After finishing the deploy system for the standard BPI-R4, here is the same concept brought to the BPI-R4 Pro 8X.
What the deploy system covers:
- SD card boot — flash a ready-made image, no Linux machine needed
- NAND system install — fully functional permanent option, no disk required
- eMMC install — permanent install to internal eMMC
- NVMe install — full OpenWrt on NVMe SSD with dedicated data partition
- UniFi Protect — camera management running in Docker on NVMe (G5 Flex tested, remote access working)
- UniFi Network controller — WiFi AP management (U7 Long-Range WiFi 7 adopted and working)
NAND and eMMC are fully functional permanent options. NVMe is recommended for larger storage — required for the UniFi stack.
Everything runs from a GitHub Actions CI pipeline — no build environment needed. Fork the repo, trigger the workflow, flash the release.
Built on mainline OpenWrt + MediaTek SDK. First public release — hardware tested end to end including powercycle persistence. Feedback welcome.
Full install guide and details:
https://github.com/woziwrt/bpi-r4-deploy
Tested hardware:
- BPI-R4 Pro 8X
- NVMe: Patriot P300 512 GB (slot CN14)
- UniFi G5 Flex camera
- UniFi U7 Long-Range WiFi 7 AP