HiFive Premier P550

• Ubuntu Releases for HiFive Premier P550 Board.
• Forum Usage Instructions is available here.

Description

Ubuntu Image releases for HiFive Premier P550 Board.

• Based on Ubuntu 24.04.2 LTS.
• Prebuilt Ubuntu image in compressed format named p550-ubuntu-24.04-preinstalled-server-riscv64_20260313_1344_68.img.zst.
• Please ensure that the validated combination of the bootloader image and the Ubuntu image are flashed to the board. The release notes provide the version and validation details.
• The latest images release is available here.

Hardware preparation

• One Type-C USB cable (for serial port monitor and uboot command)
• One USB flash driver that at least 16G (image source)

Flashing images

Copy the bootloader and uncompressed Ubuntu image to an ext4 formatted the USB flash driver

For example

USB    /- bootloader_P550.bin
        |- p550-ubuntu-24.04-preinstalled-server-riscv64_20260313_1344_68.img

connect the USB flash driver to the bottom usb port of the board and power up and wait for the uboot shell through the serial port.

Bootloader flashing

If your device already has a compatible bootloader installed, you can skip this step.

=> usb reset
=> ls usb 0
=> ext4load usb 0 0x90000000 bootloader_P550.bin
=> es_burn write 0x90000000 flash

Demo output

=> usb reset
resetting USB...
Bus usb1@50490000: Register 2000140 NbrPorts 2
Starting the controller
USB XHCI 1.10
scanning bus usb1@50490000 for devices... 4 USB Device(s) found
       scanning usb for storage devices... 1 Storage Device(s) found
=>
=> ls usb 0
<DIR>       4096 .
<DIR>       4096 ..
                 p550-ubuntu-24.04-preinstalled-server-riscv64_20260313_1344_68.img
         4818776 bootloader_P550.bin
=> ext4load usb 0 0x90000000 bootloader_P550.bin
4768600 bytes read in 27 ms (158.8 MiB/s)
=>  es_burn write 0x90000000 flash
SF: 224 bytes @ 0x0 Read: OK
FIRMWARE writing...
Bootspi flash write protection disabled
Erase progress: 100%:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SF: 2004 bytes @ 0x140000 Erased: OK
Write progress: 100%:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SF: 0x7d4 bytes @ 0x140000 Written: OK
Bootspi flash write protection enabled
DDR writing...
Bootspi flash write protection disabled
Erase progress: 100%:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SF: 455808 bytes @ 0x40000 Erased: OK
Write progress: 100%:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SF: 0x6f480 bytes @ 0x40000 Written: OK
Bootspi flash write protection enabled
BOOTLOADER writing...
Bootspi flash write protection disabled
Erase progress: 100%:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SF: 4038328 bytes @ 0x1c0000 Erased: OK
Write progress: 100%:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SF: 0x3d9eb8 bytes @ 0x1c0000 Written: OK
Bootspi flash write protection enabled
Bootspi flash write protection disabled
Erase progress: 100%:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SF: 224 bytes @ 0x0 Erased: OK
Write progress: 100%:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SF: 0xe0 bytes @ 0x0 Written: OK
Bootspi flash write protection enabled
bootloader write OK
=>

:::warning If you are using a bootloader version prior to 2025.06.30 and want to upgrade to bootloader version 2025.06.30 or later, you cannot directly use the es_burn command to flash the bootloader; instead, you must flash it following the RECOVER BOOTLOADER method. :::

Ubuntu image burning

=> es_fs write usb 0 p550-ubuntu-24.04-preinstalled-server-riscv64_20260313_1344_68.img mmc 0
=> reset

Demo output

=> es_fs write usb 0 p550-ubuntu-24.04-preinstalled-server-riscv64_20260313_1344_68.img mmc 0
Write progress:  87%:+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Essdk deb packeges install

If you find that installing essdk deb packages using apt install is too slow, you can download the essdk and ffmpeg deb packages from essdk_ffmpeg_251230.zip here and install them by dpkg -i XXXX.deb.

Download from network disk

If you are unable to download images from GitHub and you are in China, you can try downloading them here.

Login to the board Using Serial Console

Default username and password for ubuntu image is ubuntu. On first boot, user will be prompted to change the default password.