[BPI-R4 PRO 4E] OpenWRT firmware is UNUSABLE - Pls update

Banana Pi Router design BPI-R4/BPI-R4 Pro(MT7988)
1

Hello,

I just received a BPI-R4 PRO 4E and I noticed that the current Openwrt Snapshot proposed on its webpage is barely usable:

  1. The device does not cold boot properly unless a debug USB-c serial session is running. Without the USB-c cable attached, it only shows the single green power light and it’s stuck somewhere (no way to know where, since if you debug with the USB-c cable it immediately finalizes the boot correctly).
  2. The SFP-WAN port is disabled. It sees the modules in and out, but it always stays down, so Eth1 is basically only assigned to the PHY copper port next to it.
  3. How do you install OpenWRT packages? I need DS-Lite, but opkg does not work as it’s pointing to dead repositories. Also, installing the .ipk file seems impossible as the kernel signature will never match (I don’t know where are the single packages that match this custom snapshot build).

I tried to use some PRO 8X images but ofc they wont even start the booting process. In general, at this very moment, the device is barely usable. Anyone has an update on the OpenWRT image or something? This is very annoying.

Thanks.

1 Like
2

Which exact image you tried? The 8x from the PR (not yet merged) or my R4Pro_PR8 image should basicly bootup. Phy is not supported and ethmux (lan+wan) is fixed to sfp.here it will come to issues as this is different on 4E variant,so better use mxl switch and internal port for now

3

Hi Frank,

I tried exactly the image from your link https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/12u0af8eUu-ATqse4-Qg5cTYfe2XXtwQu (the Pro 8X sdcard). I booted from the sdcard and It’s not booting. It returns an error almost immediately. I’ll post you a screenshot tomorrow.

4

we will update source code to github soon.

1 Like
5

A text dump of bootlog will be better. At least uboot should boot and then load linux till some point…maybe it stops because of the lan/wan gpio-hogs before userspace/services are loaded.

1 Like
6

Alright. This is where the openwrt-mediatek-filogic-bananapi_bpi-r4-pro-8x-sdcard.img image from your repo is stopping. Not much text to log but, I will also provide that.

image
image1401×879 49.7 KB

F0: 102B 0000
FA: 1042 0000
FA: 1042 0000 [0200]
F9: 1041 0000
F3: 1001 0000 [0200]
F3: 1001 0000
F6: 380E 5012
F5: 0000 0000
V0: 0000 0000 [0001]
00: 0000 0000
BP: 0600 0041 [0000]
G0: 1190 0000
EC: 0000 0000 [3000]
MK: 0000 0000 [0000]
T0: 0000 018E [0101]
Jump to BL

NOTICE:  BL2: v2.14.0(release):OpenWrt v2026.01.23~e06f2586-1 (mt7988-sdmmc-comb-4bg)
NOTICE:  BL2: Built : 17:11:43, May 14 2026
NOTICE:  WDT: Cold boot
NOTICE:  WDT: disabled
NOTICE:  CPU: MT7988
NOTICE:  EMI: DDR4 4BG mode
NOTICE:  EMI: Using DDR unknown settings
ERROR:   no DATLAT taps pass, DATLAT calibration fail!
ERROR:   DATLAT calibration fail, write back to default values!
ERROR:   ASSERT FAIL at set_emi_cona_by_size[2143]!

This is also similar to the 8X Pro image available on the official webpage.

7

Oh,i guess the issue here is the 4bg mode for 8gb ram…you could try flashing the default bl2 for 4g bpi-r4 to offset 0 of sdcard.

8

okkkayyyy… :joy: Any quick steps on how to do that? :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

9

oh, seems that openwrt does not provide the sdmmc bl2 separately, but you can get it from my tree,bl2 should be compatible

you can try this: https://github.com/frank-w/u-boot/releases/download/CI-BUILD-2026-07-bpi-2026.07-rc2-2026-05-29_1625/bpi-r4_sdmmc_bl2.img

if you use a linux host just do a

dd if=bpi-r4_sdmmc_bl2.img of=/dev/sdX

where sdX needs to be changed to your sdcard device

10

This is the boot of the sdmmc bl2 image

image
image1195×924 48.9 KB

11

This way gpt is overwritten, sdX needs to be bl2 partition on SD card?

12

Ah ok. I’m definitely doing the process incorrectly. I’m using Win32 Disk Imager to write to the sdcard. Do I need to compose the two images (openwrt and bl2) in a single one?

13

Ah,you are right, mmc was partition 1,had nand/nor in my mind

14

Just flash openwrt again and flash bl2 to sdX1, sorry

15

Sorry Frank this is getting more confusing by the message.

You want me to flash openwrt on the sdcard, and then flash bl2 on the same card? This will overwrite the memory of the entire card with the content of the bl2 since Win32 Disk Imager always sets the whole sdcard. That’s why I’m asking if I need to compose bl2 and openwrt in a single .img before I flash the final img.

16

Mhm,if win32imager erases the full card this is bad…but replacing a piece of image is imho more difficult than writing on spcific partition…don’t you have a linux system there to write the bl2 to partition 1?

I try to create some basic support of R4Pro 4e,but i’m unable to test

17

I can do all the tests you desire when I’m at the lab. Also, if you have telegram we can be more efficient without flooding this thread (send me a PM in case). Otherwise send me a PM with a trial image, or post it here.

Whatever you prefer is fine. Thanks.

Edit: I spent sometime this evening to merge the two images. I’ll test it tomorrow.

18

please refer to the BSP: GitHub - BPI-SINOVOIP/BPI-R4PRO-4E-OPENWRT-V24.10.0-Master-Devel · GitHub

19

Hi,

is this an update over the pre-compiled here

image
image2552×442 58.8 KB
or is it the same?

20

i prepared source for 4E here (still using 8x defconfig and dts), but should get past the DRAM point

edit, seems i still have a build-error there…

cat: staging_dir/target-aarch64_cortex-a53_musl/image/mt7988-spim-nand-ubi-comb-bl2.img: No such file or directory