Radxa Rock 4 SE – Armbian on NVMe

Last mod: 2026.02.18

Radxa Rock 4 SE – Armbian on NVMe

While the Raspberry Pi 5 remains the favourite "gold standard" for a huge community of users due to its ease of use, the Rock 4 has a few hidden advantages for users looking for a little more edge. One of the most significant advantages is the native M.2 expansion slot, which allows you to ditch slow microSD cards in favour of lightning-fast NVMe storage directly on the board. The device also handles sustained workloads well, maintaining impressive thermal performance and often staying cooler than the Pi under load. You still get the familiar form factor, but with a little more flexibility for high-performance projects such as media servers or advanced emulators. Of course, you lose some of the plug-and-play simplicity of the Pi, but for those who like a slightly more ‘professional’ approach to hardware, the Rock 4 is an attractive alternative. It's basically its more powerful cousin, unafraid of heavy tasks, while the Pi remains friendly and accessible.

Introduction

Armbian is a lightweight Linux distribution designed specifically for ARM-based single-board computers. It is built on top of Debian and Ubuntu, providing a stable and optimized environment for embedded systems, IoT projects, and low-power servers. Armbian focuses on performance, security, and long-term maintainability, offering carefully tuned kernels and minimal, efficient system images. It is widely used by developers and enthusiasts who need a reliable operating system for ARM devices in both development and production environments.

Hardware

Radxa Rock 4SE - Can use a different version
M.2 Extension Board - Theoretically, it is possible to connect an NVMe drive without this adapter, but unfortunately only theoretically.
WD PC SN530 NVMe SSD - It could be a different NVMe drive
Power supply USB-C - Minimum 5V/3A
Heatsink for ROCK 4 - It is not required but recommended, as the Rock4 chipset tends to overheat
MicroSD card - Preferably with A1 or A2 speed ratings, only for installation purposes

Prepare image

wget https://github.com/armbian/imager/releases/download/v1.2.8/Armbian.Imager_1.2.8_amd64.AppImage
chmod +x Armbian.Imager_1.2.8_amd64.AppImage

Run Armbian disk imager:

Select Manufacturer:

Select Borad:

Select OS Armbian ...:

Select Storage:

And click Erase & Flash:

Run from micrSD card

Insert the microSD card into the device, connect the monitor and keyboard. Switch on the power supply and after a few seconds you should see the system starting up. We will be asked for a password and login details.
Login: root
Password: 1234
After entering them, we will need to change the root password and add a user.

By default, the ssh server is installed and running. So we can now log in remotely via the ssh console.

Armbian screen

Upgrade Armbian:

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade -y

Update the boot loader:

sudo armbian-install

Update the boot loader - step 1

Update the boot loader - step 2

Update the boot loader - step 3

Move linux from miroSD on NVMe disk

Unfortunately, Radxa Rock 4 SE does not allow booting from an NVMe drive, nor does it have a factory-built SPI Flash or eMMC chip. Therefore, the bootloader must remain on the microSD card.

With the computer turned off, install the NVMe drive.

After starting, we check with a command whether the system sees the Nvme disk: