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Ubuntu 18.04 for ODROID-C2

Posted on by neal.kim

We’ve released a new 64bit Ubuntu 18.04 image for C2 with many useful features. This LTS version will be supported until April of 2023.

Ubuntu 18.04 LTS AARCH64 Bionic Beaver with Mate Desktop
Linux Kernel 3.16.57 LTS updated from discontinued 3.14 (this 3.16 LTS Kernel was ported by user scpcom and other forum members)
OpenGL ES 2.0 driver for Mali 450MP3 GPU
Kernel header package is improved to support the DKMS driver build
OpenGL ES enabled Qt5 library
OpenGL ES enabled SDL library
GPU accelerated Chromium WebGL browser
Kodi 17.6 playback 4K/60fps H.265 files
c2play command line video player compatible
WiringPi GPIO/SPI/I2C/ADC/IRQ library
And many other features

Click this image to see the OS information in detail.

In fact, we released this image a couple of weeks ago. But there was a critical issue with OpenGL-ES applications due to the malfunction of mmap driver.
Recently, a developer tobetter made a nice workaround and patched the kernel source.
So you must update the kernel after installing the OS image with “sudo apt update && sudo apt dist-upgrade” command.

You can find the OS image link from this WiKi page.
https://wiki.odroid.com/odroid-c2/os_images/ubuntu/v3.0

Ubuntu Minimal image is available in this link too.
https://wiki.odroid.com/odroid-c2/os_images/ubuntu/minimal_image

If you are interested in running the mainline Kernel 4.17 or higher, visit this forum thread.
https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=135&t=22717&start=850#p226092
As far as I heard, most of key features are working well including the Mali OpenGL acceleration.
But the video decoding HW acceleration still has some issues.
I hope we can run the mainline kernel officially before Christmas.

BTW, we couldn’t find any way to upgrade to 18.04 from 16.04 due to very complicated dependencies.
So you have to backup your important data and freshly flash the OS image.

C1/C1+/C0 compatible Ubuntu 18.04 image will be ready in a few weeks.
Stay tuned.

neal.kim