307 replies to this topic

[EvilDragon]

notaz continued to work on the new kernel, and therefore, SuperZaxxon Beta 3 is ready to be tested!

Compared to SuperZaxxon Beta 2, this release has the following changes:

• Kernel 3.2: Added Bluetooth support (thanks to urjaman
• Kernel 3.2: Patched SD-Card routines (70% SD access speed increase)
• Kernel 3.2: Suspend-Mode doesn't unmount SD Cards (so you can use it now if PNDs are runnning)
• Kernel 3.2: Switching between composite and SVHS (TV Out) is now working again.
• Kernel 3.2: WiFi doesn't automatically start on bootup (except for if you chose that it should)
• The default kernel is now 3.2 (you can still boot into the old one using the bootmenu)
  
  And here's a list of currently known issues:

• Not all apps will work (i.e. UAE4ALL). However, these apps need to be updated, as we try avoid evil kernel hacking (to keep it as upstream as possible)
• MiniMenu: Doesn't properly add / remove apps when you remove / insert an SD Card. Simply select "Rescan Application" in the MiniMenu-Mainmenu after you swapped cards

I encourage everyone to try out the new firmware release and help us to hunt down remaining bugs of the new kernel.
Most programs should now also run using the new 3.2 kernel - but please report any that don't work yet here on this thread.
If possible, add the contents of /tmp/pndrun_xxx to your post.

The most awesome feature for the new kernel is - of course - the powersaving feature.
Right now, we're using a suspend mode that does not disable the SD Cards.
It is now safe to go into powersaving mode while running a PND - just be sure to NOT CHANGE THE SD CARDS WHILE BEING IN POWER SAVING MODE! THIS WILL CAUSE DATA LOSS!
In Suspend mode, your Pandora will survive for 100+ hours, which is pretty neat

So here it is, available as full flash:
Download SuperZaxxon Beta 3

Please note: Flashing the new firmware will put your unit back into a default state. All your settings and users will be lost. Of course, this does not apply to PNDs which save their stuff on the SD-Card.

For those running from SD cards, you first need to install the new bootloaders.
You can do this by copying everything from above zip to root of SD card, but leaving out rootfs.img and rootfs.md5 and then following usual reflashing procedure. Then everything but NAND rootfs will be reflashed.

To install it, simply extract the archive onto the root of your SD Card.
Insert the SD Card into the left slot. Keep R (shoulder) pressed while switching on your Pandora and select "Boot from SD1"

If "Boot from SD1" doesn't appear, try to reformat the SD Card using Panasonic SD Formatter, recopy the files and retry.


You can also use the SD Installer and run the OS off SD Card.
Grab the image needed for the SD Installer here

Enjoy

[milkshake]

Woah this impressive stuff.

[FaeMinx]

Awesome! I'm still on hf7 alpha 2 so am very tempted to download this...

How does suspend work? Just by closing the lid?

Sent from my HTC Sensation Z710e using Tapatalk

[Juliano]

Cool. Gonna try that,

[DaMummy]

are the hf7 realtek usb wifi drivers back into this OS?

[ensoniq2k]

@FaeMinx: You have to flick the power switch to the right then the power led gets a little bit darker and the pandora is in deep standby.

Awesome gift for easter ED. I'm going to flash it asap :-) Especially the 3.2.1 Kernel as default boot option is nice and not ejecting the SD Card so a rescan after power up is not necessary

[magic_sam]

Hi,

Is the archive corrupted ?

Archive: SuperZaxxonB3.zip
End-of-central-directory signature not found. Either this file is not
a zipfile, or it constitutes one disk of a multi-part archive. In the
latter case the central directory and zipfile comment will be found on
the last disk(s) of this archive.
unzip: cannot find zipfile directory in one of SuperZaxxonB3.zip or
SuperZaxxonB3.zip.zip, and cannot find SuperZaxxonB3.zip.ZIP, period.

Bye, Magic Sam

[ensoniq2k]

I had no problems flashing the image. Maybe you need to download it once again

[Ivanovic]

Just flashed this firmware and seems to work nicely so far. Though I saw several things:

• Minimenu does not scan all folders on all sd cards correctly (cf this report).
• The switch GUI menu seems to have been changed removing the option to select the GUI at every bootup.
• There is no support shipped to activate zram by default. I added this script (yes, a crude hack especially with the sleep and no check for the kernel) as /etc/init.d/zram.sh and created a symlink to it as "/etc/rcS.d/S98zram.sh":

  	#!/bin/sh		modprobe zram	sleep 1	mkswap /dev/zram0	sleep 1	swapon -p 5 /dev/zram0

  This way there are effectively several more MB available resulting in firefox working a lot more stable on 256MB pandora.

Thanks for this lovely release, I'll make sure to check if over the next weeks when I got it with me on a buisness travel to the US.

[Linux-SWAT]

Great news !
I didn't imagine so much bugs would be corrected that fast :^).

[Galaxis]

*grrrr* I'm falling for the "screen saver activates when system time is changed" thing every time on the first boot of a new install. Black screen. Damn. Did it finish? Did something go wrong? Oh, no, just need to do something to deactivate the screen saver...

[torpor]

Now if we could only get CDEVTOOLS.PND updated to be 100% compatible with this new version ..

[EvilDragon]

The switch GUI menu seems to have been changed removing the option to select the GUI at every bootup.

Nothing has been changed here, and it seems to work fine on my Pandora.

[Dismike]

in minimenu i've selected the list view. but when i'm closing a pnd, it switches back to icon view mode...

[Linux-SWAT]

You don't say if we can suspend while running the OS from SD card.

[EvilDragon]

You don't say if we can suspend while running the OS from SD card.

I never tested it, but as the cards aren't unmounted, I see no reason why it shouldn't work.

[notaz]

You don't say if we can suspend while running the OS from SD card.

It should work if you add mmc_core.removable=0 to kernel arguments of [auto]boot.txt , maybe that SD installer thing could be updated to do that, not sure if it's maintained any more though.

[Linux-SWAT]

Ok, will dig it.
Thanks.

Btw, is there any downside to mmc_core.removable=0 ?

[notaz]

Help text of that option says that card is almost guaranteed to be corrupted if you change it during suspend (the newly inserted one I guess).

[Galaxis]

You don't say if we can suspend while running the OS from SD card.

It should work if you add mmc_core.removable=0 to kernel arguments of [auto]boot.txt , maybe that SD installer thing could be updated to do that, not sure if it's maintained any more though.

mmc_core.removable=0 seems to be default now, and there is a warning before suspending.

Tried suspend once on the SD card I just installed with the new firmware - no problems visible so far.