Armbian Getting Started Guide

Before you start, please make sure you have:

• a proper power supply according to the board manufacturer requirements
• a reliable SD card

You will also need an existing operating system and a SD card writer tool. We recommend using USBImager because it can validate written data saving you from corrupted SD card contents.

New users

Some users might find it easier to follow this video tutorial.

Some word of advice, though. The video has been created a few years ago. You might therefore find differences between this video and our current site. So, in doubt, also follow the sections below while watching the video.

Download the image

If your hardware is supported, you must download an image for your board. All of our system images can be found at https://www.armbian.com/download/ or at one of our many mirrors. You will find that there are different types of images, either using Debian GNU/Linux or Ubuntu as their base operating system.

Debian or Ubuntu

If you have no special preferences or requirements, we recommend using an Ubuntu based Armbian image.

Minimal, Server, or Desktop

For each board, we usually provide these types of images:

• Minimal - lightweight CLI with only a bare minimum of packages and no graphical user environment
• Server - server variant with preinstalled standard utilities and no graphical user environment
• Desktop - full featured desktop image

For some boards we provide only minimal images due to their hardware limitations.

Vendor, Current, Edge, or Legacy

In some cases we provide images with different firmware. They differ in the level of hardware support and can be classified as follows:

• vendor contains a vendor-provided kernel which usually has the best hardware support while package version can be outdated, containing less general fixes
• current is following the latest Linux mainline LTS kernel and is in most cases the best choice.

Use the following images only if these are the only ones provided, or if you want to participate in testing:

• edge is, as the name implies, cutting-edge fresh / development / latest stable. It is only automatically tested, it can break at any time, and it is recommended only for experienced users.
• legacy is the old stable current kernel. Use it if current is not available or if something does not work well with it.

The level of kernel support, however, always depends on the board family. If in your specific case something does not work well, you are always free to try an image with another kernel included, or change the kernel with armbian-config.

Rolling releases

Rolling releases are suitable for Linux enthusiasts who want cutting edge packages and have the skills to fix the damage that a bad update might cause. If you want stability in a production environment or low headaches as a novice user, skip rolling releases. They are not at a suitable support quality level!

graph LR
  A[Hardware] --> B{Armbian kernel};
  B -->|legacy| C["rolling release"];
  B -->|vendor| C["rolling release"];
  B -->|current| C["rolling release"];
  B -->|edge| C["rolling release"];
  B -->|legacy| X["point release"];
  B -->|vendor| X["point release"];
  B -->|current| X["point release"];
  B -->|edge| X["point release"];


  C ---->|minimal| E[Debian or Ubuntu];
  C ---->|server| F[Debian or Ubuntu];
  C ---->|desktop| G[Debian or Ubuntu];

  X ---->|minimal| E[Debian or Ubuntu];
  X ---->|server| F[Debian or Ubuntu];
  X ---->|desktop| G[Debian or Ubuntu];

Danger

Do not use rolling release or edge images in a productive environment. Their purpose is testing and providing constructive feedback to developers.

Download and verfication

After you have determined the image you want, the download for each image consists of three separate files:

• the .xz compressed image file
• the .sha file for download verification (optional)
• the .asc file for image authentication (optional)

After you have downloaded these files, we recommend checking the integrity and the authenticity of the compressed image file.

How to check the download integrity?

Since it might happen that your download got somehow corrupted, we publish a checksum/hash for each of our images. You can compare the image’s SHA-256 hash with the one contained in the .sha file.

On Windows, you can download and use the QuickHash GUI and follow the instructions in the gui. Linux and macOS users can simply do this in the directory with the compressed image and the checksum file:

sha256sum -c Armbian_25.2.1_Bananapicm4io_bookworm_current_6.12.13_minimal.img.xz.sha

The integrity is verified if the output looks something like this:

Armbian_25.2.1_Bananapicm4io_bookworm_current_6.12.13_minimal.img.xz: OK

How to check the download authenticity?

