Introduction
The Raspberry Pi is a credit card-sized ARM based single board computer (SBC). Fedora supports the the Raspberry Pi Model B versions 2 and 3 in all current Fedora releases, the 3+ is supported in Fedora 29 without any requirement of third party kernels or scripts to adjust official images. This documentation describes how to get started, and includes a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) about what is supported and what isn't.
Supported Hardware
We currently support the Raspberry Pi Model B versions 2, 3. and as of Fedora 29 also the 3+
Prerequisites
- A Raspberry Pi 2, 3 or 3+
- Good quality SD Card (eLinux hosts a compatibility list)
- HDMI Monitor or TV, a USB keyboard and mouse
- A decent power supply. You'll want at least 2A for the RPi2 and 2.5A for the RPi3 and 3+ details here
For preparation of the SD card:
- Computer running Windows/MacOS/Linux
- SD card reader
Downloading the Fedora ARM image
Official support for the Raspberry Pi 2/3 is available in Fedora! Please read the FAQ for the current status of various features.
ARMv7 supported images
Fedora 29 images can be downloaded here:
- Fedora Workstation 29 (checksum)
- Fedora Server 29 (checksum)
- Fedora 29 Minimal (checksum)
- Fedora 29 Spins (checksums)
aarch64 supported images for Raspberry Pi 3
Fedora 29 images can be downloaded here:
Preparing the SD card
You can quite easily prepare the image on the SD card on Fedora or any Linux distribution, MacOS or Windows. The default settings will provide the user interface on a HDMI monitor with keyboard and mouse support. If you wish to have output over a serial console please see Section in the FAQ.
Fedora or other Linux Distributions
Scripted
To install using arm-image-installer:
dnf install -y arm-image-installer
To write the image out use the following:
$ sudo arm-image-installer Usage: arm-image-installer <options> --image=IMAGE - xz compressed image file name --target=TARGET - target board --media=DEVICE - media device file (/dev/[sdX|mmcblkX]) --selinux=ON/OFF - Turn SELinux off/on as needed --norootpass - Remove the root password -y - Assumes yes, will not wait for confirmation --version - Display version and exit --resizefs - Resize root filesystem to fill media device --addconsole - Add system console to extlinux.conf --addkey= - /path/to/ssh-public-key Example: arm-image-installer --image=Fedora-Rawhide.xz --target=Bananapi --media=/dev/mmcblk0 For list of supported boards please check SUPPORTED-BOARDS file.
For the Raspberry Pi 2 use
--target=rpi2
and for the Raspberry Pi 3 or 3+ use
--target=rpi3
.
Manual
xzcat Fedora-IMAGE-NAME.raw.xz | sudo dd status=progress bs=4M of=/dev/XXX # Location of your media (will be sdX or mmcblkX depending on hardware)
MacOS
The Raspberry Pi foundation provides some nice instructions for image copying using a Mac here. Simply replace any image file references with the name and path of the image downloaded in the step above.
Microsoft Windows
The Raspberry Pi foundation provides some nice instructions for image copying using a Windows here. Simply replace any image file references with the name and path of the image downloaded in the step above.
Resizing the root partition
The root partition is shrunk to the smallest size possible to ensure a small download. You currently need to resize it manually. Ideally we would like this to happen automatically (great community project idea!).
Resize before first boot
The easiest way to do this before boot on a Linux system is with gparted:
gparted /dev/XXX
Resize after initial-setup
The other mechanism for doing it is once you've booted the Raspberry Pi and completed the initial setup to create accounts.
# enlarge the 3rd partition (this example uses mmcblk0) growpart /dev/mmcblk0 3 # grow the volume to take up the rest of the disk resize2fs /dev/mmcblk0p3 # resize root partition for the armhfp server image (which uses xfs) xfs_growfs -d / # Steps for the AArch64 Server image # enlarge the 3rd partition (this example uses mmcblk0) growpart /dev/mmcblk0 3 # resize the physical volume pvresize /dev/mmcblk0p3 # extend the root filesystem to take up the space just added to the volume that it is in lvextend -l +100%FREE /dev/fedora/root # resize root partition for the server image (which uses xfs) xfs_growfs -d /
Booting Fedora on the Raspberry Pi for the first time
- Insert the SD card into the Raspberry Pi.
