I have port the sata driver from stock kernel to kernel 4.0 in order to run debian jessie (w/systemd).
Any interests to test it? the patch is on https://github.com/KL-Yang/mbl-linux-4.0
some boot log on http://kl-yang.blogspot.sg/
Hello kl-yang, welcome to the WD Community. Thanks for sharing, for any other users that want to try this, please note that this could void the warranty.
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This is great!
Is someone testing or developing this further?
I am sad that I have to live with a 4 year old openvpn.
I need some option to upgrade.
I can prepare the uImage, boot.scr and debian Jessie rootfs if you want to try.
But need install it manually, it may require you attach a serial console, or open the case to access hard drive.
The stock fs has 64KB sector size, cannot mount directly on PC, kind of tedious to test if you have a lot of file on it.
I have ereased stock firmware long time ago and has serial console.
FYI, mine has been running this kernel for some time as a file server.
root@mybook:~# cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor : 0
cpu : APM821XX
clock : 800.000008MHz
revision : 28.130 (pvr 12c4 1c82)
bogomips : 1600.00
timebase : 800000008
platform : PowerPC 44x Platform
model : amcc,apollo3g
Memory : 256 MB
root@mybook:~# uname -a
Linux mybook 4.0.0-mbl #15 Tue Apr 21 14:24:32 UTC 2015 ppc GNU/Linux
root@mybook:~# uptime
20:01:45 up 11 days, 7:40, 1 user, load average: 0.09, 0.05, 0.05
A rationale of method (WIP) to install Jessie and compiled 4.0 kernel, boot script and dtb is attached.
https://sites.google.com/site/yangkunlun/benchmark/debianjessie
Hope someone interested can try and give some feed back to enrich it.
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Hi kl-yang,
Thank you very much for your work! I’m very interested in booting Jessie. Is it possible to use your files with the method described on this page?
Thank you in advance.
Kind regards,
afortunado
Thank you. Will this allow me to then install the latest versions of openssl and openvpn?
You can install with the same method as shown in
https://www.schwabenlan.de/en/linux/clean-debian-install-on-mybook-live-nas
I have a updated the github page
https://github.com/KL-Yang/mbl-linux-4.0
to include a link to a working debian Jessie rootfs with linux kernel 4.1.5 and modules.
The openssl and openvpn should work, (if not, it should be a kernel configuration issue and easy to solve).
I only test with the single drive MBL. The aim is to support the patch till debian Stretch.
Note, only sata and ethernet works (no led/button/hardware encrytion engine), but it works fine as a nas.
I run the 4.0.x kernel with uptime of 60 days, two sata port software reset seen in kernel log, seems fine.
Thanks a lot! If I use the method from schwabelan.de, and then extract your rootfs, will this give problems with the 16K page size?
kl-yang wrote:
You can install with the same method as shown in
https://www.schwabenlan.de/en/linux/clean-debian-install-on-mybook-live-nas
I have a updated the github page
to include a link to a working debian Jessie rootfs with linux kernel 4.1.5 and modules.
The openssl and openvpn should work, (if not, it should be a kernel configuration issue and easy to solve).
I only test with the single drive MBL. The aim is to support the patch till debian Stretch.
Note, only sata and ethernet works (no led/button/hardware encrytion engine), but it works fine as a nas.
I run the 4.0.x kernel with uptime of 60 days, two sata port software reset seen in kernel log, seems fine.
Cool. I’ve been running 2.6.32.67 on my MBL for awhile and Gentoo has been whining at me (kernel too old). It’s time to recompile Gentoo on both my MBLs. Now, if I could find a newer kernel for the MBWE WL.
Is there anything special you did to get 4.x to recognize the drive?
Hello,
I installed your kernel and Debian Jessie file system, and all seems to run fine until I do an “apt-get update”. After a few seconds the system just hangs. Transferring a large file seems to also create the hang. Is your system stable when transferring large files? I updated the system time so that commands like “ps” etc work correctly and I don;t see any errors /var/log/kern.log.
Regards,
Ewald
Lots of progress since my previous post. For folks wanting to test KL Yang’s kernel, a few tips that helped me stabilize the MBL with Debian Jessie and Kernel 4.1.5:
- Make sure your power supply is strong enough. I went for a 4TB hybrid WD drive cause my original 1TB WD drive sadly died recently (I have one of the very first MBL’s). Compared to the original WD green drive, the new drive requires more peak power. I measured over 30W peak power.
- Make sure your swap space is formatted in line with the kernel block size (swapoff /dev/sda3; mkswap -p 16384 /dev/sda3; swapon).
- Disable software RAID between sda1 & sda2. SW RAID complicates things as we working with significant different Debian versions/kernels and if you want to use it, it’s better to re-initialize cleanly under Debian Jessie.
- Recreate your date drive on the MBL in Debian Jessie versus in Linux x86. While mine had the right block size (4K), it was not stable and hangs would occur after it being mounted. However, I can’t say what exactly could be the issue.
I can validate that performance is quite good (>70MB/s file system write and ~100MB/s read). Now I’m setting up NTP (cause MBL has no battery backed up clock) and doing a number of stress and performance tests.
Regards,
Ewald
Hi Folks,
first thank you KL Yang for the amazing packets, I now got two MBL up 'n running with your 4.1.5-mbl kernel. (old 240GB and 200GB HDDs)
(initial troubbles could be fixed using UART and serial console)
On one of them I was playing around with openvpn and I could not get it running since no tun/tap device is available there. Of course I could create the missing nodes /dev/net/tun … by hand, but still no kernel or module support.
#modprobe tun:
modprobe: FATAL: Module tun not found.
Is there a link to source code to compile the modules by myself?
Or can someone give me a hint on how to go further from this point to get openvpn up 'n running?
Thanks a lot!
Best regards,
Theo.
Hi Theo,
According to OpenVPN - ArchWiki, can you check your /proc/config.gz has the necessary module enabled? Maybe the original kernel wasn’t completed.
Regards
KL
Hi KL,
:# cat /proc/config.gz | gunzip > running.config
:# cat running.config | grep TUN
CONFIG_NET_IP_TUNNEL=y
CONFIG_NET_UDP_TUNNEL=m
# CONFIG_NET_FOU_IP_TUNNELS is not set
CONFIG_INET_XFRM_TUNNEL=m
CONFIG_INET_TUNNEL=y
CONFIG_INET_XFRM_MODE_TUNNEL=y
# CONFIG_INET6_XFRM_TUNNEL is not set
# CONFIG_INET6_TUNNEL is not set
CONFIG_INET6_XFRM_MODE_TUNNEL=y
# CONFIG_IPV6_TUNNEL is not set
# CONFIG_TUN is not set
Looks like I recompiled my kernel with CONFIG_TUN later but forgot to share it.
I will upload a new tar ball in a few days, you can give it a try by then.
thanks!
looking forward to that. 
can you try this kernel (only uImage and kernel modules)?
I enabled openvpn and strongswan related kernel modules.
(see GitHub - KL-Yang/mbl-linux-4.0: WD My Book Live Kernel 4.1.y patches README for updates)
Hi KL,
thanks for your quick response.
OpenVPN is up 'n running.
TUN support ist active.
Now I’m playing around with the setup and can tell you more after I got it working.
On your page you provided an 4.1.5-mbl+ kernel, any chance you could add the tun support on this one as well some time? 
Thanks a lot for your work.
I’ll keep you informed on further function tests.
This is the second version of kernel only package (4.1.15)
MD5:be917ac9e4bcbcc085dc03243465c4db
Iptable should work in this version.
For older version kernel, is there any particular reason you want to stay with it?
