[HiassofT]

No idea either why SPI is built into the kernel in OpenELEC. I also think having both SPI drivers built as modules makes more sense and IMHO that should be safe.

The last 2 days I did various tests with my cirrus OpenELEC build having SPI drivers built as modules and haven't noticed any issues.

Just did another test with the cirrus dtoverlay removed from config.txt so it's very near to your build:

With dtparam=spi=on /dev/spidev0.{0,1} show up fine and lsmod/dmesg show that the new driver is used

Code:

OpenELEC:~ # lsmod | grep spi
spi_bcm2835             3659  0
OpenELEC:~ # dmesg | grep -i spi
[    5.608210] spi spi0.0: setting up native-CS0 as GPIO 8
[    5.618668] spi spi0.1: setting up native-CS1 as GPIO 7

When also adding dtoverlay=spi-bcm2708 to use the old driver the device nodes show up fine again and lsmod/dmesg output is also as expected

Code:

OpenELEC:~ # lsmod | grep -i spi
spi_bcm2708             4682  0
OpenELEC:~ # dmesg | grep spi
[    5.563134] bcm2708_spi 3f204000.spi: master is unqueued, this is deprecated
[    5.605692] bcm2708_spi 3f204000.spi: SPI Controller at 0x3f204000 (irq 80)

I think you should be safe switching to modules in you next regular testbuild, don't think we'll need another intermediate build.

so long,

Hias