1. Start here
   1. Welcome
   2. Specifications
   3. General background info about SW/HW
   4. Assemble the HW
   5. Install SW
   1. Campaigns
      1. Funded: Crowd Supply PC 1
      2. Funded: Crowd Supply PC 2
   2. Use it
      1. Success stories
      2. Get support
   3. Sponsoring
      1. Become a sponsor
   4. Contribute
      1. Build Firmware
      2. contributing code
      3. images .. documentation

Install firmware

Assuming that you have GnuBee PC1 without any upgraded firmware nor installed linux distribution you have two choices using the built-in webserver or using a USB-stick.

The GnuBee PC 1 has a 32MB soldered on Flash-chip. It contains 6 parts. Their names (u-boot, u-boot-env, factory,firmware,kernel,rootfs,rootfs_data) should be self-explanatory.

Upgrading the firmware as documented here, will replace the content of the firmware,kernel,rootfs and rootfs_data.

All the firmware discussed here, have the following common characteristics:

• The mount a read/write overlay partition, where changes are preserverd over reoboots. This allows you to add more packages, download scripts, change password, etc.
• By default there is no root password.
• After the startup you may access the device ** either with a USB-to-UART cable as

Via built-in webserver

Is documented under built-in webserver

Via USB-Stick

Download a firmware (Check whether there are newer files present). Depending on what you want to achieve you choose:

Choose the desired firmware

1. Debian
   https://github.com/gnubee-git/gnubee-git.github.io/raw/master/debian/librecmc-ramips-mt7621-gb-pc1-squashfs-sysupgrade_2017-07-22.bin (around 17 MB)
2. LEDE
   https://github.com/gnubee-git/GnuBee_Docs/raw/master/GB-PC1/firmware/LEDE/GnuBee/GnuBee-lede-17.01-full-0915.bin (around 29MB)
3. libreCMC
   https://github.com/gnubee-git/GnuBee_Docs/raw/master/GB-PC1/firmware/libreCMC/GnuBee/GnuBee-librecmc-sysupgrade-full-0911.bin (around 10 MB)

Copy firmware to USB-Stick (MS-DOS format)

Use a USB-stick with a MSDOS partition table and a vfat or fat partition. Copy the downloaded file and rename it to gnubee.bin. Unmount the USB-stick.

Flash the firmware

Place your USB-stick into any of the 3 USB connectors. Reboot the GnuBee via a SW command or by pressing twice the red power on/off button.

While loading the new firmware the LEDs will give an indication or reading/writing. Lower LED fast blink = read, slow blink = write, solid = done. (This may take several minutes.) When the upper LED changes from off to on solid it’s time to remove the USB Stick and reboot into the new firmware.

Copyright © 2017 Niklaus Giger