Xiaomi Box S 3rd Gen as a Dual-boot CE Box

Me? If so, not expecting anything.

You or the user that posted exactly this on Reddit. And I really don’t care what you personally expect. Just don’t mislead the users, in general.

Not me on Reddit. If you see my posts to date above, haven’t misled anybody.

Glad you are up n running.

Some things in settings I sometimes forget during clean install, may help with file

Make sure default CoreELEC Estuary skin is set to expert

Under Settings/Media/General, make sure have enabled (Show hidden files and directories)

(Allow file renaming and deletion)

Under File manager/add source/browse/root file system (add / storage)

Maybe will help

You’re right, someone just copied your post to Reddit and added, after the quotes “work in progress"

Sorry

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Did all of this except for the '“add source” part. Will try tomorrow. Thank you for your input. :slight_smile:

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I tried with s7d_s905x5m_2g.dtb but it stuck at the MI boot logo after adb reboot update.

That’s weird, I used that exact same dtb.
Could be unrelated and I guess you did it already but did you enable USB debugging in Developer Options ?

Sure,

I used CoreELEC-Amlogic-no.aarch64-22.0-Piers_nightly_20250924-Generic and s7d_s905x5m_2g.dtb.

It just stuck at MI logo. Now is the question: open the device and check for a UART or just return to seller…

Are there pictures of the PCB exist? Is there a debug header at all?

I tried with the 20250920 build.
Could you try with this one and see if you get the same result ?

I’m also using the same dtb, it didn’t work with the first 64GB USB stick I tried, I also got stuck at the MI logo. However it worked with a different 32gb stick.

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I tried two same 16GB and one 64GB, nothing.

How to open the cover. Can you make photo from the cover to see how it’s locked?

Damn, that’s crazy, I don’t understand why it doesn’t boot.

It’s just clips, put something thin into the seam and pry. I started at the back corner and worked my way around. Once open the board is fastened with 2 little screws and clips at the sides and front.

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Any test what of the test points could be UART?

No idea, I was hoping they’d be labeled.

I’ve just tried again with a fresh install of the latest nightly and mine boots fine. Are you plugging the usb directly in to the box or through a hub? I did my first boot directly connect to the box and then used a hub after.

Test points are probably underneath the heat sync shield, the black plastic molding on both sides of pcb,

Can it be removed?

Same here.

Are you using USB hub? Make sure to add external power source.