All our images are digitally signed. It is therefore possible to check their authenticity. Linux and macOS user might need to install the required tools first: for Debian/Ubuntu, this can be done via sudo apt-get install gnupg, and for macOS use brew install gnupg. Windows users can install GnuPG from here. To check the authenticity, you will need the public key that was used to sign the images. This key can be retrieved from a keyserver or from the Debian/Ubuntu package repository (this step only needs to be done once):

# download the public key either from a keyserver
gpg --keyserver hkp://keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-key DF00FAF1C577104B50BF1D0093D6889F9F0E78D5
# or from the repository server
wget -O- https://apt.armbian.com/armbian.key | gpg --import -

To perform the verfification, run the command shown below.

gpg --verify Armbian_25.2.1_Bananapicm4io_bookworm_current_6.12.13_minimal.img.xz.asc

While the output can very depending on the GnuPG version, it should result in a response similar to the one below. It is safe to ignore the message WARNING: This key is not certified with a trusted signature!.

gpg: Signature made Thu Feb 13 11:53:18 2025 CET
gpg:                using RSA key DF00FAF1C577104B50BF1D0093D6889F9F0E78D5
gpg: Good signature from "Igor Pecovnik <igor@++++++++++++.com>" [unknown]
gpg:                 aka "Igor Pecovnik (Ljubljana, Slovenia) <igor.++++++++++++@gmail.com>" [unknown]
gpg: WARNING: This key is not certified with a trusted signature!
gpg:          There is no indication that the signature belongs to the owner.
Primary key fingerprint: DF00 FAF1 C577 104B 50BF  1D00 93D6 889F 9F0E 78D5

If something is wrong, the output will look something like this:

gpg: Signature made Thu Feb 13 11:53:18 2025 CET
gpg:                using RSA key DF00FAF1C577104B50BF1D0093D6889F9F0E78D5
gpg: BAD signature from "Igor Pecovnik <igor@++++++++++++>" [unknown]

Deploy the image

Before you start, there is an important note: Make sure you use a good, reliable and fast SD card. If you encounter boot or stability issues, in over 95 percent of the time it is either caused by an insufficient power supply or it is related to the SD card (due to a bad card, bad card reader, something went wrong when burning the image, card too slow to boot … ‘Class 10’ is highly recommended!). Armbian can simply not run on unreliable hardware. So checking your SD card with either F3 or H2testw is mandatory if you run into problems. Since counterfeit SD cards are still an issue, checking with F3/H2testw directly after purchase is also highly recommended.

Write the .xz compressed image with a tool like USBImager onto your microSD card. Unlike other tools, it can validate written data saving you from corrupted SD card contents. Due to known issues, balenaEtcher can no longer be recommended at this time.

Also important

Most SD cards are only optimised for sequential reads/writes as it is common with digital cameras. This is what the speed class is about. The SD Association defined Application Performance Class as a standard for random IO performance.

Application Performance Class	Pictograph	Miniumum Random Read	Minimum Random Write	Minimum Sustained (Seq. Write)
Class 1 (A1)		1500 4k IOPS	500 4k IOPS	10MBytes/sec
Class 2 (A2)		4000 4k IOPS	2000 4k IOPS	10MBytes/sec

We recommend at least A1 rated SD-Cards (A2 rated cards need yet lacking driver support and therefore show lower overall and especially random IO performance). For example:

In case you chose an SD card that was already in use before, please consider resetting it back to ‘factory default’ performance with SD Formatter before burning Armbian to it (explanation in the forum). Detailed information regarding ‘factory default’ SD card performance.

First boot

Insert the SD card into a slot and power on the board. With the cheapest board, the first boot (with DHCP) can take up to two minutes with a class 10 SD card.

First login

The first boot will log you in automatically if you have connected a display via HDMI or if you are connected to the serial console. For SSH, you need to login as root and use the password 1234. If you need to find your board’s IP address, you can use this tool.

After logging in, you will be prompted to change the default password. You will then be asked to create a normal user account that will have sudo permissions. Beware, at this stage the keyboard is using the QWERTY layout. In case you have no wired network connection and there is a wireless adaptor detected, the system will prompt you to connect.

