Bootable 64-bit RPi3 Gentoo image (OpenRC/Xfce/VC4) UPDATED

[Sakaki]

antonlacon,

So, I have built a 4.14 bcmrpi3_defconfig kernel based on the latest 4.14.y in raspberrypi's repo, and added a binary package and matching ebuild for it to the rpi3 overlay used on the gentoo-on-rpi3-64bit image. It boots, and HDMI video and sound works well. BT works, but at the moment WiFi doesn't (it is probably something simple, I haven't really looked into it properly yet). Ethernet works.

If you'd like to try it out on a modern copy of the image, just issue:

[NeddySeagoon]

Sakaki,

I'm running the 4.15.y branch, stripped right down because I'm trying to build Rust.
Its bcmrpi3_defconfig does not have the right SDIO driver enabled for the WiFi.

When I added it the SDcard moved to card 1 from card 0. It took a while to spot that.

The wifi came up in ifconfig -a but I did not test operation.

I'm building Pi kernels with a gcc-7.3 cross compiler.
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

[Sakaki]

NeddySeagoon, thanks, that's interesting. Do you recall the config item you had to enable for WiFi? If so, I'll modify the build script to set it, and try 4.15 too.
_________________
Regards,

sakaki

[NeddySeagoon]

Sakaki,

It looks like I left my kernel in a mess. I have all three possibilities selected.

[Sakaki]

NeddySeagoon,

following your suggestions, and a little trial and error, I've found that using the bcmrpi3_defconfig on the 4.14.21 kernel (current 4.14.y from https://github.com/raspberrypi/linux), and changing only:

[Sakaki]

I've built another 4.14 bcmrpi3_defconfig kernel based on the latest 4.14.y in raspberrypi's repo, and added a binary package and matching ebuild for it to the rpi3 overlay used on the gentoo-on-rpi3-64bit image. This has CONFIG_MMC_SDHCI_IPROC=m set (in addition to the standard bcmrpi3_defconfig) and seems to work well, including WiFi now.

If you'd like to try it out on a modern copy of the image, just issue:

[orion777]

Finally.. MPTCP seems working!
Probably patch was correctly applied as was discussed here.
NOTE that MPTCP works only with TCP (at least to me it does not works with ICMP packets from ping)
All discussion and final conclusion is here https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-1076702.html

[Sakaki]

FYI, the CONFIG_MMC_SDHCI_IPROC=m change has now been merged into the official 4.14.y kernel config (so WiFi should work without SD card renumbering). I'll make a new release of the bcmrpi3_defconfig kernel next week, and remove the mask shortly thereafter.
_________________
Regards,

sakaki

[roylongbottom]

Raspberry Pi 3B+

I have just received a Raspberry Pi 3B+ and neither Raspbian nor 64 bit Gentoo would boot, both just displaying that rainbow coloured square. I found the solution for Raspbian, a sudo rpi-update. The problem was said to be due to /boot/bcm2710-rpi-3-b-plus.dtb missing in older Raspbian images.

Is there a solution for 64 bit Gentoo?
_________________
Regards

Roy

[Sakaki]

roylongbottom,

working on a new release for the 3B+ now. I have it running locally, so shouldn't be too long. Will post here when available.
_________________
Regards,

sakaki

[antonlacon]

FYI, binutils-2.30 will fail at linking the arm64 kernel. Lots of "dangerous relocation: unsupported relocation" messages. Bug is: https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=22764 and should be fixed in binutils' next point release.

[Sakaki]

Raspberry Pi3B+ Heads Up

Hi, for those interested in getting 64-bit Gentoo running on the new 3B+ version of the RPi3, I thought I'd just post quickly what I've learned so far. I'm going to push an updated version of the gentoo-on-rpi3-64bit image soon, which will have all the necessary changes integrated, but here's the raw version...

