HowTo EASILY Boot From MMC card

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How to easily boot your Nokia tablet from the MMC card

Here are the links to older pages on which this one is based:

* http://maemo.org/maemowiki/HowTo_BootRootFSFromMMC

Why would we want to boot from MMC?

* Because we'll have enough space to INSTALL as MANY applications as may fit in our (GB-size) MMC card.

  • Because we'll have an INTACT COPY of the original system. So that if something goes wrong, we'll be able to BACKUP the system without reflashing the device.
  • Because we'll still be able to mount our MMC on a Windows-based PC via USB.
  • Because the whole system will be FASTER than before (almost DOUBLED), since it won't be based on a compressed and journalized filesystem (jffs2)

Known working devices

This procedure has been tested on the following configurations:

Hardware Software
Nokia N770 ITOS 2006 3.2006.49-2
Nokia N800 ITOS 2007 2.2006.51-6 1

1 The first time I tried this on my N800 it led to continuous reboots 30-90 seconds after booting. Trying it a second time on a clean install (directly after flashing and erasing everything already on the device) worked fine.

/!\ **This procedure should work with any device listed at http://fanoush.wz.cz/maemo/#initfs** /!\

It is supposed that without any previous knowledge you should be able to accomplish the whole procedure. Ask for help in case something goes wrong.

First of all: you need to become root

First of all you need to be able to get ROOT access from an Xterm on your Tablet. If you don't know how to do it, please follow this link, and come back when ready: http://maemo.org/maemowiki/HowTo_EASILY_BecomeRoot

Second: you need to partition your MMC !

Follow this link to find the instructions to partition the MMC card: http://maemo.org/maemowiki/HowTo_EASILY_Partition_your_MMC_card

Once you've partitioned your MMC, come back to this page and go on with the process...

How to install a dual boot menu?

Connect your device via the AC/DC power adaptor to the main power supply, or verify the battery is fully charged. It's important not to run out of battery in the middle of this operation.

From your own Tablet use the browser to download this file from Fanoush's webpage: http://fanoush.wz.cz/maemo/initfs_flasher.tgz

Supposing it's been downloaded to the fold named Documents, open an Xterm and type AS ROOT:

# cd /home/user/MyDocs/.documents/
# tar zxvf initfs_flasher.tgz
# cd initfs_flasher/
# ./initfs_flash

Just follow instructions.

Now it's time to clone the whole original system !

Connnect to Internet for apt-get to work below.

If you are working on an N770, SKIP THIS STEP. If you are working on an N800 running OS2007, you'll have to type as ROOT:

# insmod /mnt/initfs/lib/modules/2.6.18-omap1/mbcache.ko

NOW FOR ALL DEVICES, continue by typing as ROOT:

# insmod /mnt/initfs/lib/modules/current/ext2.ko
# mkdir /opt/
# mount /dev/mmcblk0p2 /opt
# mkdir /floppy/
# mount -t jffs2 /dev/mtdblock4 /floppy -o rw,rpsize=1024,rpuid=0,rpuid=30000

The following command will generate dire warnings and prompts, requiring you to type YES. However, -d tells apt-get to only download the package and not install it, so it's safe to ignore those warnings and type YES.

# apt-get -d install tar
# cd /var/cache/apt/archives/
# mkdir /tar-temp/
# dpkg -x tar*.deb /tar-temp/
# /tar-temp/bin/tar cf - -C /floppy . | /tar-temp/bin/tar xvf - -C /opt

{{{

umount /opt

umount /floppy

chroot /mnt/initfs cal-tool --set-root-device ask:mmc2

shutdown -r now

}}} And the process is complete. After rebooting the Tablet, you should be able to boot from the MMC card. You'll then be able to install as many applications as fit into the card. The system will double its speed. And if there's any problem in the future, you can always boot from the flash and recover the original system and start again ;) ---- CategoryHowToDevelopment CategoryHowTo