Getting 25.12 onto Mikrotik RB411UAHR

[Felix Baumann]

Am 18. Juli 2026 12:08:16 MESZ schrieb Mark Ter Morshuizen <mark at honingklip.co.za>:
>Hi,
>
>I'm trying to get 25.12 to work on a Mikrotik Routerboard 411UAHR.
>
>I end up with no kernel messages whatsoever.
>
>8<------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>RouterBOOT booter 6.49.18
>
>RouterBoard 411UAHR
>
>CPU frequency: 680 MHz
>  Memory size:  64 MiB
>    NAND size: 128 MiB
>
>Press any key within 2 seconds to enter setup..
>trying bootp protocol.... OK
>Got IP address: 192.168.0.45
>resolved mac address 00:15:C5:F6:B3:60
>Gateway: 192.168.0.1
>transfer started .................................................... transfer ok, time=2.67s
>setting up elf image... OK
>jumping to kernel code
>
>
>OpenWrt kernel loader for AR7XXX/AR9XXX
>Copyright (C) 2011 Gabor Juhos <juhosg at openwrt.org>
>Decompressing kernel... done!
>Starting kernel at 80060000...
>
><blinking cursor here>
>
>8<------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>I've reset the whole build environment to defaults after trying all sorts of changes to get this to work.
>
>I have a very simple .dts to try to just get serial output:
>
>8<------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>// SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-or-later OR MIT
>
>#include "ar7100_mikrotik_routerboard-4xx.dtsi"
>/ {
>    compatible = "mikrotik,rb411, qca,ar7161";
>    model = "Mikrotik RouterBOARD 411/A/AH/U";
>
>    memory at 0 {
>        device_type = "memory";
>        reg = <0x0 0x04000000>; /* 64MB RAM */
>    };
>
>    chosen {
>        bootargs = "console=ttyS0,115200 root=/dev/mtdblock3 rootfstype=squashfs";
>        stdout-path = "serial0:115200n8";
>    };
>
>    aliases {
>        serial0 = &uart;
>    };
>};
>
>&uart {
>    status = "okay";
>};
>8<------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>What am I missing here?
>

Hi,

what is the size of your initramfs? according to
<https://github.com/openwrt/openwrt/commit/b7a8a5454226f34256c5d76480dda5abb1308395>

"Notes:
- initramfs image will not work if uncompressed image size over ~8.5Mb"

So maybe building full fledged 25.12 including LuCI is too large?

Also I'm not sure
"ar7100_mikrotik_routerboard-4xx.dtsi" was ever meant to support your device.
It comes with config for 128MiB NAND flash amongst other things that your device likely does not have.

Due to the .dtsi it is not a minimal/simple .dts file.
Including #include "ar7100.dtsi" would be fine though (or rather it would be necessary)

I suggest editing and minimalizing
"ar7100_mikrotik_routerboard-4xx.dtsi" until it fits your needs. currently it does lots of stuff you probably didn't expect it to do like leds, partitions, ethernet phy-handle etc.

Which target/subtarget are you building?
(feel free to share your entry in image/mikrotik.mk)

Which baud rate are you setting on your terminal/screen to grab the text from during bootloader phase?

Regards
Felix Baumann