Shift6mq (axolotl): failed installation
Last week I tried to install Mobian on the Shift6mq according to the following guide: https://wiki.mobian.org/doku.php?id=install-android
Unfortunately, I was unable to complete the installation successfully. Perhaps I misunderstood some of the instructions or perhaps the instructions are correct, but there is something different about the device that is not covered by the process.
Here is what I did.
I downloaded the installation package and decompressed it in my computer. I rebooted the device to the bootloader. That is, as I understand, I entered fassboot mode. By this I do not mean the userspace implementation (fastbootd, accessible through fasboot reboot fastboot
), but the bootloader itself (fastboot reboot bootloader
).
Then I did the following:
antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot flash boot mobian-sdm845-phosh-20230212.boot-axolotl.img
Sending 'boot_a' (22808 KB) OKAY [ 0.605s]
Writing 'boot_a' OKAY [ 0.137s]
Finished. Total time: 1.322s
[antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot flash system mobian-sdm845-phosh-20230212.boot.img
Sending 'system' (40100 KB) OKAY [ 8.367s]
Writing 'system' FAILED (remote: 'Partition not found')
fastboot: error: Command failed
At this point I decided to try doing this from the userspace implementation (fastbootd). That allowed me to go further ahead:
[antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot reboot fastboot
Rebooting into fastboot OKAY [ 0.001s]
< waiting for any device >
Finished. Total time: 19.116s
[antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot flash system mobian-sdm845-phosh-20230212.boot.img
Resizing 'system_a' OKAY [ 0.006s]
Sending 'system_a' (40100 KB) OKAY [ 1.094s]
Writing 'system_a' OKAY [ 5.964s]
Finished. Total time: 7.077s
[antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot -S 100M flash userdata mobian-sdm845-phosh-20230212.rootfs.img
Sending sparse 'userdata' 1/32 (102396 KB) OKAY [ 3.882s]
Writing 'userdata' OKAY [ 1.387s]
[...]
Sending sparse 'userdata' 32/32 (75064 KB) OKAY [ 2.687s]
Writing 'userdata' OKAY [ 6.814s]
Finished. Total time: 217.521s
[antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot erase dtbo
Erasing 'dtbo_a' FAILED (remote: 'Erasing failed')
fastboot: error: Command failed
At this point then, I had to once again reboot to bootloader:
[antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot reboot bootloader
Rebooting into bootloader OKAY [ 0.000s]
Finished. Total time: 0.051s
[antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot erase dtbo
Erasing 'dtbo' OKAY [ 0.008s]
Finished. Total time: 0.012s
[antoniomaciej@colibri mobian]$ fastboot reboot
The result was this screen on boot:
After that, I could not go further.
A couple of notes that might give a hint:
- Before trying to install mobian, I had postmarketOS installed according to the instructions in the wiki (Installation on userdata partition, https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/SHIFT_SHIFT6mq_(shift-axolotl)). Thus, I did not begin from a device with the default ShiftOS. I don't think that it is an issue, but perhaps there is something I don't know about postmarketOS modifying the layout of partitions.
- After this installation, I was able to install again postmarketOS and the device is fully functional.
Thank you for you help and time. Let me know if there is anything I can add or do to help. It would be great to see mobian on the device. I learnt that you don't have a device to test the installation, so if needed, please let me know and I can test.