Installing NixOS on Raspberry PI 3B
This is assumed that you already have access to a running NixOS System..
Initial Configuration
- Download SD Image from Hydra.
- Write the image to the SD Card
dd if=nixos-sd-image-23.11pre498616.6b3d1b1cf13-aarch64-linux.img of=/dev=sdd bs=4M
- Allow main development system to build derivations off of its machine emulating
aarch64
architecture so as to not choke out the Raspberry PI. to main development system to build derivations off the machine to not choke out the PI.
# configuration.nix
boot.binfmt.emulatedSystems = [ "aarch64-linux" ];
Build Configuration
- Build the configuration on your workstation and take note of the store path that is ouputted.
nix build .#nixosConfigurations.beer.config.system.build.toplevel --print-out-paths
# Example Path
/nix/store/randomarbitraryhashavc-nixos-system-beer-23.05.20230626.ab3331
Initial Install
-
Boot SD Image on PI and make sure SSH is accessible
-
Get hardware information
nixos-generate-config
-
Move around
hardware.nix
and configure other settings (configure.nix or flake repo, what have you
) -
Copy the built files over to the PI
nix copy [the path above] --to ssh://root@[pi]
- Install NixOS on the PI
# configuration.nix
nixos-install --root / --system [the path above]
# Flakes
nixos-install --root / --flake /tmp/system/nixos#beer --system [the path above]
Subsequent Installs
Use the remote rebuild functionality of nixos-rebuild
NIX_SSHOPTS="-t -p 22" nixos-rebuild switch --flake .#beer --target-host remoteuser@beer --use-remote-sudo
# config.txt
# See /boot/overlays/README for all available options
initramfs initramfs-linux.img followkernel
dtoverlay=vc4-fkms-v3d # or vc4-kms-v3d or nothing
hdmi_force_hotplug=1
hdmi_timings=2560 0 48 32 80 1080 0 7 20 12 0 0 0 52 0 159838855 7
hdmi_group=2
hdmi_mode=87
hdmi_drive=2
framebuffer_width=2560
max_framebuffer_width=2560
framebuffer_height=1080
hdmi_pixel_freq_limit=160000000
display_auto_detect=1
# Uncomment to enable bluetooth
#dtparam=krnbt=on
[pi3]
dtoverlay=rpi3-hdmi
[pi4]
# Run as fast as firmware / board allows
arm_boost=1