Hi everyone,
Sorry for sending out this odd titled announcement, but a few days ago, I found
my ZOTAC ZBOX nano VD01 buried inside a (clean) black garbage bag.
I feared it might have been stolen since it was in a good condition (I tend to
treat my computers fairly well, so I do not wreck too many of them. That being
said, I have smoked a few mainboards I have repaired the bad caps due to a
faulty power supply.), but I am glad the employees of a dishonest building
repair / cleanup firm did not steal this one. (They likely stole some money
from my place.)
Even if they did, they would not have been able to use it other than Windows at
this point, unless one knows how to install the VIA Technologies' non-mainlined
proprietary graphics device driver.
Anyway, I obtained a 250 GB SK hynix SATA SSD in a raffle drawing, so I decided
to use it with ZBOX nano VD01 since I only have partial access to my collection
of computer parts like a SATA hard drive at this point.
Many of my computer parts are buried in the black garbage bags I still have not
been able to go through since they are so many bags.
Since drm-openchrome is still not mainlined, I will be going through the
installation method I figured out for HP Pavilion a800n desktop PC.
I will install Lubuntu 12.04 first, then I do an upgrade installation to
Lubuntu 14.04.
After Lubuntu 14.04 is installed, will clone drm-openchrome repository, and
install Linux 3.19-rc6 kernel that contains drm-openchrome.
While I have not seen it work in front of me, James Simmons wrote the code to
support HDMI, and Frank Huang made a fix several months ago to the HDMI code
inside drm-openchrome.
As some may already know, ZOTAC ZBOX nano VD01 was marketed as an HTPC (Home
Theater PC), so probably because of this, it does not come with a VGA or DVI
output. (i.e., legacy-ish PC monitor interfaces)
It only supports HDMI and DisplayPort.
Obviously, this makes the installation painful for now since drm-openchrome is
still not mainlined.
In other words, I cannot just attach an external DVD drive and install Lubuntu
to ZBOX nano VD01 at this point. (Obviously, this will be remedied eventually
by me.)
I am installing Lubuntu images to the SK hynix SSD on my usual development
computer (Epic Learning Epic 1314 laptop), and when I am done with this, I will
transfer the SSD to the ZBOX nano VD01.
As of right this minute, I am in the process of converting one of the partition
with Lubuntu 12.04 to Lubuntu 14.04.
After that is done, I will be cloning drm-openchrome to the Lubuntu 14.04
partition.
I will also need to find an old (9 years old) abandoned Full HD HDTV I found at
the apartment trash collection site (I rescue lots of working computer parts,
and several of my VIA IGP mainboards were also rescued.) where the TV tuner
does not seem to work, but HDMI input works (confirmed this with an Intel
Baytrail based WinBook tablet I bought at Microcenter last year), so I was
planning to use this one for HDMI testing, but it is still buried somewhere in
the room at this point. (I hope it was not stolen.)
Basically, I am writing this message to let users of OpenChrome know that I
will be backporting drm-openchrome's HDMI support code to OpenChrome DDX.
I am sure the process is not going to be as easy as copy and pasting
drm-openchrome's code to OpenChrome DDX, but as a practical matter, mainlining
drm-openchrome will take a while, so in the meantime, I think it is helpful to
the existing OpenChrome users with VX900H chipset (VX900 chipset with HDMI
activated) to backport the HDMI code so that they can see something on the
screen.
That being said, please do not expect this will be completed right away.
It is likely be available around OpenChrome Version 0.7 or 0.8 at the earliest.
Regarding DisplayPort, that will be done after HDMI is working.
That's all for now, and I will likely send out another announcement piece
when I get HDMI working with ZBOX nano VD01.
Regards,
Kevin Brace
The OpenChrome Project maintainer / developer
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