First off, you need the latest firmware (bootcode.bin, start.elf etc.) from https://github.com/raspberrypi/firmware/tree/master/boot - without this, you'll be stuck at the rainbow square. It turns out you don't actually need the bcm2710-rpi-3-b-plus.dtb file - I modded the kernel makefiles to construct a 64-bit variant of this, but the boot-time code will intelligently update your existing 2710 dtb file anyway if it is missing (there is a note by Eben somewhere on line to that effect, but I can't find it again; nevertheless, it is an empirical fact you can boot the 3B+ with just the (64-bit) bcm2710-rpi3-3-b.dtb file in /boot).

vvv
Bluetooth works out of the box with the vanilla 64-bit 3B setup.
^^^ Edit: it turns out this is not, in fact, the case: please see my later post for an update about Bluetooth differences between the 3B and 3B+.

WiFi does not work immediately; there is a new dual-band chip (the Cypress CYW43455) and just as with the previous model, it needs an sdio.txt file to configure it. Put the following (copied from the latest Raspbian) into /lib/firmware/brcm/brcmfmac43455-sdio.txt:

[Sakaki]

Hello,

I've just posted a v1.2.1 release of my bootable 64-bit Gentoo image for the RPi3 on GitHub (here, includes full download instructions).

A changelog from the prior release image (with upgrade instructions) may be viewed here, but in summary:

• Added support for the RPi3 Model B+ (the RPi3 Model B remains supported too). Further details of the changes required may be found in this post and on the main project page. Dual-band WiFi, (faster) Ethernet, Bluetooth etc. all work on the B+, so you should be able to seamlessly upgrade to the newer board, should you wish.
  
• Migrated to kernel 4.14.y (shipped version: sys-kernel/bcmrpi3-kernel-bin-4.14.31.20180401); this is now the default branch of the RPi3 kernel tree, and is required for RPi3 B+ support. It boots fine on the RPi3 B too. VC4 and audio support is included.
  
• Added the top-level package media-gfx/fotoxx-18.01.3 (a digital photo processing program).
  
• Migrated to Firefox Quantum (www-client-firefox-58.0.1, plus the mandated dev-lang/rust-1.23.0-r1 and cargo-0.24.0); this should offer significantly faster browsing than the previous version.
  
• Added a service to set the WiFi regulatory domain (net-wireless/rpi3-wifi-regdom); the shipped default is "GB", but you can edit the file /etc/conf.d/rpi3-wifi-regdom to change this.
  
• Various minor ebuild tidy-ups.
  
• All packages brought up-to-date against the Gentoo tree, as of 31 March 2018.

The binhost and rsync mirror have been frozen while I've been working on this release (about a month), but they are now back running on the regular one-week cadence. Apologies for any inconvenience ><
_________________
Regards,

sakaki

[MarkG]

Thank you for posting the update, really useful. I'm looking to build a minimal system for the Pi3+, are there any details of the process you go through to build your system? Did you start with a 32bit system and "just" recompile everything for the 64bit? I've not been using Gentoo much in the last decade so its going to be a bit of a relearning curve.

Thanks again for your work.

MarkG

[Sakaki]

MarkG,

thanks for the feedback ^-^

NeddySeagoon has a really useful wiki page which covers building a 64-bit RPi3 system from scratch, here.

This is basically the process I followed originally, but then I added a number of OpenRC services etc. (details on the gentoo-on-rpi3-64bit page); the ebuilds for which live in this overlay. And I set up a custom profile to cover the various keywording, USE flags etc. needed to get a clean build (the profile files can be reviewed here).

Also, for the RPi3 B+, I needed to make some additional changes, covered in my post above.

To build I use a distcc system which offloads compilation to a crossdev toolchain on a PC; I have instructions for setting this up on the gentoo-on-rpi3-64bit wiki.

Once the system is built I have a custom script to "clean" it and prepare a vanilla image; that's not currently public but it is fairly mature now, so I may publish it at some stage.

Hope that helps, if you have any further questions or problems building up your own arm64 system from scratch just ask!

