Hepacker: A tool to pack Android, CoreELEC and EmuELEC into one USB burning image to flash onto eMMC

The project is at GitHub - HybridELEC/hepacker: HybridELEC image packer , some of the images for devices I personally own are available at GitHub - HybridELEC/HybridELEC: Side-by-side dual-bootable CoreELEC + EmuELEC, and on-eMMC triple boot with Android

As long as you have a stock Android USB burning image for your amlogic-ng or amlogic-ne device then this should work. you just need that Android image, the latest CoreELEC upgrade tarball for the version of CE that verifies to work on your device, and the latest EmuELEC upgrade tarball for the version of EE that verifies to work on your device. Follow the project README and specify the DTB names and size of CE and EE storage paritions, and you should get a USB burning image.

At this stage there won’t be any data loss as long as you don’t use the image. If you do use, note there’s no “upgrade/partial install”, there’s only “full install”: to erase your eMMC completely while installing. This is by-design: to both minimilize the space usage in system partition and fight against resellers that want to make cheap money with boxes with CE/EE pre-installed and other illegal stuffs pre-populated. As soon as you flash it you would lose all of your Android and possibly CoreELEC data on eMMC, and it’s possible to brick you device if the flashing was interrupted. Be warned and be prepared.

This tool also only supports stock Android + official CE + official EE 3-in-1, it does not support Android + official CE (just do that with ceemmc) 2-in-1 or Android + official EE 2-in-1, or non-official CE/EE, this is also by-design.

The embedded CE and EE systems would report themselves as “official” because they’re not touched in any means, the only thing hacked around is Android itself.

After burning you would get the stock Android experience as that’s also not touched, you could use GitHub - HybridELEC/HybridELEC_Rebooter: Release-only repo for the HybridELEC Rebooter app used in Android+CE+EE firmware (not pre-installed as I don’t like pre-installed apps) to reboot into the on-eMMC CE or EE, as long as you have root permission, Android would function like your entrance: a cold boot would always get you into Android. Or you could use it just like a generic Android + CoreELEC box installed with ceemmc AFTER you boot an external CoreELEC installation once, in this case it’s CE that functions as your entrance and you would need to manually reboot into Android.

If you have any problem, please open an issue on the project page, not here. Do note that as I developed the tool and all its depedencies (ampart, the partition tool to embed modified partition info; and ampack, the tool to unpack and repack the burning image) on Arch Linux, I don’t support running them on any other Linux distro.

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I received my HK1 RBOX X4 yesterday and CE 21 is perfectly stable. I’m very happy with it.

I decided to run CE on the eMMC in (no dual boot support for this device) in hopes of later running Android from SD/USB because I only really need it for SmartTube and Twitch.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be possible, so that’s my mistake. So I was looking at HybridELEC as a possible solution or really just running stock firmware on eMMC and then a fast, small USB to run CE.

Unfortunately, no version of USB Burning Tool will recognize my device. I’ve tried them all. I’ve also tried Bootcard maker with original firmware, HybridELEC and even a SlimTVBox image.

It’s refusing to boot from the SD card now, so recovering the original firmware seems impossible.

Is there any way I can force boot from SD with CE on my eMMC already?
The only thing I haven’t tried yet is cracking it open and shorting the eMMC. But even then, I don’t know how I would get a recovery flash working.

Edit: I’m stupid.

Calling ceemmc -x again will remove the internal installation and make the player flashable again. I was then able to toss HybridELEC on it easily (Vontar X4 image) and now have triple boot working.

Thanks for that information.

Rainy Day
Watching Football EURO 2024
Germany 2 Denmark 0

And testing triple Boot on Hk1x4 S905X4

Took awhile to figure out
Need to install rebooter APK.

All working !!!

Us there any way to upgrade CoreELEC version?

Partition is reszed as 203 mb…???

Keep getting error
Must resize partition to 512 mb minimum…

Why this method can Install Emulec 4.7 or Corelec in Vontar HK1BOX with S905 X4 in SD card?

Yes !!

I reread the OP a couple of times
Partitions sized this way on purpose
This was 7Ji intention ,so Build your own with Tool Provided.

No Linux machine
Or at that skill level yet !!!

However, since there is no dual Boot with CoreELEC on amlogic S905X4 SoC .
I was already Testing CoreELEC on external SD.

So now i have 4 X or Quad Boot on Hk1x4 !!!

  • 2 of the OS are the same.

Booting ne version 64 bit on External

I just ignore/ CoreELEC version on Internal
Have full use of Android and EmuELEC on Internal!!!

Happy Testing

Hi! First of all, thank you for your work, it works very well.
I tried building a CE+Android system.
I’m not a Linux guru, but thanks to the description I was able to do it.
I set the size of ce_system to be larger, but unfortunately, as I can see, it is not possible to update the CE either.
Is there no solution for this?
The error message: “Could not mount LABEL=COEREELEC”

I think you need to build your own hybrid elec image
With tool provided.

And must replace CoreELEC version 20.5 with CoreELEC 21.1.1.

Was/is beyond my skill level
So thats why i use External

For something different i have used Doppingkoala Build on external.

So have Triple Boot with Dolby Vision (it is limited) on The HK1X4 S905X4

I made several versions with hepacker in CE+Android version.
Unfortunately, when cold booting, Android always starts. I can only go back to CE from there.
The finished img file downloaded from Hybridelec, on the other hand, starts with CoreElec.
What am I doing wrong?
Or what should be done to start the CE?
Sorry for my bad english.