Welcome to Armbian!

Documentation: https://docs.armbian.com/ | Community support: https://forum.armbian.com/

IP address:  Network connection timeout!

Create root password: ********
Repeat root password: ********

Shell: BASH

Creating a new user account. Press <Ctrl-C> to abort

Please provide a username (eg. your first name): jane
Create user (Jane) password: ********
Repeat user (Jane) password: ********

Please provide your real name: Jane

Dear Jane, your account jane has been created and is sudo enabled.
Please use this account for your daily work from now on.

Internet connection was not detected.

Connect via wireless? [Y/n] y

Multiple wireless adaptors detected. Choose primary:

1        wlx00e032cxxx94
2        wlx60fb00yyyc4a

Enter a number of wireles adaptor: 1

Detected wireless networks:

1        NETWORK
2        MY-WIFI
3        Caatsanddogs

Enter a number of SSID: 3

Enter a password for MY-WIFI: password

Probing internet connection (9)

Detected timezone: Europe/Ljubljana

Set user language based on your location? [Y/n] y

Generating locales: sl_SI.UTF-8
root@bananapim2pro:~#

Automated config

These settings can be pre-loaded, see Autoconfig

First steps

You can customize your Armbian Linux before or after installing it onto your device’s hard-drive. In many cases, you probably want to apply some basic customizations like adjusting the keyboard layout, the timezone, etc. before the installation, so you can use the same SD-card again if necesasary. Or you want to adjust your hardware configuration, or install software.

While the underlying operating system offers tools and processes to make these customizations, the preferred method to change most of these settings is using the interactive armbian-config tool which is shipped with all Armbian images.

Installation

At this stage, nothing has been installed onto the boards internal drive yet. Using the installer, you can now decide, where you want to install the boot loader and the rest of the system. The installer supports various combinations depending on the availability of onboard eMMC and/or attached SATA, NVME or USB storage.

Armbian Installer support those storage scenarios:

• boot from SD, system on SATA / USB
• boot from eMMC / NAND, system on eMMC/NAND
• boot from eMMC / NAND, system on SATA / USB / NVME
• Boot from SPI - system on SATA, USB or NVMe
• Install/Update the bootloader on SD/eMMC
• Install/Update the bootloader on special eMMC partition
• Install/Update the bootloader on SPI Flash
• Install system to UEFI disk

Start the install script and follow the lead:

armbian-install

After you have decided for an option, you can choose between the following file systems:

• ext2,3,4
• btrfs

For novice users, a sensible default is ext4.

Congratulation. You have successfully installed Armbian onto your board!

Update the system

The operating system consists of two parts that must be updated separately.

Update the Armbian OS

For the base operating system, use the APT package manager to keep the packages up to date.

apt update
apt upgrade

The Update process can take quite some time in case you are using an old or a cheap SD card and/or experience heavy load.

Users with a desktop will find graphical tools that allow one to update the system packages without using the command line.

Armbian provides a firmware package freeze feature to provide you with the possibility to upgrade all packages but the firmware. This prevents unplesant surprises on functionality regressions that can come with kernel upgrades. To enable or disable this feature, look for

Enable Armbian kernel/firmware upgrades / Disable Armbian kernel upgrades

within armbian-config.

If the kernel was upgraded during this process, you will be prompted to reboot at the next login.

When a new major release of Debian or Ubuntu is out, we recommend to start with a fresh image. While it is possible to do what is called a “dist-upgrade”, the process is largerly in the domain of the underlaying Debian or Ubuntu user space. We provide an experimental Distribution upgrades feature for armbian-config.

Danger

Userspaces distribution upgrades are neither tested nor supported. Therefore Armbian cannot provide any support if something goes wrong.

Update the boot loader

First, you need to update all packages as described in the previous section. Then run:

sudo armbian-install

and select:

Install/Update the bootloader on SD/eMMC

Troubleshooting

How to report bugs

Follow our bug reporting form and follow its instructions to collect the necessary information and how/where to provide them depending on the type of issue. Please understand that any reports lacking these fundamental diagnostics will be ignored.