Edit: PS, since you say you're coming back to Gentoo after a bit of an absence, you may find this "background reading" section of my EFI install guide a useful refresher as regards Portage, ebuilds, Gentoo's configuration files etc. (the guide overall is for an x86_64 install, but this bit is applicable to all architectures).
_________________
Regards,

sakaki

[roylongbottom]

Thanks Sakaki

I have produced a new Raspberry Pi 3B+ bootable Gentoo from your GitHub page. The only problem was it needed sudo su (Ubuntu 14) to copy the image to the SD card. I am now running my 64 bit benchmarks. It also booted on my original Pi 3. I needed to do this to explain peculiarities with certain programs.
_________________
Regards

Roy

[Sakaki]

[roylongbottom]

Raspberry Pi 3B+ 32 Bit and 64 Bit Benchmark Results

Below is a summary of single core benchmark results on a Raspberry Pi 3B+ using 32 bit Raspbian and 64 bit Gentoo. Older model 3B results are also included for comparison purposes. These benchmarks measure processor speeds, including using some cached data, where, as expected, performance was proportional to CPU MHz of the two systems (subject to normal variations in running time of individual test functions). They are the first programs that set standards of performance for computers, from the 1970s and 1980s. Details and further results can be found in “Raspberry Pi 32 Bit and 64 Bit Benchmarks and Stress Tests.pdf” at ResearchGate:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319433633_Raspberry_Pi_32_Bit_and_64_Bit_Benchmarks_and_Stress_Tests?_iepl%5BviewId%5D=w3FaXcjGmjpJ52MUwtB7jYqY&_iepl%5Bcontexts%5D%5B0%5D=projectUpdatesLog&_iepl%5BtargetEntityId%5D=PB%3A319433633&_iepl%5BinteractionType%5D=publicationTitle

This also provides links to download the benchmarks and source codes, plus files relating to other types of systems and historic data (from ResearchGate or Archives). Reports include some for Android devices that might provide a clue to performance of future Raspberry Pi computers.


Whetstone Benchmark - overall rating in MWIPS and eight test functions with speed in MFLOPS or MOPS. RPi 3B+ speeds at 32 bits and 64 bits were essentially the same on some tests, with overall MWIPS 36% faster.

There is also a Java version, where initial comparisons indicated that the 3B+ was slower than the original, via Gentoo but not Raspbian. The problem is that, as with Android, there can be wide variations produced by each new release of Java. Booting the old RPi 3 from the new version of Gentoo produced the expected differences.

[Sakaki]

roylongbottom,

as always, many thanks for taking the time to produce these benchmarks, it's a really useful resource you've built up there ^-^

Per my earlier post, I have now gone ahead and created an RPi3 optimized binary kernel package. If you like, you can easily install it on your 64-bit Gentoo system (assuming you are running the current v1.2.1 of the gentoo-on-rpi3-64bit image (the one which boots on the 3B+)). To do so, on the rpi3 just become root, and issue:

[orion777]

Good day!

I wish to install mavproxy, which is build on python https://github.com/ArduPilot/MAVProxy
Prior to start its install, I have to install:
pymavlink>=2.2.8
pyserial>=3.0
So I was trying to install pyserial 3.2, 3.3, but they depend on many additional packages and one of the package is missing from emerge list (eix shows nothing, but pyserial request it).

Could someone, please, try to run emerge -pv for any of 3.x version of the pyserial? I wish to know is it impossible to install pyserial on gentoo or exactly my rpi3 setup has some problems..
Thank you!

[Sakaki]

orion777,

so, I've just emerged pyserial-3.4 on my RPi3 B+ buildserver, without issues or any additional deps required (the server is running the v1.2.1 of the gentoo-on-rpi3-64bit image), and uploaded the resulting tbz2 binary package to the binhost if that is of any use to you - please see https://isshoni.org/pi64pie/dev-python/?C=M;O=D
_________________
Regards,

sakaki

[NeddySeagoon]

orion777,

I can't find pymavlink in the repo.
(edit ... put that down to a senior moment)

pyserial-3.4 builds on arm64 for me but I have no idea how to test it.
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

[orion777]

So, I cant understand why I get message that dev-python/certifi-2017.11.5:0/0::gentoo is not awailable, but you gets everything works fine. My eix also reports that there are no dev-python/certifi-2017.11.5:0/0::gentoo

[Sakaki]

orion777,

looks like your Portage tree may be out of date?

[orion777]

emerge --sync and then eix --update?