Where can I download latest stable FB software?

If you are asking for support for an issue, please include the following information at the top of your post:

I bought a FB in March 2023. My FB is plugged into a router at home. I can’t access the FB web page so I plan to download the software to a new micro SD, and start over. ALSO, should I delete the settings for FB currently on my router? Thaks for any assistance.

  • Whether your FreedomBox is plugged into a router at home or not (if not, please specify how it is connected to the internet)
  • The month and year you bought your kit (feel free to omit if you want to preserve some privacy, but this could be helpful information)
  • The version of FreedomBox your are running (available by clicking on the “?” in the top menu → “About”)

The download page on the FreedomBox wiki includes URLs to images for supported target hardware. It sounds like you have a FreedomBox Pioneer Edition, for which the Olimex product page includes a URL to the download directory containing files for the current stable image and its signature. Unfortunately, the date of those files (2022-01-28), the same files the wiki leads you to, indicates they’re for the previous stable version of Debian (bullseye), not the current stable version (bookworm).

You could try the files under nightly (with a date of 2023-07-01), which which should be based on bookworm even if they’re not completely current.

This sounds like the same issue (can’t access the FB webpage) that you describe in another thread, where you mention that you can access the FB from the command line. I posted a few questions on that thread. If your FB is booting successfully, maybe the problem isn’t with the SD card.

Without knowing what settings you changed in the router I can’t say.

In the router UI, can you see the FB & mac address? If yes, you could assign it a permanent static ip address and try:

http://xxx.xxx.x.xx/plinth/

or can you use:

http://xxx.xxx.x.xx/_cockpit/system/terminal

to check for updates? You could be on an older version trying to update where it will give you a 500 error when trying to connect to plinth. Do you get an error when trying to connect or does it just fail?

My original FB is running the stable version from the download page: Download | FreedomBox - Personal Server at Home , while the others I just added the FB software via the Debian repos after a fresh base installation.

You can make a fresh microSD card for Pioneer with bookworm by doing as described in this post.

What’s new is that I can no longer get to the FB at all. Previously, I could not get to the FB web interface but was able to use the command line. NOW, I can’t access FB at all. The router cannot ping the FB. So, I’m going to give it another shot and start all over. Eventually, I will get this working. With help, I learn something new every time. Thanks for your time. Much appreciated.

Did all this happen immediately after the installation? Did it happen after an update?

This is a wild guess, but if you were updating, you might be running into this issue:

Thank you for the response. The micro SD card may not have been the problem but I the problem today (Sept 20, 2023) is that I did create a new micro SD card using the balenaetcher program for my Mac OS machine from the Olimex bookworm image. So, I turned off the FreedomBox power, disconnected the ethernet cable from the FB to the router, inserted the new micro SD card into the FB, reconnected the cable to the router, powered up the FB, waited 30 minutes and still no connection from the FB to the router. I checked the online and offline devices on the router. I also tried to connect from the browser (“freedombox.local” and “admin@freedombox” and “admin@[freedombox-IP address-OLD”] without success. If I used the MacOS terminal command line program (which I successfully had in the past before the new installation) even if there was a connection, I could not enter a password because I had not yet set up a new admin username and password for the new installation. (if there was a way to save the old admin name and password, I had not done it).

So, I would very much appreciate any help **how to use balenaetcher program on a Mac OS machine to download and install FreedomBox bookworm OR FreedomBox bullseye software.

Thanks to all ……

WCW

Yes it happened after the bookworm update. Eventually, I tried to flash a new micro SD card as follows:

Thank you for the response. The micro SD card may not have been the problem but I the problem today (Sept 20, 2023) is that I did create a new micro SD card using the balenaetcher program for my Mac OS machine from the Olimex bookworm image. So, I turned off the FreedomBox power, disconnected the ethernet cable from the FB to the router, inserted the new micro SD card into the FB, reconnected the cable to the router, powered up the FB, waited 30 minutes and still no connection from the FB to the router. I checked the online and offline devices on the router. I also tried to connect from the browser (“freedombox.local” and “admin@freedombox” and “admin@[freedombox-IP address-OLD”] without success. If I used the MacOS terminal command line program (which I successfully had in the past before the new installation) even if there was a connection, I could not enter a password because I had not yet set up a new admin username and password for the new installation. (if there was a way to save the old admin name and password, I had not done it).

So, I would very much appreciate any help how to use balenaetcher program on a Mac OS machine to download and install FreedomBox bookworm OR FreedomBox bullseye software.

Thanks to all ……

WCW

Thank you for the response. The micro SD card may not have been the problem but I the problem today (Sept 20, 2023) is that I did create a new micro SD card using the balenaetcher program for my Mac OS machine from the Olimex bookworm image. So, I turned off the FreedomBox power, disconnected the ethernet cable from the FB to the router, inserted the new micro SD card into the FB, reconnected the cable to the router, powered up the FB, waited 30 minutes and still no connection from the FB to the router. I checked the online and offline devices on the router. I also tried to connect from the browser (“freedombox.local” and “admin@freedombox” and “admin@[freedombox-IP address-OLD”] without success. If I used the MacOS terminal command line program (which I successfully had in the past before the new installation) even if there was a connection, I could not enter a password because I had not yet set up a new admin username and password for the new installation. (if there was a way to save the old admin name and password, I had not done it).

So, I would very much appreciate any help how to use balenaetcher program on a Mac OS machine to download and install FreedomBox bookworm OR FreedomBox bullseye software.

Thanks to all ……

WCW

I did not change any settings in the router. I had my FB connected to the router before the bookworm update. My FB is the pioneer FB from March 2023. What I deleted before trying a new micro SD card installation was the “freedombox” listed item from the list of online and offline devices on the router.

Here is my current situation with the new SD card installation:

Thank you for the response. The micro SD card may not have been the problem but I the problem today (Sept 20, 2023) is that I did create a new micro SD card using the balenaetcher program for my Mac OS machine from the Olimex bookworm image. So, I turned off the FreedomBox power, disconnected the ethernet cable from the FB to the router, inserted the new micro SD card into the FB, reconnected the cable to the router, powered up the FB, waited 30 minutes and still no connection from the FB to the router. I checked the online and offline devices on the router. I also tried to connect from the browser (“freedombox.local” and “admin@freedombox” and “admin@[freedombox-IP address-OLD”] without success. If I used the MacOS terminal command line program (which I successfully had in the past before the new installation) even if there was a connection, I could not enter a password because I had not yet set up a new admin username and password for the new installation. (if there was a way to save the old admin name and password, I had not done it).

So, I would very much appreciate any help how to use balenaetcher program on a Mac OS machine to download and install FreedomBox bookworm OR FreedomBox bullseye software.

Thanks to all ……

WCW