Open Letter to Umbrel Devs

General Discussions
1

I’ve been using Umbrel for years on a Raspberry Pi 4 with few issues and when I’ve had issues, this forum has been extremely helpful even though a lot of the information is outdated.
Over the years I’ve been pleased with the OS, the support, and the direction it’s been going. With my usual Bitcoin evangelism, which includes running a node, I suggested novice users looking for an intuitive system follow the hardware list for the RPi and build their own.

But ever since the developer’s push into expanding the product to the Home things have been getting buggier and buggier. I get it, the various RPi setups can be finicky with items such as the microS card, the SSD used or even the power adaptor can cause problems. So it makes sense to “standardize” the hardware with a product such as the Home. Plus, all this work isn’t free, your team deserves to turn it into a product that can put some food on the table.

In the past, I’d usually swap out the microSD card with a new one flashed with a fresh version of the OS and things would be good for awhile.

My node has been having various issues over the past few months. The device is running v1.3 which was updated through the GUI and like others here on the forum and on X, I’m having problems with it similar to what several other users have described here: Bitcoin Node Not Starting AGAIN

Usually a restart via logging into the GUI fixes everything but now it’s getting to the point where the Bitcoin node doesn’t start or sync, therefore the other Bitcoin-related components such as the Lightning node do not work. I’m unable to remove apps, even though the option to right click and remove them is there, the command simply does nothing. I’ve had other issues before the update to 1.3 the Bitcoin Node had synced completely and my lightning channels were operational yet Bluewallet and Sparrow refused to connect to my node. Both had previously worked flawlessly.

All these issues to me are an indication it’s time to reflash the microSD card again which in the past did the trick.

Except when I go to the Umbrel website (https://umbrel.com/), there are a lot of cool graphics showing what the Home product and the OS can do but no link to download the OS. It’s genuinely a slick website. But uh, hello. Isn’t this supposed to be an OS that’s user-friendly, especially to beginners? If someone purchases a Home, sure, that’s easy, they just buy it off your website, plug it in, and get started. But ya’ll are still marketing the OS as something that can be installed on other systems that aren’t the Home. Yet the website fails to be user-friendly towards this market now.

I’m not the only one to point out issues with the website:

So, I decided to try the Github page which is IIRC where the now removed or hidden download links on the Umbrel website linked to in the past.

When I go there, I get the impression that the Rpi4 is not actually supported or no longer supported with recent versions of the Umbrel OS or whatever you’re calling it these days.

Here’s why:
On the page, it says the umbrel rep can be installed on an RPi, but it doesn’t specify which model.
The umbrel-os rep, per the text is specifically for the RPi4 only but it’s archived and hasn’t been updated in some time.

image
image1976×1478 335 KB

Okay fine, so when I go into the umbrel rep all the language there mentions the Rpi 5 specifically. There is no mention of the RPi4.

This is utterly confusing and utterly strange when your team has been so user friendly and communicative in the past.

So which version do I download? I get the impression that if I download the RPi5 version, it won’t work, and ultimately I fear I might mess up the SSD causing even more problems.
I ultimately think I need to download the RPi4 version but it hasn’t been updated in some time, while my RPi running Umbrel has received updates all the way to 1.3. What gives? Given the luck I’ve had here and the frustrations with all that’s mentioned above, I fear doing that will screw up the SSD too.

In closing, I echo the concerns and comments and concerns from others.

Thank you

2 Likes
2

Personally, I don’t expect many responses to your open letter.
I support everything you say, but certain things are already starting to become noticeable.

Users are starting to disperse because most of them can’t find an answer to their problems. Neither here, nor on Discord, nor on X, etc.

The guys at umbrel have unfortunately managed to start to disperse their “captive audience.” First with the website, which is a “maze-loop,” followed by outdated information and silence in response to any request for help. The little help that users receive really comes from other users. But if you don’t know what you’re really doing, the best intentions aren’t enough.

On the other hand, I believe more and more that the guys at umbrel are overwhelmed. For the same reason, this silence to requests for help. They are neglecting a great number of aspects and making wrong decisions. The classic “patches” to keep everything working. But you can’t live off “patches.”

Throughout my working life I have seen this type of situation many times. Projects that “ended up dying of success” because the project grew but the project team could not grow at the same time.

Anyway, saying more is redundant and I will end up earning the scorn of many.

In case it helps, here are the links to the installers for all platforms (amd64, RPI4, RPI5). It took a bit of time to find them but it is better to save them because, as things are…

3

Thank you for the links and comments.
I agree completely.

I’m also utterly concerned about what these issues will do to Bitcoin adoption. Umbrel received a lot of good press from prominent Bitcoiners over the years and it’s a great platform (when it works) for onboarding new users to become node-runners.

4

I did end up trying to flash another SD card with both RPi versions.
Neither worked. The Pi connects to my network and is pingable but the browser GUI doesn’t load and SSH claims I have the wrong password.
Then I popped the old SD card back (which should still at least boot the Umbrel OS) but … it does the same thing.

Tomorrow another SSD is coming (2tb version) and with the extra Pi4 sitting around, I plan to spin up another Umbrel on that from scratch, will redownload the blockchain, enter my recovery phrase, close my lightning channels if they haven’t already been forced closed, and look for an alternative node software.

Crazily enough I typed the recovery phrase into both Sparrow and Bluewallet and can’t recover the on-chain funds. Sparrow claims it’s not a valid phrase (edit: there’s more to the process to getting it working in Sparrow) and Bluewallet doesn’t load any txn history and shows a 0 sat balance.

This Lightning node had good ratings on Lightning Network Plus and had large channels to several prominent Bitcoin communities in Latin America and Africa.

Hoping Umbrel’s devs, if they are really still dedicated to Bitcoin, will soon wake up.

5

This is why I stopped using Umbrel. I want to restart my Node journey and came to see if things had changed with Umbrel. It was around June this year I stopped using Umbrel and after reading this letter not much has changed.

1 Like
6

What do you use now?