PI2B installation - SD-card problem

[cpighin]

Hi,

this is my first post. Be patient with me! Thank You

I got my first card "Raspberry Pi Model B" and I tried to boot it with a new SD-card, but it did'nt work.
Consider that I read the article STICKY BOOT PROBLEM http://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewt ... 28&t=58151(also for PI2B) and that my SD-card (Kingston SDC10 / 16GB) is on the list of the Working ones.
It happened that my PI2B did'nt booted properly and in the end I found that the content of SD-card was deleted (the SD-crad was corrupted).
In particular:
- I connected my new PI2B to a Samsung TV (HDMI), to a mouse and to a keyboard (USB) and then to the power supply,
- suddenly the red led turned on, and also the green one (after a while it started blinking),
- on the monitor it appeared the warning: unsupported mode,
- then for a moment I saw a white screen (disturbed) with the raspberry icon ,
- I noticed a beginning of activity,
- then the monitor was turned off with the message "unsupported mode" and also the green LED went off,
- I unplugged the power,
- I removed the SD-card and checked on a PC that its contents was deleted. Now it contains only the file noobs.conf

Code: Select all

[General]
display_mode = 0
keyboard_layout = gb
language = en

and the name of the card is altered in SETTINGS.

I ran again the sequence of actions, after reformatted the SD-card and having flashed it with NOOBS_v1_4_0 and got the same result: the PI2B did'nt boot and SD-card resulted corrupt again!

What's up?
Who changed the name of SD-card, deleted its content and wrote file noobs.conf?

Claudio

[FTrevorGowen]

...
It happened that my PI2B did'nt booted properly and in the end I found that the content of SD-card was deleted (the SD-crad was corrupted).
In particular:
- I connected my new PI2B to a Samsung TV (HDMI), to a mouse and to a keyboard (USB) and then to the power supply,
- suddenly the red led turned on, and also the green one (after a while it started blinking),
- on the monitor it appeared the warning: unsupported mode,
- then for a moment I saw a white screen (disturbed) with the raspberry icon ,
- I noticed a beginning of activity,
- then the monitor was turned off with the message "unsupported mode" and also the green LED went off,
- I unplugged the power,
- I removed the SD-card and checked on a PC that its contents was deleted. Now it contains only the file noobs.conf

Code: Select all

[General]
display_mode = 0
keyboard_layout = gb
language = en

and the name of the card is altered in SETTINGS.
...
Claudio

If your card was "corrupted" it's possible that you "unplugged" the power before NOOBS had finished re-organising the SD card as part of the installation process. Because a Windows PC doesn't understand Linux partitions what you see is only part of what is there. I'm currently re-writing/updating my webpages to include NOOBS 1.4 screenshots/monitor photo's so, at the moment, I can only point to those for an older version:
http://www.cpmspectrepi.webspace.virgin ... NOOBS.html
(and the other examples linked to therein)
W.r.t. the monitor/T.V. reporting "unsupported mode" - try re-formatting your card using the SDA's formatting tool etc. and reload NOOBS 1.4 on to it. If you're not certain that your PC's card reader/writer (built-in) supports SDHC cards you may need to use an external (USB-stick-like) device. During "first" boot hold/toggle key '2' to make NOOBS use its HDMI "safe mode" and, hopefully, you may get a proper display.
Trev.

[cpighin]

Thanks FTrevorGowen

I did a new attempt to boot my RPI2.

I deeply formatted the SD-card using Gparted (Linux), to remove all partitions and a quick format to FAT32, and Windows for a deep formatting. In doing so I found that Linux was reading the label on the card as SETTINGS, while in Windows resulted RECOVERY.

Then I did a new attempt of booting the RPI2, using the advice of FtrevorGowen to press key 2 (not F2?) of the keyboard during boot, to induce NOOBS to use the HDMI monitor in "safe mode".

It happened what follows:
- I connected to RPI2 the Samsung monitor, mouse, keyboard, and then the power holding down key 2,
- the red led switched on and after a couple of seconds the green led switched initially on and than began to blink irregularly,
- the monitor showed initially the warning: unsupported manner,
- then, on several occasions, for a few tens of seconds, I saw the white screen Ruspberry (disturbed) and I noticed system activity,
- then the monitor was turned off with the warning: unsupported manner and also the green led was switched off,
- I waited a few tens of seconds,
- I released the button 2
waiting for your help on the way to proceed.

