Manual Installation

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▶ Manual Installation

In this tutorial we will demonstrate the installation of OpenELEC onto a single hard drive system (USB, SSD, HDD, CF, etc).

First off all boot your Linux System or download and boot Ubuntu Live CD. If you use a live cd, remember to enable the needed universe repository for the extlinux installation.

Manual Installation

Locate the device (SD,CF,SSD or HDD) to use.

In my case /dev/sdb.

 sudo fdisk -l

Create the needed partitions

1 - System 250MB | 2 - Storage reminding free space

Or use Gparted and set the partition size option to cluster.

 sudo fdisk /dev/sdb

 o - create DOS partition table

 n - new partition

 p - primary

 1 - partition number

 ENTER - use default start point

 +250M - for 250 MB System Disk

 n - new partition

 p - primary

 2 - partition number

 ENTER - use default start after partition 1

 ENTER - use default end for all free space usage of partition 2

 a - set partition boot flag

 1 - partition 1

 p - show partitions

Now you have 2 linux partitions like this.

 ...Device...boot.....Start........End......Blocks...Id..System
 /dev/sdb1....*............2..........261.......48976+..83..Linux
 /dev/sdb2.............261........1021......730991+..83..Linux

Create filesystem on partitions.

 sudo mkfs.ext4 -m0 /dev/sdb1

 sudo mkfs.ext4 -m0 /dev/sdb2

Set disklabels to partitions.

 sudo e2label /dev/sdb1 System

 sudo e2label /dev/sdb2 Storage

For SD, CF & SSD disable ext4 journal.

 sudo tune2fs -O ^has_journal /dev/sdb1

 sudo tune2fs -O ^has_journal /dev/sdb2

Experts All in One Command.

 sudo mkfs.ext4 -v -m0 -O ^has_journal -L System /dev/sdb1

 sudo mkfs.ext4 -v -m0 -O ^has_journal -L Storage /dev/sdb2

SSD Trim Support

For SSD you can enable the discard mount option if TRIM is supported.

 sudo hdparm -I /dev/sdb1 | grep TRIM

If you get the output TRIM supported activate discard.

 sudo tune2fs -o discard /dev/sdb1

 sudo tune2fs -o discard /dev/sdb2

Install the needed extlinux bootloader.

 sudo apt-get install extlinux

Write MBR (Master Boot Record Code) to the device.

 sudo dd if=/usr/lib/extlinux/mbr.bin of=/dev/sdb bs=440 count=1

Mount System partition for bootloader & system installation.

 sudo mkdir -p /media/System

 sudo mount /dev/sdb1 /media/System

Install extlinux bootloader.

 sudo extlinux -i /media/System/

Create bootloader menu config file.

 sudo gedit /media/System/extlinux.conf

And paste the following lines.

In case of problems with the Partition Labels use APPEND boot=/dev/sdb1 disk=/dev/sdb2 quiet

 DEFAULT linux
 PROMPT 0
 LABEL linux
 KERNEL /KERNEL
 APPEND boot=LABEL=System disk=LABEL=Storage quiet ssh

Install OpenELEC

Now copy the KERNEL & SYSTEM file from the OpenElec.tar.gz/target/* folder to the System partition.

 sudo cp ./OpenELEC.tv/target/KERNEL /media/System/

 sudo cp ./OpenELEC.tv/target/SYSTEM /media/System/

Umount and enjoy...

 sudo umount /dev/sdb1