New user here on an inherited dev kit with a bunch of the old user’s “stuff” on it.
What’s the easiest way to blow this away and start fresh? I’m very, very new to linux.
I would like to update my linux version on the TX2 I have. I’m currently on Ubuntu 16.04.
I’d like to update to 18.04, if possible, and get a fresh start.
Is this possible using a LiveUSB like other linux installs?
I’ve seen that to install the Jetpack software, I’ll need another system. But the post was a couple of years old. Is this still true?
You would use a host PC runnng Ubuntu18.04 with true Linux filesystem. Download the last SDKM and run it for reflashing your Jetson. Note that this will erase any data in Jetson, so better save any work in it before.
Although some VM can sometime work, you will save much time debugging this by using a native Linux host.
FYI, a live Ubuntu 18.04 cd might work. It depends on whether or not you have a true Linux ext4 filesystem available (it could be a large enough external drive properly mounted…something @Honey_Patouceul mentions) and if the live cd has a kernel supporting loopback.
NOTE: The live CD must run on a separate host PC for flash software. This will never work if run on the Jetson.
If the TX2 has a recent L4T version (I’d say after L4T R32.3), it may be able to apt upgrade, but this wouldn’t clean what has been installed before out of apt nor manually installed apt/pip packages.
Some history might be of interest: Up until the early R32.1 release the Ubuntu part of the install was entirely by package, but the NVIDIA content was just a set of unpacked files. I forget when, but at around R32.3 (anyone know the exact release?) the NVIDIA content itself was put into packages as well, and a repository was created by NVIDIA. Prior to this the only upgrade would have been by flashing, and this would never work with “self flash” (100% of all flashes would require a host PC). The later releases (which are not all that old) could have the NVIDIA content updated via standard apt mechanisms.
The earlier releases which used packages for NVIDIA content needed tuning, and although it worked well within that release, an upgrade to the next release did not always work well. Newer releases should be able to use ordinary apt mechanisms to upgrade the actual release (ordinary Ubuntu 18.04 documents would have the correct mechanism listed). Still, this is not flashing, this is merely the package manager migrating. Any true flashing still requires a host PC.
Following up on this old post … I finally have some momentum to keep working on this.
I’ve been able to get approval for a virtual machine for Ubuntu 18.04.
Unfortunately, Hyper-V doesn’t support USB ports (which is needed to connect and install Jetpack/ reflash my Jetson).
Does anyone know if using VMWare would allow me to connect to the Jetson for the reflash/ Jetpack install?