- Make sure you have a keyboard, mouse, network cable and monitor connected.
- Power on the Raspberry Pi.
- You will see Fedora booting and eventually the "Initial setup wizard" will appear.
- Follow the wizard to set language, timezone and create users.
- You should be presented with a login prompt or a getting started guide (depending on which Desktop/SPIN you're using).
Applying updates and installing software
There are no special ways or procedures necessary to install or update the software so you just use standard Fedora installation and update mechanisms such as dnf, gnome-software or any of the other GUI update systems as supported in the various desktop environments.
Getting help and reporting issues
So where can you get help if it’s not working? The usual Fedora support forums are:
Frequently Asked Questions
Why do I get a rainbow display when I try and power on my Raspberry Pi?
There's a number of different reasons you might get rainbow output on the display when you're trying to boot as Raspberry Pi. The three common ones we see are:
- The power supply isn't strong enough. See Prerequisites above.
- There's no OS installed. Check the SD card is properly in place and you've followed the instructions to write out the card.
- Wrong edition of the Raspberry Pi. If you try and use Fedora on a Raspberry Pi 1 or Zero you'll get this as we don't support ARMv6 SoCs.
- Unsupported version of Fedora, eg releases older than Fedora 29 on the RPi 3 B+
Power Supplies
The biggest single support issue is generally not a powerful enough PSU. The Raspberry Pi 3 Series needs a 2.5W PSU, this is especially important with Fedora 29 where we support higher CPU frequencies which draws more power. PSUs that seemingly worked in the last have been seen to cause issues with Fedora 29 due to this.
What desktop environments are supported?
Both 3D/2D work out of the box and most lightweight desktops as shipped in Fedora should work just fine. There is an open source fully accelerated driver for the Video Core IV GPU.
Will there be more enhancements to the hardware support
Yes. New enhancements will be delivered when, and as soon as, they are ready via the standard Fedora updates mechanism. New significate features will be blogged about as they arrive either via Fedora Magazine or the Fedora Planet.
What about support for the Raspberry Pi Models A/A+, B/B+ (generation 1), Zero/ZeroW and Compute Module?
THESE ARE NOT SUPPORTED!!!
Fedora doesn't, and NEVER will, support ARMv6 processors. There's been a number of attempts to support these over the years. The current best effort is Pignus based on Fedora 23. More information can be found at the Pignus site. Support for the Compute Module 3 (CM3) has landed upstream in the 4.20 kernel and we will support a number of devices based on CM3 in Fedora 30.
What USB devices are supported on the Raspberry Pi
You should be able to use most USB-2 compatible devices that are supported in Fedora on other devices. There are some limitations to the USB bus of the Raspberry Pi hardware as documented here.
Is the onboard WiFi and Bluetooth supported on the Raspberry Pi 3?
Wifi:
Wifi on the Raspberry Pi 3 and 3+ works out of the box with Fedora 29. There was a bug with WiFi on aarch64 that is fixed with 4.19.2-301 kernels. Older stable releases also have this support with the latest kernel/linux-firmware releases.
Using Wi-Fi on CLI
To use Wi-Fi on minimal and server images you can configure the device using command line:
# list of networks nmcli device wifi list # connect nmcli device wifi connect $SSID --ask
Bluetooth:
Bluetooth works quite well and seems to be quite stable. The device sometimes has a generic bluetooth address but should over all work just fine without any configuration.
Does sound work?
HDMI audio output is included Fedora however the analog port is not yet supported. Audio output via a USB audio interface should also work fine.
Does the add-on camera work?
Not currently. There is still ongoing work to support this upstream and add the appropriated media acceleration support.
Does accelerated media decode work?
No. There's no upstream kernel support and it relies on code from a number of kernel subsystems to be supported.
Does HDMI-CEC work?