I have a feeling that the process lasted a couple of minutes and that something positive actions happened.

Claudio

[cpighin]

While waiting for your advice, I turned off the RPI2 to check the status of the SD-card and verified that, again, the card had been over-written: all files had been deleted, it was there only noobs.conf with the content reported above, there were created unwanted partitions and its label (read with Linux) had been changed in SETTINGS.

Claudio

[cpighin]

I did a new attempt of booting the RPI2, by pressing the F2 key (instead of key 2) on the keyboard during boot, to induce NOOBS to use the HDMI monitor in "safe mode".
It happened as follows:
- I connected to RPI2 the Samsung monitor, mouse, keyboard, and then I powered the board holding down the key F2,
- suddenly the red led turned on, after a couple of seconds also the green led went on and started to blink irregularly,
- at the beginning the monitor showed: unsupported manner,
- then, only once, for about ten seconds, I saw the white screen (disturbed) with the raspberry icon, I noticed some activity of the system,
- then, after about twenty seconds, the monitor was turned off with the message "unsupported manner" and also the green LED was off,
- I still waited up to 2 minutes,
- I released the F2 key and switched off the RPI2.
After that the SD-card resulted corrupted as usual.
This test showed to me that the system performs better by pressing the key 2 (not F2) during boot, even if the operation was not completed successfully.

Waiting for help, Claudio

[cpighin]

News ...

My TV/monitor Samsung specifications are: optimal PC resolution 1920X1080 @ 60 Hz.
Should I use any specific command?

By reading the articles "https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/se ... n-and-doom" and "http://elinux.org/R-Pi_Troubleshooting#SD_cards" i noted the statement "After writing the image to the SD card, verify That You Can See the boot partition when you insert the SD card into your computer. The partition Should Contain a number of files, including start.elf and kernel.img. If you do not see These files on the SD card, you have made an error writing the image file" I wanted verify the situation and found out that in my folder NOOBS_v1_4_0 there were not such files!
Is this correct since I'm using a new NOOBS release or there was an error downloading NOOBS?

Claudio

[FTrevorGowen]

Thanks FTrevorGowen
I did a new attempt to boot my RPI2.
I deeply formatted the SD-card using Gparted (Linux), to remove all partitions and a quick format to FAT32, and Windows for a deep formatting. In doing so I found that Linux was reading the label on the card as SETTINGS, while in Windows resulted RECOVERY.

Do not use Windows' own tools to (re-) format the card - GParted is sufficient (Delete all existing partitions and create a new, FAT32 partition to fill the card and give it a label**). If you want to use Windows you must use the SDA Formatting tool as per the instructions ****.

...
By reading the articles "https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/se ... n-and-doom" and "http://elinux.org/R-Pi_Troubleshooting#SD_cards" i noted the statement "After writing the image to the SD card, verify That You Can See the boot partition when you insert the SD card into your computer. The partition Should Contain a number of files, including start.elf and kernel.img. If you do not see These files on the SD card, you have made an error writing the image file" I wanted verify the situation and found out that in my folder NOOBS_v1_4_0 there were not such files!
Is this correct since I'm using a new NOOBS release or there was an error downloading NOOBS?
Claudio

That information relates to a "raw image" of Raspbian, not the NOOBS Installer!
When you have unzipped the NOOBS 1.4 zip file directly onto the newly formatted card (or copied the contents of any folder created by the unzip process on your Windows PC) you should have these files/directories there:

NOOBS14_OnCard.jpg (109.34 KiB) Viewed 2274 times

Trev.
** http://www.cpmspectrepi.webspace.virgin ... reparation
**** http://www.raspberrypi.org/help/noobs-setup/

[cpighin]

I finally managed to install the OS Raspbian, hacking a lot.

It was not a problem of the SD-card, but a video one.

Now that Raspbian is installed my SD-card has been completely over-written, and consists of three partitions: SETTINGS (ext3 /ext4, 2 items, total 360 bytes), boot (msdos, 34 objects, total 14.9 MB ), root (ext3 /ext4, 86 296 items in total 2.4 GB). This explains why, in past occasions, the SD-card was over-written: the system was trying to install the OS, but did not complete the process because I unplugged my RPI2!

