×

INDI Library v2.0.6 is Released (02 Feb 2024)

Bi-monthly release with minor bug fixes and improvements

Alternate single board computer experimenting

  • Posts: 96
  • Thank you received: 25
The Radxa Zero is pretty fast, though it only has a single USB2 port, so a hub would be needed and downloading 18MB raw frames takes a while. That said, the test unit I'm using is able to build indi and kstars quite quickly.

It'd be nice to have an APT source that could be added to any ARM SBC supported by dietpi, and not all of these support PPAs.
The following user(s) said Thank You: Bob Stephens
1 year 6 months ago #86058

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 59
  • Thank you received: 9
Rob I didn't end up with a functional system for some reason. I could not find kstars and the utilities scripts were missing as the most obvious bit's that failed. I do have a working x11vnc server. I don't know why the failures happened yet and am doing some play with what I have (installed kstars, building indilib from source etc) before restarting from a clean build with some extra logging running.
After an install of kstars some things started but Ekos failed trying to start up mount and ccd simulators.

I have most things running after some manual steps although Ekos crashes when I try and connect either of my ZWO ASI cameras.
Given how far I've got I might try the rebuild on the other box so I can keep playing while that runs.

Love what you have done here, I'm assuming it's an oddity with my setup .
1 year 6 months ago #86060

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 486
  • Thank you received: 87
Regarding the subject I have been using in the last couple of months, a X96 Max+ 8K 4GB/64GB Android 9 TVBox.
It's cheap (60eur) it's fast and it works very well. It's basically a Amlogic S905X3 Quad Core ARM Cortex A55, the same as
in the ODroid C4 and with similar configuration. A full desktop/ekos/indi works very well even from an SDcard. There's instructions
to write the OS on the internal EMMC but didn't try that, I wan't to keep it original for now. It has only 2 USB (1xUSB3 + 1xUSB2) ports,
it may require an USB powered hub. An excellent alternative to the RPi.
Last edit: 1 year 6 months ago by nMAC.
1 year 6 months ago #86091

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 59
  • Thank you received: 9
Rob I'm working through the errors I'm hitting and finding some packages which appear to have changed names etc. For instance libwxgtk3.0-dev no longer has a candidate but I found a note for Ubunto that it was renamed to libwxgtk3.0-gtk3-dev in Ubuntu 20.04 (askubuntu.com/questions/1241217/package-...date-on-ubuntu-20-04) and trying that name in the script it looks to be working.

Are you still maintaining the scripts and interested in the details once I've either finished or got as far as I can? If so how what is the best way to pass that on? I don't know that I'll stick with the T95 max long term, the ODroid N2+ looks pretty interesting but am finding the build process interesting and hopefully educational.
1 year 6 months ago #86092

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 2876
  • Thank you received: 809
Yes, they do change names sometimes. I would be glad to update anything that is out of date. Please let me know and I will certainly fix it.

When I was working on developing the scripts in the first place, I ran them many times and set up multiple Pi's, But once I got it all working pretty well, I don't run them all the time. I only need to update or set up a pi every now and then myself. Sometimes people let me know that something is out of date, and if it is, sure I will fix it.
The following user(s) said Thank You: Bob Stephens
1 year 6 months ago #86099

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 59
  • Thank you received: 9
If I'm not running my operating system via a USB3 port then 2 usb ports is sufficient. I will have a look.
1 year 6 months ago #86103

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 59
  • Thank you received: 9
Rob this is what I have so far. It's possible that in the back and forth I'm doing I've either missed noting a change or done unnecessary steps etc. Builds and compiles are still a thing that I'm not understanding to my satisfaction.
I will at some point recreate the original file and do a diff between it and what I'm running.
My build has been for a while stalling the box during the build of kstars so I'm still working away.
kstars seemed to be failing earlier on because of the dependency of stellarsolver on the qt5 pieces. I tried installing stellarsolver and later added the qt installs, kstars seems to get further but then began hitting the lock up issue.
zram service is failing but I've not looked into that yet.
I was seeing errors at one point when I reran the script with a permission error

