Sailfish OS on ONDA V820W V3 and other Intel SoC-based tablets
 

I got pretty much inspired by https://jolla.comes.today/jolla-tablet-on-taobao-china/ article and firmware from http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=96474. In a nutshell, official Jolla Tablet is a device based around Intel Atom Z3735F SoC (Bay Trail) and can work both with Sailfish OS and Android (by the way, Android device tree it's based on is called "anzhen4_mrd8_w").

There have been a lot of cheap Chinese tablet using the same SoC, and usually they come with Android/Windows dualboot. So what's preventing us from running Sailfish OS on them? Android firmware can often be easily ported between such devices, but kernel is device-specific, so custom ROM makers just use the stock kernel from their device unmodified.

For Sailfish OS, we can't, since systemd requires some kernel options which are most of time turned off in Android kernels. Enabling them and recompiling kernel would be easy if Chinese manufacturers didn't violate GPL and actually provided kernel sources, but that's not the case. Thankfully, since most of hardware is similar, it's possible to base custom kernel on other device source.

I have Sailfish OS running on Onda V820w tablet. It's not perfect yet, but the hardware itself (touchscreen, audio, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, front and back cameras) works. Many thanks to Stskeeps for providing modules folders which were missing from Jolla Tablet kernel sources. The biggest problem was getting kernel working with camera sensors. Even though the needed drivers are present, PMIC regs and GPIO pin meanings turned out to be different. Just a few values to change, but it was very troublesome to debug and I had to disassemble Onda stock Android kernel to understand what's wrong.

Below is a guide to installing Sailfish OS on Onda V820w (tested with V3, see serial number to understand what revision is yours if you happen to have it). Hope community will be interested in running Sailfish OS on other similar devices and we can have more supported. I'm happy to help with what I can either here or at #sailfishos-porters on IRC.

Update: automatic installer (all data is going to be erased!) image for ONDA V820W V3: https://mega.nz/#!8FZRiBwB!FBBD8CUMa...Qp713VqT-FoAhM. Unpack it to the root of FAT32 formatted USB drive and boot tablet from USB drive.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Hi, sorry for replying so late, but this really caught my attention as it could be a cheaper alternative to the Jolla Tablet. First, I want to thank you for the detailed tutorial and for the effort.

Would you (or anyone else with this tablet) please be willing to share any experience with using it for a few weeks?

What about the battery life? How much power does it draw when idle?
Does the miniHDMI-out work?

And the final question - since the port is based on the Jolla Tablet files (if I understand it correctly) and it uses the same kernel version, do the proprietary parts of SailfishOS work as well? Namely Alien Dalvik, Jolla Store and MS Exchange (never used it, but I'm curious).

Thanks.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Hi there
Also interested for my
Toshiba Encore WT8-A-103

Specifications

Toshiba Encore WT8-A-103Notebook: Toshiba Encore WT8-A-103 (Encore Series)
Processor: Intel Atom Z3740
Graphics Adapter: Intel HD Graphics (Bay Trail)
Would be great it someone could make a port for it

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Unfortunately, I was more interested in getting SailfishOS running on it than actually using the device, so can't really share much user experience. Battery should be around 3 hours for general use. miniHDMI is untested, since I don't have a display to plug it in, but it probably won't work, since Sailfish OS doesn't support more than one screen so far and they purposefully shipped Jolla Tablet without HDMI port.

As for the device itself, build quality/official OS (Windows/Android I mean) support/etc is not to be compared with more expensive devices, but it still does a lot for the price in terms of hardware itself.

And for the last question, yes, but it probably goes against the rules.

Since your device doesn't have official Android firmware, libhybris can't be used, but pure Linux adaptation will be probably much more generic. You can try running latest build of Remix OS and Android-x86 itself (they've integrated many kernel patches for Bay Trail) or general Linux distro to see what in terms of hardware support is likely to work and what's not.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

+1 for Encore port. Btw, have you tried getting your encore to dnx/fastboot mode? mine just flashes the dnx mode screen and continues booting, whereas on my jolla tablet dnx mode works correctly?:confused:

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Any chances for Nokia N1? Have an TW-Version (Android 5.0.2) with unlocked boot loader.
But i can't find kernel and android sources for this Tablet.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

i bricked my tablet by flashing sfos with fastboot. any ideas how to unbrick? i cannot even flash original os

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

which one?
I think, now you need to put your Tablet into Flash mode and flash it with Intel Phone Flash Tool or Intel Plattform flash tool

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

the onda v820w, i used both tools, but it gives me an error like flashing ifwi failed - sn. i tried sfos, android 5 for this tablet and the factory image for android, how i understood

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

now i maybe try booting a life cd and putting sfos to the internal nand. the question is how i get grub.cfg bzimage and grubia32.efi. but maybe ihave to install a Linux to have it

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

hopefully they are in the rootfs tarball and work for the internal nand also

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

How did you try flashing SailfishOS on that Onda thing?

