I had been running v6.2 or 6.3 (I presume) and checked for updates a month or 2 back. On 6.4 I noticed a few odd issues, where I would have to reboot occasionally, but figured it was just my apps being problematic (specifically Pi-Hole’s FTLDNS branch). This weekend I ran updates again and got v6.6. Once it completed and rebooted, it never came back online.
I had been connecting to it via SSH, but connected up a monitor and keyboard to see what might be going on. When I powered it on again, nothing displayed on the monitor. The caps lock light indicator did not illuminate when I pressed it. So, I unplugged it from power and then back in. I started tapping caps lock and the light would toggle consistently for a few seconds. But after just a 3 or 4 seconds, it became unresponsive again.
I started to think my MicroSD card might be going bad, so I got a new one and imaged it with v6.6 directly from DietPi’s site. However, it has the same behavior. No video ever displays; the caps lock light will toggle for a few seconds then stop. Out of concern that the Tinkerboard itself had gone bad, I imaged another MicroSD card with the TinkerOS from Asus. It booted up without any issues.
I was curious if v6.6 itself was the problem, so I looked for but couldn’t find any old versions of DietPi for the Tinkerboard on DietPi’s site. I then headed to archive.org and grabbed what I could find there. (The latest index of the Tinkerboard image is dated January 20, 2018–which looks like it might be v6.0). But loading it onto a MicroSD card still comes back with the same results.
DietPi is, hands down, the best SBC OS I have come across. I really don’t want to switch to something else. But it seems like my Tinkerboard has simply stopped playing nice with DietPi and I am at a loss for further troubleshooting ideas. Any suggestions?