New install on RPi5 stuck trying to boot up

Installation Home Assistant OS
1

I have used the Raspberry Pi Imager v1.9.4 to flash HOAS to a 64 GB sd.

Raspberry Pi Device:
RASPBERRY PI 5

Operation System:
HOME ASSISTANT OS 16.0 (RPI 5)

Storage:
(set to the SD device)

It flashes and verifies ok.

I install the SD card to the RPi5. It’s connected to my ethernet. I have an HDMI monitor connected as well to watch what it does.

I apply power and it begins the boot up process but seems to get stuck in an endless loop retrying.

Perhaps this screenshot can give a clue. Note that I’ve tried re-flashing the SD and even used a SD card from a different manufacture. The results are the same.

What have I done wrong?

20250710_181342
20250710_1813421920×1081 137 KB

2

what i get is The RPi is seeing the SD card, but cannot find a valid bootable partition

perhaps your image on the sdcard is corrupted, try to make a new one

3

Hi Bob, welcome to the forum!

Check this: Help! OS 16 killed my Home Assistant Yellow?

4

I have tried 3 different SD cards:
amazon basics 64GB A2
SanDisk Extreme PRO 64GB A2
Samsung 64GB EVO

I get the same results on all.

I’m doing this from a Windows computer…
I run diskpart and use it to create a primary partition that is 32GB. I format it to FAT32 and exit diskpart.

In Windows explorer it shows as single drive of 31.9 GB free of 31.9 GB, and reports that it is indeed FAT32.

I run the Raspberry Pi Imager (which finds the 64 GB card) and it says it writes ok however the moment it finishes, Windows explorer now shows 7 drives (E: through K:) each of which it warns needs to be formatted.

If I put this SD card into the RPi5 it fails as I described above.

I believe the issue is with the RPi Imager but I don’t know what to try next.

5

try with this

get the las recovery image
watch the LED flash pattern after about 30 seconds, it should stop blinking update complete

and try again with version 15.2

the 16 is causing crash all over diferent systems on yellow and rpi something with eeprom
try with a different version of hass

also you can try instead of a sdcard use a USB, i dont have a rpi5 but as far as i remember you can boot on usb without modifications

6

I did the first part as you suggested. It continued to blink for much longer than 30 seconds. After 5 minutes of waiting I removed power to restart and hoped I didn’t just brick it.

When I gave it power back with no SD card there was no output on the HDMI port, so I got mighty nervous.

I powered down again and put the SD card back that had the version 16.0 of HA and by some magic it fired up, complete with the welcome screen on a browser going to homeassistant.local.8123

1 Like
7

i agree is scary when something like that happen

so you manage to solve it?

8

@BobR Did you follow the step-by-step installation procedure below?
It’s very simple and takes just seconds.

9

Well
I encounter the same problem on a brand new rpi5 and new sdcard

I followed the instructions and end up with no boot partition, flashed the image manually with rpi tools → same problem.
Try pi defaut OS → OK
Flash manually last version of haos with balena etcher → works like a charm

10

Absolutely yes it solved it by using just the first step you provided. I have not done anything with it yet beyond getting the welcome screen because I’ve been busy on other projects, but I will get to it soon I hope.

I’m completely new to HA so I need to sit down and go through everything. I have a Vera system that failed on it’s ethernet port and decided it makes sense to convert to HA. Hopefully I won’t have issues pairing all my existing Z-Wave devices to the new system. I’ve heard horror stories of devices that pair once and never again to a different system. I certainly hope I don’t run into that.

11

Yes, I tried the step by step procedure, which was pretty simple, but it failed to work unfortunately.

12

Interesting. When you did this did you format the SD card outside of balena etcher first? If so what partitions did you use and what size SD card was it? When I tried balena etcher I didn’t have success but I might not have prepared it properly.

13

Actually I forget to format lol
I used Rufus before balena, so rufus did it for me, then just flash the img with balena and it worked :confused:

14

Looks like all RPI5 images for the version 16.x are corrupted. Flashing the same card with the same software (Balena, Raspberry Imager, etc) produce corrupted file system with version 16.x image, and perfect file systems with any other image (RPI4, 15.x, vanilla raspbian).

Something is wrong with the image creation precisely for RPI5.

15

Yes, indeed. Try 15.2