Based on the first post in this thread (and my research), the only way to run SailfishOS on it is to boot it off a microSD card.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

like it was a jolla tablet from taobao, only it isn't. how are the internal partitions called ?

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

I wonder if Nokia will reply to kernel sources request. I know it's not manufactured by them, but still... Otherwise your best bet is to look for devices with the same SoC (Intel Atom Z3580 - Moorefield). For example, I found Dell Venue 8 7840 - http://opensource.dell.com/releases/...40_Moorefield/. Core hardware should work, but no idea what else will and what not. You can contact me in IRC if you want to do some tinkering.

Please confirm if it's Onda V820w or Onda V820W CH and what revision (look for serial number at the back side). And yes, you can't flash original Jolla Tablet image via fastboot. Hardware is still a little different.

Booting off microSD isn't a requirement, you can install it into NAND like a general Linux distro (except partitioning/copying files needs to be done manually), it's just more safe to start from. I have it in NAND on mine.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

how did you do it?^^

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

I asked alredy Foxconn for Android Sources and Kernel but got of course no answer...

I have an second Nokia N1 (Chinese Modell), which i bought for spear parts....
I can try to flash Sailfish on it, or you think it wouldn't be so easy?

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

sn is P820DBG2V5A02794, what does that mean?^^

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

have you also got a 32bit efi bios?

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

summary of what i did so far: i installed debian on the tablet but it seemed like while boot the display gets turned off, even with ctrl + alt + f1 i didn't see anything, anyway i managed to copy the 3 files to the bootpartition from a usb-stick, from which i booted the debian live cd, then my cable got a loose contact so i decided to copy the tarball to the sdcard and start the copyingprocess, but unfortunately i couldn't make contact with the cable, so i couldn't use the keyboard. next i will buy a new usb-cable and copy the files to the datapartition. then hopefully it will boot :)

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Your tablet is ONDA V820W V5 then. Hardware like Wi-Fi/touchscreen/cameras might be different, but it should boot at least. You need to have 100 mb EFI partition and copy GRUB/kernel there, and ext4 root partition, large enough to contain Sailfish OS files.

Are the devices identical hardware-wise? As first step, extract boot paritition from stock firmware. Try to repack it and make sure it can be booted (flash or boot directly via fastboot). Then try replacing kernel with the one found on Dell Venue 8 7840 Android 5.0 firmware and check if it still can boot (kernel modules won't match, but display driver is usually built into kernel).

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

i don't know if they are identical. thanks for the ideas. why do i need the new kernel? for drivers? btw i broke ground on USB ,so ibrought it to arepair shop

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

I was replying to explit in second paragraph, please look at quotes.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Okay thanks, it was very late

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

will the 6MB "kernel" file i extracted from boot.img do?

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

or can sb send me the contents of the boot partition?^^ it doesn't hurry though, because the tablet is still at the repair shop :D

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

You don't need boot partition. The kernel from /boot folder in rootfs is loaded using GRUB. We can't use Android bootloader, since UEFI is 32-bit and Jolla Tablet has 64-bit kernel (it's possible to compile 32-bit one, but I had some PulseAudio-related system crashes).

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

so i just have to copy the files to a partition and install grub with reference reference to the kernel

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Exactly, no special installation is needed for GRUB, copying files to EFI partition is enough. If you want, I can try to make image for fastboot to flash Sailfish OS on ONDA.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

yes please :)

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Well, no luck with fastboot so far due to droidboot limitations and some problems with tools.

To make it easier, I did an improvised installer, based on Archiso and custom script. Just download the archive, extract it to the root of FAT32-formatted USB drive, and boot tablet from it:
https://mega.nz/#!8FZRiBwB!FBBD8CUMa...Qp713VqT-FoAhM

One thing though, the tablet of yours is ONDA V820W V5, while mine is V3. There are slight hardware changes, but I'm not sure what is different exactly. The image should boot, but touchscreen/Wi-Fi/Bluetooth/sound/etc may not work depending on what has been changed.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

thabk you very much :)

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

thanks, i did it :D with a few changes though, in grub.cfg you set russian locale i suppose, but it isn't there, so i commented that line, and wehere you mount the archiso for loopback i put a (hd0,1) before the $... oh and i forgot, i set the uuid manually

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

although after i made an update it cannot boot anymore :/

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

i know how to put back old sfos now, but i will try to replace the files from the overlay master zip over usb debugging

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

i don't know on what ip-address it listens and for which services, the phone listened on 192.168.2.15

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

It should listen at 192.168.2.15 port 2222 for telnet

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

thanks, i reverted the changes now and didn't update. okay, multitouch isn't working, sound isn't working at all and i cannot update. but i will use it because i want it mainly for sheet music

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

Can you post dmesg output of your tablet after booting? As I said, some hardware might be different.

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

will do when i'm at home :)

Re: Sailfish OS on Intel SoC-based tablets
 

What about SailfishOS on below :D

https://www.eevblog.com/2016/08/24/e...o-pc-teardown/