Yes. It's supported using the new upstream CEC support. There's a /dev/cec0 character device, it can be accessed using any application that supports the IR remote using the rc-cec keymap in the v4l-utils package, there's also a cec-ctl util for use via the command line.
Is the Raspberry Pi Touch Display supported?
Work on the official Raspberry Pi Touch Display is ongoing upstream and initial support has landed in the 4.10 kernel, being tracked upstream. Fedora will review any missing pieces for support soon. The touchscreen driver isn't yet releases upstream. Support for other displays is not currently planned.
Is the composite TV out supported?
The composite TV out is not currently supported in a stable Fedora release but the core support has landed upstream in the 4.10 kernel. There's some missing enabling patches currently which we will add to the Fedora kernel soon.
Are the expansion HATs supported?
The quick answer here is they are not currently supported.
The long answer is a lot more complex. Most of the hardware interfaces that are exposed by the 40 pin HAT connector are supported with drivers shipped with Fedora. Drivers for the hardware contained on a lot of the common HATs are also enabled and supported in Fedora. The core means of supporting the HAT add-on boards require the use of device tree overlays. The kernel and the u-boot 2016.09 boot-loader supports the loading over overlays manually. Currently there is no upstream consensus on the means of autoloading these overlays by means of an "overlay manager" (also known as Cape Manager and by numerous other names) by reading the EEPROM ID and loading the appropriate overlay automatically. There's also no consensus on the extensions to the dtc (Device Tree Compiler) to build the binary blob overlays, and no consensus of the exact format of the overlay file. There is now a group of people working to resolve this issue which enable Fedora to better support HATs (Raspberry Pi), Capes (BeagleBone), DIPs (C.H.I.P) and Mezzanine (96boards) before long.
The first focus HAT to support will be the official Raspberry Pi Sense HAT. This will be documented using the manual process to build and load the overlay to provide access to the onboard devices as a means of demonstrating how this process works for those wishing to use this manual method in the interim. The link to this documentation will be added here once that is complete.
The use of config.txt
The config.txt is only used for basic configuration at the moment. Because of the the use of the opensource vc4 GPU driver most of the video configuration is done within Linux.
The configuration of HATs using config.txt is currently unsupported but is being actively worked on.
Are Device Tree Overlays supported?
There's basic support for overlays in u-boot and the linux kernel but an overlay manager isn't yet upstream.
Is GPIO supported?
GPIO isn't supported well as they need to be mapped with Device Tree overlays. This will be improved in the F-29 cycle, and in Fedora 29.
Is SPI supported?
Yes, basic SPI is supported. It will need to be enabled using Device Tree
Is I2C supported?
Yes, basic I2C is supported.
How do I use a serial console?
The serial console is disabled by default on the Raspberry Pi 2 and 3 because it requires the device to run at significantly slower speeds. To wire up the USB to TTL adapter follow this guide from Adafruit. You'll need a 3.3 volt USB to TTL Serial Cable like this one from Adafruit
To enable the serial console follow the specific steps for the Raspberry Pi 2 or 3 as they both differ slightly:
Raspberry Pi 2:
- insert the micro SD card into a PC
- on the VFAT partition edit the config.txt file and uncomment the enable_uart line:
enable_uart=1
- on the boot partition edit the extlinux/extlinux.conf file adding "console=tty0 console=ttyAMA0,115200" to the end of the append line so it looks similar to:
append ro root=UUID="LARGE UUID STRING OF TEXT" console=tty0 console=ttyAMA0,115200
- Safely unmount the micro SD card
- Insert micro SD into Raspberry Pi, connect serial console, power on
Raspberry Pi 3:
- inset the micro SD card into a PC
- on the VFAT partition edit the config.txt file and uncomment the enable_uart line:
enable_uart=1
- on the boot partition edit the extlinux/extlinux.conf file adding "console=tty0 console=ttyS1,115200" to the end of the append line so it looks similar to:
append ro root=UUID="LARGE UUID STRING OF TEXT" console=tty0 console=ttyS1,115200
- Safely unmount the micro SD card
- Insert micro SD into Raspberry Pi, connect serial console, power on