Volumio 3.785 has stopped booting randomly, RPi5 2GB, ethernet orange and green LEDs both lit solid

Help and Support
1

Hi all,

I had been using my Volumio for a decent time without issue and was making good progress on finally getting the system built into a case.
It runs on a PiMoroni NVMe M2 hat with Kingston 512GB 2280 drive.
It had been disconnected for maybe 6 weeks, while I prepared metalwork etc.
It had been updated from the app to V3.785 on January 5th, previously being 3.779 (beta?) and had been connected and used daily for perhaps a month since then.

I had rigged up 5V GPIO powering, and wanted to test this worked firstly. It all booted fine in terms of the green activity indicator, but I then thought I best check it came to life as a system too, so connected ethernet and USB DAC.
This is where it went wrong, it has not shown up an on the app at all, and ethernet lights are both lit solidly.
I return to powering via USB, but the situation stays the same, green activity and solid ethernet lights.

So, I have to make a Raspbian image on SD card again. This boots without any issues, and I can see what looks like a perfectly in-tact Volumio install, including all my music library, on the NVMe drive attached.
As far as I can tell this should all work, but removing the SD card I am back to a non-booting system with the solid ethernet indicators.

I am unsure what to do at this point. I can flat install, but why would this be needed? Nothing has changed here, except briefly trying to power from GPIO 5V, which was successful.
This definitely feels like a software issue, I expect unrelated to the different way of powering, I returned to the exact same USB PSU as before, ethernet cable etc. all the same.

Any insight welcome! I was on the final strait of finishing the project up, finally, and now it just feels doomed to failure…

2

Hey @PlushRest,

It sounds like you might be dealing with a boot partition issue on your NVMe drive. Here’s a detailed response to help diagnose and resolve the issue:

Booting from MiscoSD and Diagnosing the FAT32 Boot Partition

  • Boot from MiscoSD:
    Try booting your Volumio system from a MiscoSD card. This will let you access and inspect the FAT32 boot partition on your NVMe drive. Look for essential boot files (such as bootcode.bin, start.elf, and related configuration files). If these files are missing or corrupted, the board won’t boot correctly from the NVMe drive.

  • Diagnose the Boot Partition Content:
    Once booted via MiscoSD, mount the boot partition of your NVMe drive on another Linux system or through a live USB environment. Verify that all the necessary files are present and compare them against a known good Volumio image if possible.

Confirming Your Raspberry Pi Version

Could you please confirm which Raspberry Pi model you’re using? Different models have varying boot requirements and EEPROM configurations. You can identify your board by referring to this guide:
Guide: Identifying Your Raspberry Pi Board on Volumio

This information is crucial, as the boot process (and any necessary firmware updates) can differ between models.

Power Supply Considerations and EEPROM Updates

  • Power Source Change Impact:
    Switching power sources—from using the standard USB PSU to powering via the 5V GPIO - can sometimes cause issues. Depending on your Raspberry Pi version, this change might require additional adjustments to the EEPROM settings.

  • EEPROM Version Update:
    It’s a good idea to check if your boot EEPROM is running the latest version from the stable channel. Updating to the latest firmware can resolve boot issues and improve compatibility with different power sources. This is especially important if your Pi requires specific EEPROM settings for booting from NVMe.

Preparing Your Board for NVMe Boot (CM4, CM5, or Pi5)

If you are using a Compute Module 4 (CM4), Compute Module 5 (CM5), or Raspberry Pi 5 board to run Volumio OS with an NVMe drive, please refer to this guide for detailed instructions on preparing your board:
Guide: Prepare Raspberry Pi for Boot from USB NVMe

This guide provides step-by-step instructions on configuring your board’s firmware and ensuring that your NVMe setup is compatible with Volumio OS.

By booting from MiscoSD, inspecting the FAT32 boot partition, confirming your Raspberry Pi version, and ensuring your power and EEPROM configurations are correct, you’ll have a clearer picture of whether the issue is due to corrupted boot files or a firmware/power setup mismatch. Let us know which Raspberry Pi version you’re using and any findings from the boot partition check.

Kind Regards,

3

Hi,

Thanks for your reply! I was waiting for a bit of time to try this and now have some results.
Unfortunately, nothing is working any better :frowning:
But here’s what I know…

Running Rasbian 64-bit I can look at the NVMe boot drive and find those files. It looks like this, I think it’s all in tact?:

VolumioBootCrop
VolumioBootCrop1779×450 155 KB

I am running Raspberry pi5 2GB model. I checked my EEPROM, it was this version previously:
VolumioEEPROMCrop

But after performing a full update from the Raspbian environment I was able to upgrade to this newer version:
VolumioEEPROMupdated

This did not get it to boot from Volumio on the NVMe.

I noticed in the guide you linked that there is a recommendation to add “PCIE_PROBE=1” to the EEPROM config, so I now have added that. I also checked my boot order, which is “0xf461” as is wanted.

I did power via GPIO, only briefly to check it, and had no issue with the board seemingly booting up, but since then I have returned to powering via the same USB power supply I had always used previously.
Maybe I should add this line to my EEPROM “PSU_MAX_CURRENT=5000”, but I haven’t so far as it seems irrelevant at least until I return to GPIO powering?

Not sure where this leaves me, I think everything is looking correct and this previously worked for many weeks. Something went wrong either from being disconnected for a longish period, or by briefly powering over GPIO.
I must stress I did not mis-connect the board or anything, in fact, since the Activity LED lit green I almost skipped the step to actually connect the system up again and check it and almost went ahead and built it into the case! Probably lucky I did at least check that, saves some disassembly…

I speculate that this boot pattern - activity turns Green, a few seconds later both ethernet ports light solid - might indicate that is is trying to PXE boot having unsuccessfully found either SD or NVMe boot drives?
Not sure, I don’t think that is an easy thing to set up, it doesn’t do that without intervention?

Thanks again!

4

Hi again,

In the end I’m afraid I had no idea what really happened.
I performed a flat install with the latest version, V3.795, and happily it is all working again and I managed to transfer my 116GB collection over the network to it this morning!

I made a little thread to show the finished product too: A simple Raspberry Pi5 + NVMe build

Thanks