I'm kicking off setupDebianSBC.sh from a wrapper script and think I'm capturing all the output to a log (happy to take advice if there is a better way of doing that).
sudo ./setupDebianSBC.sh 2>&1 | tee setupDebianSBC.log

I've added the following into my local copy at about line 60 to install items that appear to have shown up as missing (and included notes where changes have been made elsewhere). Some may have been optional but I'm trying to be able to build as much as possible.
BTW I also added an " @ $(date)" into the display routine to help me identify when things have really locked up.
#########################################################
############# My Addons
display "Running Bob Stephens add ons."
# libwxgtk3.0-dev has been renamed to libwxgtk3.0-gtk3-dev (PHD2 install)
# askubuntu.com/questions/1241217/package-...date-on-ubuntu-20-04
# Changed the call from git to https at git clone anongit.kde.org/kstars
# installs that didn't look like they needed to be done in place.
sudo apt -y install libkf5doctools-dev libkf5texteditor-dev libkf5kdelibs4support-dev
sudo apt -y install kdoctools5
sudo apt -y install libgtest-dev
sudo apt -y install libgmock-dev
sudo apt -y install oggfwd
sudo apt -y install libtheora-dev
# qt is used by the stellarsolver install and had issues in this build
sudo apt install qtbase5-dev qtchooser qt5-qmake qtbase5-dev-tools
1 year 6 months ago #86104

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 59
  • Thank you received: 9
I have a mostly configured controller using a mix of Rob's script and some manual work. It's hooked up to my mount, focuser and two ZWO cameras and being accessed via realVNC Viewer from inside the house. I used the X11VNC Server which Rob's script sets up nicely. Weather is still mostly cloudy here at the moment so no actual Astrophotography work has been done yet.

My attempts to build both Kstars and phd2 were locking up the box for some reason once I got past some prerequisite installs.
I did a "sudo apt install kstars" and that appeared to get me to the point of having a functional Observatory control box. I wasn't able to install phd2 as it wanted a newer version of a library than was readily available. I use the built in guider so PHD2 was just to see what worked. I may revisit that at some point for the learning exercise.
The Uitilty scripts are not available for some reason, I was looking forward to some automation on the fixing of names for USB serial devices.

So far the T95 max boxes look like they could do the job in a pinch but have been difficult to get the install setup on and other's have pointed to some more powerful alternatives which may be better suited as an alternative to Raspberry Pi's.
1 year 6 months ago #86112

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 59
  • Thank you received: 9
I think my lockup issues were memory related. I used the steps in Rob's file to add swap space and am running the System Monitoring Center (chewing extra resources but it's interesting). The build has run a lot further than previous attempts. I think this is a case of letting it run and see what tomorrow brings.
1 year 6 months ago #86114

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 59
  • Thank you received: 9
Kevin I've decided to try the 8GB ODROID-M1.
1 year 6 months ago #86453

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 421
  • Thank you received: 102
I was just looking at that board last night. Looks nice. The CPU isn't quite as fast or have as many cores as the ODroid-N2+, but it has native m.2 and twice as much RAM, so that makes up for it. :)

Keep in mind I don't think it has built-in WiFi, so you'll need to get a USB WiFi dongle. HardKernel (the makers of ODroid) sell one that is known to work without needing to do anything special with drivers, so I just ordered that at the same time I ordered the ODroid.
1 year 6 months ago #86454

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

  • Posts: 59
  • Thank you received: 9
I liked the Sata port as well. I may not use it but having it there might be useful in the future. I skipped the WiFi dongle as I'm expecting to be wired for observatory (and away from home) use. I may regret that but by the time I paid shipping and dealt with the exchange rate it was adding up. Threw some extra on 64GB eMMc storage though.
1 year 6 months ago #86456

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

Time to create page: 1.582 seconds