HS4PI boot from SSD

[Blinder]

I'm not great with Linux, but I found this:

This is how I was able to boot from SSD. You will write 2 different image files. The eeprom update image will require one sd card. and of course you'll need an SSD.
When you boot from the CF drive, it programs the EEprom to boot from USB. Boot to USB is not enabled by default.
The second disk is the SSD. It's just amazing to watch even the full desktop version get installed on the disk between one and two minutes! so cool.

These instructions were copied almost verbatim from https://www.tomshardware.com/how-to/...berry-pi-4-usb

This will only work on a Pi4 not Pi3

1. Download and install Raspberry Pi Imager from the Raspberry Pi website.

2. Insert a spare micro SD card into your computer. Note that this card will be erased. once you boot this once, eeprom is written and you wont' need to do it again.

3. Launch Raspberry Pi Imager and under Operating System scroll down to Misc Utility Images and left click to open the next menu.

4. Select Bootloader and then Select USB Boot. This will return us to the main menu.

5. Under Storage click on the button and select the micro SD card. Double check that you have the right drive before proceeding.

6. Click on Write to download and write a configuration image to the micro SD card. When done remove the card from your computer.

7. Plug in SSD drive into USB3 port.

8. Launch Raspberry Pi Imager and under Operating System Select the first option, Raspberry Pi OS.

7. Insert the micro SD card into your Raspberry Pi 4 / 400 and power on. The green activity light will blink a steady pattern once the update has been completed. If you have an HDMI monitor attached, the screen will go green once the update is complete. Allow 10 seconds or more for the update to complete, do not remove the micro SD card until the update is complete.

8. Power off the Raspberry Pi and remove the micro SD card.

9. your next boot will be to the USB SSD

[cesarvog]

The latest HS4Pi image can also boot from USB SSD.

That was not my experience with HS4Piv5 which I downloaded just a few days ago.

First thing I did was copy all contents from the HS4Piv5 SD card to the USB connected SSD drive:

#dd /if=/dev/mmcblk0 /of=/dev/sda bs=16M status=progress

The copy operation took some time, which really depends on the size and speed of your SD card being copied and the USB SSD one is using. In my case, using a class 10 Sandisk Ultra Plus 32GB as source and a Kingston Sa400m8/240g 240gb as destination, it took about 20 minutes (estimate - I really did not paid that much attention as I was doing other things during the copy operation. It did not take an exorbitant time, though). YMMV.

Then, to be able to have HS4Piv5 boot from my USB based SSD I had to manually edit the following files on the destination SSD drive, replacing every occurrence of /dev/mmcblkp6 with /dev/sda6 and every occurrence of /dev/mmcblkp7 with /dev/sda7:

- /boot/cmdline.txt: replace all above mentioned device paths in parameter root=
- /boot/os_config.json: change the above mentioned contents in partitions […]
- /etc/fstab: change all lines beginning with /dev/mmcblk0px… to /dev/sdax

After making the above mentioned manual edits, and since I had already updated my RPi4 eprom, I just safely removed the SD card from the RPi4 sd card reader and powered it up to boot exclusively from the USB SSD drive ending up with a perfect HS4Piv5 running from the SSD.

Cesar

[PFL]

HI PFL. What software do you use to clone the SD to SSD? I have tried it with Etcher and Win32 Disk Imager and cant seem to get it to work.

The latest HS4Pi image can also boot from USB SSD. The only issue is the 5 plugins limit. and if you install on microSD card that is unlimited plugins. I use Pi imager.

after clone to SSD, you will need to expand the root partition.

or you can remove noobs partition.

Maybe I can post the image here. but this forum limited the upload file size. the image is about 650MB.

[Michael McSharry]

In my case I followed the google guidance on a generic RPI4 boot from USB. It then installed HS4 per the directions provided by Rich at https://forums.homeseer.com/forum/ho...g-hs4-on-linux

[Jamr]

Jamr,

The instructions at the link you provided are too outdated.

It updates fine and I believe it works much better than the OEM build for HS4

I need to build a base image for a friend of mine soon so I'll document the entire process and post the results.

Will you be connecting a Display and Keyboard to the Pi directly or will you be running it headless?

Roger D

That would be great Roger, thanks.
I usually do it with a Display and Keyboard as I stink with Commands.
After a quick look I found some instructions from HS on installing to Linux dated about a year ago. Some of it is a bit above my head but I should be able to figure it out.
Just not looking forward to it as I just got my PI version running from scratch and I am not sure if I can use the backup on my future Linux version?
Thanks.

[Roger D]

Jamr,

The instructions at the link you provided are too outdated.

It updates fine and I believe it works much better than the OEM build for HS4

I need to build a base image for a friend of mine soon so I'll document the entire process and post the results.

