The release of the Linux distribution Armbian 26.5 has been published, providing a compact system environment for single-board computers with processors based on ARM, RISC-V, and x86 architectures, supporting various models of Raspberry Pi, Odroid, Orange Pi, Banana Pi, Helios64, pine64, Nanopi, and Cubieboard based on Allwinner, Amlogic, Actionsemi, Freescale/NXP, Marvell Armada, Rockchip, Radxa, and Samsung Exynos processors.
The assemblies are formed using the Debian and Ubuntu package bases, but all components are completely rebuilt with a custom build system that includes optimizations for reducing size, increasing performance, and applying additional security mechanisms. For example, the /var/log partition is mounted using zram and stored in RAM in compressed form with data being flushed to storage once a day or upon shutdown. The /tmp partition is mounted using tmpfs.
The project supports over 30 different Linux kernel build variants for various ARM and ARM64 platforms. An SDK is provided to simplify the creation of your own system images, packages, and distribution editions. ZSWAP is used for swapping. When logging in via SSH, there is an option for two-factor authentication. It includes the box64 emulator, which allows running programs compiled for x86 architecture processors. Ready-made packages are offered for launching user environments based on KDE, GNOME, Budgie, Cinnamon, i3wm, Mate, Xfce, and Xmonad.
Key changes in Armbian 26.5:
- Support has been added for Arduino UNO Q (QRB2210), Mekotronics R58S2, NanoPC-T6 LTS Plus, Ariaboard Photonicat 2, EByte ECB41-PGE, NORCO EMB-3531, Cainiao CNIoT-CORE, SpacemiT MUSE Book, EasePi A2/R2, TQ-Systems TQMa8MPxS/TQMa93xxLA, Seeed reComputer, and Qidi X boards.
- For the sunxi, meson64, rockchip64, rpi4b, and uefi edge platforms, the Linux kernel has been updated to version 7.0, while for the rockchip64 and meson64 platforms, it has been updated to 7.1-rc.
- The U-Boot bootloader has been updated to version 2026.04 in builds for boards based on Rockchip chips (NanoPC-T6, NanoPi M5/R76S, Rock 5 ITX, Rock 5B Plus, Helios4/64, odroidhc4/n2, xt-q8l-v10).
- Desktop environment configurations have been rebuilt using settings in YAML format and a multi-level architecture in armbian-config. Support for custom environments KDE Plasma, KDE Neon, MATE, and i3wm has been transitioned to the new configuration system. Expanded support for Xfce, MATE, i3, Xmonad, Enlightenment, and Cinnamon for the armhf and riscv64 architectures. Vulkan and Panthor GPU runtime have been added to the mid-level component set, and libcamera/v4l and alsa-ucm-conf to the minimal level.
- New modules with configuration scripts (Armbian Config Next Generation) have been added for code-server, Dozzle, Wallos, managing ZFS pools, editing the device tree, and memory management.
Source: opennet.ru