Now it remains to solve a minor problem: the monitor is running at a inadequate resolution : 640x480 (refresh rate 0.0) and I will have to change the file config.txt.

Tips?

Claudio

[FTrevorGowen]

I finally managed to install the OS Raspbian, hacking a lot.
It was not a problem of the SD-card, but a video one.
Now that Raspbian is installed my SD-card has been completely over-written, and consists of three partitions: SETTINGS (ext3 /ext4, 2 items, total 360 bytes), boot (msdos, 34 objects, total 14.9 MB ), root (ext3 /ext4, 86 296 items in total 2.4 GB). This explains why, in past occasions, the SD-card was over-written: the system was trying to install the OS, but did not complete the process because I unplugged my RPI2!
Now it remains to solve a minor problem: the monitor is running at a inadequate resolution : 640x480 (refresh rate 0.0) and I will have to change the file config.txt.
Tips?
Claudio

More or less what I suspected but I needed to be sure you were (re-)creating the NOOBS card correctly. It looks as if, for some reason, NOOBS has "fallen back" to hdmi_safe_mode's resolution (I've had that happen with a HDMI-to-VGA converter and an ancient VGA CRT monitor**). Take a look at these notes:
http://www.cpmspectrepi.webspace.virgin ... tings.html
and post the output of the tvservice command options (-n, -s, -m DMT and -m CEA) as compared to those shown there for a similar display type.
Trev.
** http://www.cpmspectrepi.webspace.virgin ... erter.html

[cpighin]

Thanks FTrevorGowen

Take a look at these notes:
http://www.cpmspectrepi.webspace.virgin ... tings.html and post the output of the tvservice command options (-n, -s, -m DMT and -m CEA) as compared to those shown there for a similar display type.

OK Trev, I will try tomorrow in the afternoon and I will post results.

Claudio

[mbh16_x]

If you need any help setting up the raspberry pi have a look at http://mattsweb.ddns.net/gettingstarted.php

[cpighin]

Hi Trev,

here is the requested output for tvservice command:

Code: Select all

pi@raspberrypi ~ $ tvservice -n
device_name=SAM-SyncMaster
pi@raspberrypi ~ $ tvservice -s
state 0x120016 [DVI DMT (4) RGB full 4:3], 640x480 @ 60.00Hz, progressive
pi@raspberrypi ~ $ tvservice -m DMT
Group DMT has 19 modes:
  (prefer) mode 4: 640x480 @ 60Hz 4:3, clock:25MHz progressive 
           mode 5: 640x480 @ 72Hz 4:3, clock:31MHz progressive 
           mode 6: 640x480 @ 75Hz 4:3, clock:31MHz progressive 
           mode 8: 800x600 @ 56Hz 4:3, clock:36MHz progressive 
           mode 9: 800x600 @ 60Hz 4:3, clock:40MHz progressive 
           mode 10: 800x600 @ 72Hz 4:3, clock:50MHz progressive 
           mode 11: 800x600 @ 75Hz 4:3, clock:49MHz progressive 
           mode 16: 1024x768 @ 60Hz 4:3, clock:65MHz progressive 
           mode 17: 1024x768 @ 70Hz 4:3, clock:75MHz progressive 
           mode 18: 1024x768 @ 75Hz 4:3, clock:78MHz progressive 
           mode 21: 1152x864 @ 75Hz 4:3, clock:108MHz progressive 
           mode 28: 1280x800 @ 60Hz 16:10, clock:83MHz progressive 
           mode 32: 1280x960 @ 60Hz 4:3, clock:108MHz progressive 
           mode 35: 1280x1024 @ 60Hz 5:4, clock:108MHz progressive 
           mode 36: 1280x1024 @ 75Hz 5:4, clock:135MHz progressive 
           mode 47: 1440x900 @ 60Hz 16:10, clock:106MHz progressive 
           mode 48: 1440x900 @ 75Hz 16:10, clock:136MHz progressive 
           mode 51: 1600x1200 @ 60Hz 4:3, clock:162MHz progressive 
           mode 58: 1680x1050 @ 60Hz 16:10, clock:146MHz progressive 
pi@raspberrypi ~ $ tvservice -m CEA
Group CEA has 14 modes:
           mode 1: 640x480 @ 60Hz 4:3, clock:25MHz progressive 
           mode 2: 720x480 @ 60Hz 4:3, clock:27MHz progressive 
           mode 3: 720x480 @ 60Hz 16:9, clock:27MHz progressive 
           mode 4: 1280x720 @ 60Hz 16:9, clock:74MHz progressive 
           mode 5: 1920x1080 @ 60Hz 16:9, clock:74MHz interlaced 
  (native) mode 16: 1920x1080 @ 60Hz 16:9, clock:148MHz progressive 
           mode 17: 720x576 @ 50Hz 4:3, clock:27MHz progressive 
           mode 18: 720x576 @ 50Hz 16:9, clock:27MHz progressive 
  (native) mode 19: 1280x720 @ 50Hz 16:9, clock:74MHz progressive 
           mode 20: 1920x1080 @ 50Hz 16:9, clock:74MHz interlaced 
           mode 31: 1920x1080 @ 50Hz 16:9, clock:148MHz progressive 
           mode 32: 1920x1080 @ 24Hz 16:9, clock:74MHz progressive 
           mode 33: 1920x1080 @ 25Hz 16:9, clock:74MHz progressive 
           mode 34: 1920x1080 @ 30Hz 16:9, clock:74MHz progressive