Will you be connecting a Display and Keyboard to the Pi directly or will you be running it headless?

Roger D

[Jamr]

Roger, I forgot to ask. Can you do updates normally and does everything else work as expected as compared to the release for Pi from HS?

[Jamr]

The issue is the version of the Raspbian OS that is on the HS image does not support booting from USB.


Here I'm running Raspbian 64Bit upgraded to Debian 11 64Bit on a Raspberry Pi4 8GB on an Argon one SSD adapter with a Samsung 860 EVO 256GB SATA SSD.
Note: I use this as my main system even though I have an Intel I9 system next to it.

Install your OS first.
Download the HS4 image
Copy the /usr/local/HomeSeer folder from the HST image to your new OS.
Install the HS4 dependencies such as Mono 6, vbnc, flite, Etc..
Navigate to /usr/local/HomeSeer and launch ./go

Roger D

Roger, Thanks for that.
I found these instructions on the dependencies. Do they look accurate?

[SteveW]

The issue is the version of the Raspbian OS that is on the HS image does not support booting from USB.


Here I'm running Raspbian 64Bit upgraded to Debian 11 64Bit on a Raspberry Pi4 8GB on an Argon one SSD adapter with a Samsung 860 EVO 256GB SATA SSD.
Note: I use this as my main system even though I have an Intel I9 system next to it.

Install your OS first.
Download the HS4 image
Copy the /usr/local/HomeSeer folder from the HST image to your new OS.
Install the HS4 dependencies such as Mono 6, vbnc, flite, Etc..
Navigate to /usr/local/HomeSeer and launch ./go

Roger D

This... The earlier posts were incorrect guesses. The Homeseer Pi image is significantly altered and it cannot boot as-is on a Raspberry Pi 4. The only way to accomplish running HS4 on a RPi 4 is to build it manually, as Roger describes above, or to make several manual edits to various device names, etc.

[Roger D]

The issue is the version of the Raspbian OS that is on the HS image does not support booting from USB.


Here I'm running Raspbian 64Bit upgraded to Debian 11 64Bit on a Raspberry Pi4 8GB on an Argon one SSD adapter with a Samsung 860 EVO 256GB SATA SSD.
Note: I use this as my main system even though I have an Intel I9 system next to it.

Install your OS first.
Download the HS4 image
Copy the /usr/local/HomeSeer folder from the HST image to your new OS.
Install the HS4 dependencies such as Mono 6, vbnc, flite, Etc..
Navigate to /usr/local/HomeSeer and launch ./go

Roger D

[Jamr]

You just need to run:
sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade
after it finished, then clone to SSD, it will run from SSD. the only thing is that you have to upgrade wiringPi to make little board LED display properly.

HI PFL. What software do you use to clone the SD to SSD? I have tried it with Etcher and Win32 Disk Imager and cant seem to get it to work.

[PFL]

I doubt it with the partition setup on the card. There’s so many new users out there and I doubt they knew what they were buying into. I reckon it’s a case of “you have what you bought” and get on with it.

For anyone serious about HS I reckon HS Standard is a minimum for anything exotic like booting from SSD 😂

I’m sure there must be an upgrade path. If not suck it up or go HS Standard or better.

You just need to run:
sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade
after it finished, then clone to SSD, it will run from SSD. the only thing is that you have to upgrade wiringPi to make little board LED display properly.

[Tillsy]

I reckon it’s a case of “you have what you bought” and get on with it.

When I used to run the Pi version of HS I extracted it from the HS Pi image and put into my own Pi setup. Worked an absolute treat including integrated updates.

[concordseer]

HS4-Pi is only distributed as an SD card image. I think he's saying that it doesn't boot to the OS.
https://homeseer.com/wp-content/uplo...S4Pi-Guide.pdf

The image is NOOBS-based. I wonder if a NOOBS-based distribution is compatible with re-targeting to an SSD.

I doubt it with the partition setup on the card. There’s so many new users out there and I doubt they knew what they were buying into. I reckon it’s a case of “you have what you bought” and get on with it.

For anyone serious about HS I reckon HS Standard is a minimum for anything exotic like booting from SSD 😂

I’m sure there must be an upgrade path. If not suck it up or go HS Standard or better.

[zwolfpack]

Ok. So assuming you have installed the OS and rebooted and it boots fine. Then you install HS. Is that correct. Before you attempt to set up any system daemon or reboot could you try launching HS manually as I outlined above.

HS4-Pi is only distributed as an SD card image. I think he's saying that it doesn't boot to the OS.
https://homeseer.com/wp-content/uplo...S4Pi-Guide.pdf

The image is NOOBS-based. I wonder if a NOOBS-based distribution is compatible with re-targeting to an SSD.