09:37 <darkbringer> Hello. I'm looking for an Amlogic device/board to play with and I wonder if X96 Max would be a nice one. Does it require some kind of bootloader signing if I'll need to replace the stock one eventually?

13:02 <chewitt> darkbringer: x96max runs mainline kernel fine (with the right patch-sets) .. so depends on what kind of playing you're wanting to do

13:04 <adema> le potato works fine too

13:26 <darkbringer> chewitt: what about u-boot? I know that mainline u-boot support is quite incomplete at this point but it seems quite a lot of S905X2 devices also have some kind of bootloader secure chain for AVB 2.0 and whatnot to compicate things further. I was interested if x96max has it or if it will be possible to replace the bootloader. That information is really hard to find unfortunately.

13:27 <chewitt> factory bootloader will boot images from SD card or USB 2.0 ports

13:27 <chewitt> I haven't bothered with trying to overwrite the emmc

13:28 <chewitt> that can wait until mainline u-boot has more support for g12a/b devices

13:28 <chewitt> the Odroid N2 sources might be usable

13:29 <chewitt> but I'd rather wait .. the N2 u-boot sources aren't great

13:29 <chewitt> I'd guess AVB will be for AndroidTV devices .. x96max is AOSP

13:31 <darkbringer> Ok, thank you.

15:23 <narmstrong> darkbringer: it’s not easy/usual to change u-boot on these Chinese boxes, boards like LePotato, LaFrite, Odroid N2, khadas vim/vim2/vim3 are easily hackable from ROM to Linux console