DietPi, a lightweight, performance-focused Debian-based Linux distro for SBCs (such as Raspberry Pi) and server systems (with an option to install desktop environments), has released version 10.4 as the fourth maintenance update to its 10.x series.
Security is the main focus this time, as the new version addresses the recent Copy Fail and Dirty Frag Linux kernel vulnerabilities across all supported SBCs. Debian and Raspberry Pi have already released kernel updates with these fixes, and DietPi has updated its own APT repository accordingly.
DietPi 10.4 automatically upgrades kernel packages unless an administrator has placed them on hold. For systems where this does not occur, DietPi recommends manually upgrading the kernel packages or disabling the affected kernel modules.
Apart from those security fixes, this release adds a dedicated image for the Orange Pi 5B. Previously, users needed to manually modify the device tree to enable features such as WiFi, but the new image eliminates this requirement.
Persistent DietPi logs have been relocated from /var/tmp/dietpi/logs to /var/lib/dietpi/logs, as Debian Trixie deletes /var/tmp content older than 30 days. During the update, existing log files are copied to the new location. The old /var/tmp/dietpi directory remains temporarily, as the updater continues to log there during the update process.
For Allwinner, Amlogic, and Rockchip SBCs, DietPi has merged linux-dtb-* packages into the corresponding linux-image-* packages. NanoPi R76S users receive a networking fix: the two Ethernet interfaces now retain persistent names across reboots, resolving previous issues with ports randomly swapping names after restarts.
Moreover, DietPi 10.4 now provides updated Unbound packages through its APT server. Java has been upgraded to version 26 on 64-bit systems, while ARMv7 remains on Java 21 due to performance limitations with newer versions.
The installer has also been improved to better support GRUB BIOS images using a GPT partition table without a dedicated BIOS boot partition. In these cases, the installer now follows Debian’s grub-pc behavior and calls grub-install with --force when this setup is detected.
On top of that, several regressions from DietPi 10.3 have been resolved. Fixes address a Raspberry Pi boot issue after moving the root filesystem, Docker installation failures, and startup problems with Immich and ownCloud Infinite Scale related to systemd automounts.
This release also resolves installation issues with Home Assistant and Synapse. Additionally, it fixes a Raspberry Pi issue in Prometheus Node Exporter where CPU temperature values could be stored incorrectly if the system locale used a comma as the decimal separator.
For more details, see the announcement. Existing users can update through the standard mechanism, and new images, including the Orange Pi 5B build, are available on the project’s download page.