Should I try to set Raspberry to use Group CEA mode 5 (1920x1080 @ 60Hz 16:9, clock:74MHz interlaced)?

Claudio

[DougieLawson]

Try CEA mode 16.

[cpighin]

Thanks DougieLawson

Are following lines correct to be used in config.txt?

Code: Select all

hdmi_ignore_edid=0xa5000080
hdmi_force_hotplug=1
config_hdmi_boost=4
hdmi_drive=2        
hdmi_group=1         
hdmi_mode=16     

Claudio

[DougieLawson]

Code: Select all

hdmi_ignore_edid=0xa5000080
hdmi_force_hotplug=1
config_hdmi_boost=4

Remove those three settings.

[cpighin]

Hi DougieLawson

I modified the file config.txt with instructions:

Code: Select all

hdmi_drive = 2
hdmi_group = 1
hdmi_mode = 16

then I started RPI2 and I noticed that the screen was not activated, while noting that the green LED was blinking repeatedly.
I waited about ten minutes and I turned off the RPI2.

What should I do?

Claudio

[DougieLawson]

Set the HDMI parms to:

Code: Select all

hdmi_force_hotplug=1
hdmi_ignore_edid=0xa5000080
config_hdmi_boost=4
hdmi_group=2
hdmi_mode=4

and try again to find a setting that works.

You can use the tvservice command to update things dynamically.

[cpighin]

Hi DougieLawson
I did a new attempt to start RPI2 with DHMI setting you proposed and it happened as follows:
- after a few seconds appeared the linux console with a resolution (disturbed) of 1660x1200,
- after loading, I entered login, password and the command startx,
- than the Desktop Raspberry appeared with a resolution (disturbed) of 1660x1200, though better than previous,
- I took following picture of the screen to show here (you will see a worning that is a minor problem at present!).

hoping for your help to find a better combination of settings.

Claudio

[DougieLawson]

Just ignore that message. There's a solution for it published here on the forum, but it's not important.

[cpighin]

DougieLawson

I'm not enough expert to use safely the tvservice command to update things dynamically.

Can you help me?

Claudio

[DougieLawson]

tvservice -h

Read the fine instructions.

tvservice -e 'CEA 16 HDMI'
tvservice -e 'DMT 4 DVI'

Do it from an SSH session so you're not typing blind when the picture disappears from your TV.

[cpighin]

Hi Trev and DougieLawson

Since it is clear that the reason for the problematic installation of Raspbian on my RPI2 was not the SD-card, but the monitor being used, which was not properly recognized or managed, I considered more correct to open this new topic:

PI2B installation - Video problem http://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewt ... 67#p723767

Please, try to contribute there. Thanks.

Claudio