockpis
• Support adb by default.
• Support SSH by default.
• Resize root filesystem to fit available disk space for the first boot
• Automatically load Bluetooth firmware after system startup.

Get ROCK Pi S Ubuntu Bionic system image

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