SD card image for booting Linux on Mele A1000
---------------------------------------------
(and possibly other Allwinner A10 and A13 based systems)
File: mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img

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THIS IS A SKELETON IMAGE, missing Linux kernel and Linux filesystem.
It is designed to be used by the Woof build system.
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I have chosen an image size that should fit on any "4GB" SD card.

size: 3999998976 bytes
for dd:
bs=1024 count=3906249

ex:
dd if=/dev/sdb of=mele-ubuntu-lucid-sd4g.img bs=1024 count=3906249
sync

to compress with gzip, keep original:

got 14MB:
gzip --stdout mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img > mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img.gz

got 7.0MB:
xz --stdout mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img > mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img.xz

got 6.3MB:
xz --stdout --extreme -9 mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img > mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img.xz

To write image to SD card:

unxz mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img.xz

ex, SD card is /dev/sdb:
dd if=mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120501.img of=/dev/sdb
sync

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
May 6, 2012
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File: mele-sd-4gb-skeleton-20120506.img

Hmmm, someone has reported they have a smaller "4GB" card, at only 3,956,359,680 bytes.
So, I have reduced the image to:

3863632 KB

3863632 x 1024 = 3,956,359,168 bytes

So the read operation will now be:

dd if=/dev/sdb of=mele-ubuntu-lucid-sd4g-skeleton.img bs=1024 count=3863632
sync

Note, in reverse, writing image to card, no need to specify size:

unxz --stdout mele-ubuntu-lucid-sd4g-skeleton.img.xz | dd of=/dev/sdb
sync

...please note that "sync". Always do that to flush the filesystem buffers before
unplugging the SD card!
Also, always be sure that the card is unmounted before doing the "dd" thing on it
-- many major Linux OSs have automatic mounting when the card is plugged in.