Install RISC OS to SSD on RPi4 ?

Hello All,

I’m returning to RISC OS after 30 something years and in the process of building a RPi4-based RO workstation. I’m mid project and would like to install RO to SSD rather than SD card. I’ve done some research and tried to follow the instructions on David Pilling’s website, but I can’t get it to work….

Does anyone have any instructions they can share? I know its possible. Grateful for any advice.

Many thanks,

André

Welcome back. There are folk here who have had success at doing just that. I prefer to use Partition Manager, located here. If you chose this path, the feedback thread is here.

I haven’t tried the latest version yet, so the following steps may change. I needed to “initialise Pi Boot drive”, then at the new desktop:
Ctrl-F12: Open a TaskWindow
Enter the following commands:-

configure autodst
configure monitortype EDID
configure filesystem SCSI
configure SCSIFSDrive 4
savecmos scsi::ssd4.$.!Boot.Loader.CMOS
time

Good luck!

PS. SDCard creation- there’s no need for the extra commands.

Many thanks! I followed your instructions, and I’m pleased to say I have a test system successfully booting from USB drive. Great stuff. Thanks for the tip regarding Partition Manager. That made the whole process far easier.

As per instructions from Andrew Rawnsley, I also added an obey file in Postdesk (!Boot.Choices.Boot.Postdesk) containing the command
savecmos scsi::ssd4.$.!Boot.Loader.CMOS

Andrew wrote: "This saves the cmos settings on shutdown into SSD’s partition. This is necessary because “SDcmos” module (as name implies) saves cmos to SD card (if present), not SSD."

Interesting. Thanks for the tip, Paul.

Using Partition Manager, I haven’t yet encountered an issue requiring the intervention, but I’ll keep it in mind. Thanks again.

@André. You’re welcome, and it’s good to hear that it worked for you. :)

As you’re a returning user, here’s a link to a series of community videos that I’d previously pulled together.

As I understand things, the intervention saves the CMOS at every shut down, even if it hasn’t changed – which usually will be the case. Only when you do change the CMOS, the intervention will have its benefits.

This is necessary because “SDcmos” module (as name implies) saves cmos to SD card (if present), not SSD.

<shrug>

SDCMOS saves the CMOS file when you do the OS_Byte to change CMOS (or the config does it for you); and at shutdown it will stamp the CMOS file so that if the machine restarts in the absence of an RTC, it’ll get the clock set to the last used time instead of something silly like 1970.

It is useful, so I’m surprised nobody has tried hacking a copy of the module to write to “SCSI::$.!Boot.Loader.CMOS” rather than assuming SDFS.

As it happens, I did exactly this back in 2019…

If so, here’s an UNTESTED version with the “SDFS” replaced by “SCSI”. It might work.
http://heyrick.ddns.net/files/SDCMOSscsi.ffa

Or, better yet, have the module read the configured FileSystem and use that prefix instead of always assuming SDFS? Yes, I know it’s called “SDCMOS”, but times move on… ;)

@Paul: Thanks. Yes, I can see the value in that. I’ll add that to my test system to head off any unwanted issues later on.

@Andrew: Thanks for the links to those community videos. Much appreciated. I’ll have a look. Things have certainly moved on since my heady days owning an A3000 with RO 3.11 – I need to catch up!

Or, better yet, have the module read the configured FileSystem and use that prefix instead of always assuming SDFS? Yes, I know it’s called “SDCMOS”, but times move on… ;)

Well, that doesn’t sound too difficult.

Ah. We were still writing new things in assembly in 2012, I see.

Although thinking about it some more, looking at the configured filing system isn’t necessarily the correct behaviour anyway. My configured FS is SCSIFS but my CMOS file is still on the SD card, along with the ROM.