The Firmware Page

I hope I am making this request correctly. I have been reading these forums for hours.

I recently purchased one of the new iMacs with a slot-loading DVDRW GA11N. I have downloaded the most recent official firmware update I could find, which is KA16.
http://files.rpc1.org/index.php?act=category&id=1821

I have run this through MCSE and have the modified installer file but have not run it yet. My drive's firmware is JA18. Can I use the KA16 patch for this drive? I'm only interested in the RPC2 Autoreset.
Is there a way to extract my current (JA18) firmware? So I could reflash the firmware if I needed to?

Thanks in advance. DISC Info output is below:



Update: This journey did lead to success. If you are looking to flash your GA11N drive or similar, you can skip some reading and go to my summary here.

you can back it up with the software i made.
viewtopic.php?p=224492

there is a link to a mac version there.. if you plan on flashing with it you best read the entire thread after i post the mac program.

Thanks, devilsclaw, for the flasher ware! On my intel iMac, i've used the console version of flasher in both OSX and in WinXP (using bootcamp). I was able to dump/backup my main and core firmwares in both OSs with no problems. They loaded in MCSE and looked fine. Links are here:

Main and core firmware dumps in OSX for a GA11N drive with firmware version JA18:
http://rapidshare.com/files/329446130/o ... x.zip.html

Main and core firmware dumps in WinXP for same drive:
http://rapidshare.com/files/329446131/o ... p.zip.html

I'm guessing these files from the 2 OSs are exactly the same. I just included them both in case you wanted to compare them.

So now do I run the main firmware dump thru MCSE and then flash the drive using flasher, or the flash utility (in OSX)? Or does ala need to work his magic?

And do I understand it correctly that these dumped firmwares are only good for my drive? I don't want to lead anyone else with a GA11N JA18 astray.

Thanks,
kymyrra

these dumps work on any drive that is exactly the same as yours. and yes you run the main firmware through ala's tool. it can be flashed from mac, linux, or windows with my tool. but if your using mac be sure to fallow the instructions on the thread i posted before. for some reason the mac os forgets what drive it was talking to once flashed so im not able to verify the drive until i rewrite the code to refind the drive and dump and test.

If that's the case then feel free, you Powers That Be, to post it for others to enjoy. I imagine there's quite a few of us who picked up a new iMac in the last couple of months with this drive and firmware. btw, even though the drive shows up as a GA11N with JA18 firmware, the dumped firmware will ID it as:
Firmware: DVDRAM GA10N JA18-00 010909
Bootcode: GA10N CORE

Thanks again, devilsclaw!

-kymyrra

Okay, I just tried to flash my drive using flasher with the output of my main firmware dump run through MCSE and got an unexpected result, or lack of result:


C:\>flasher -d e -f firmware.bin
Devilsclaw's Renesas Utility
cmd_drive: Opening Drive: e.

C:\

It seems like it was opening the drive but then quit. As far as I can tell it has made no changes to the drive. I haven't tried using flasher in osx yet.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
kymyrra

seems that version still has the bug I fixed.. it didnt even attempt to flash.. I will up a binary file that has that fix here. I am in the middle of revamping the code and linux is being a pain so i have not upped it and built it yet.

here you go.
http://www.filefront.com/15278999/flasher.zip

for windows there is a new way to use the program compared to before since I want it to work the same in all OS's.

Thanks, devilsclaw, i'm a couple of steps further in the process:

Downloaded and used the new version of flasher.

The "flasher -D" cmd (without quotes of course) returned this result:


My attempt to flash the MCSE-washed firmware returned this:


I was unable to confirm if the light was flashing because the iMac doesn't have a drive light.

An immediate check with DISCInfo gave this info:


After a shutdown and restart, DISCInfo says this:


(I blanked out the serial number)
That is, it doesn't seem to have made any changes at all. Drive seems to be working normally.

Next step?

thanks,
kymyrra

You can not see the effect of the RPC2 AutoReset patch without changing the region and making a poweroff/on sequence.

ok that self diag thing i need to remove. normally what it allows the drive to do is a soft reset and allows me to dump the drives firmware and verify what was flashed it does not mean it actually failed there is just no way for the program to test it that is why it says its possible that it failed. so until I can get it working 100% of the time i guess im going to have to remove it.

ala, once again your wisdom is unassailable. It had indeed flashed the patched firmware and RPC2 Autoreset is in effect! I had thought that it had not done anything because of the error message I had gotten during flashing, the flashing operation completed rather quickly, and that after a powerdown and restart that my number of User Changes Left remained at 3. I had assumed the Autoreset would have set it back to the original 4, but apparently it only undoes user changes that occur after the firmware is patched.

Thanks to you, ala, for MCSE, and devilsclaw for Flasher and for the quick responses!

One more question, and then I'll leave you two alone. Is there a way for me to reset the number of User Changes Left back to the original 4 (or 5)? If not, it's not a huge deal since the RPC2 Autoreset is working now, but I was just wondering.

best,
kymyrra

The patch sets the counter to 5 if it is 0. In principle I could reset it at power on or eject, but I am too lazy to look for the right spot in the firmware, as this is not really needed.

ala, for anyone who has seen your accomplishments and your activity in these forums, "lazy" is not exactly a word that comes to mind. Quite the opposite... Thanks for the info.

So to recap how I successfully flashed the firmware in my Intel-based iMac's optical drive, a HL-DT-ST DVDRW GA11N (LG is the manufacturer) with firmware version JA18 so that it has RPC2 Autoreset (with much help and software from ala42 and devilsclaw):

Disclaimer: Following the steps below comes with no guarantees of success for others, flashing a drive involves risk, your mileage may vary, all standard disclaimers apply, etc..

Note: I have WinXP running on my iMac using bootcamp, and all of the following steps were completed on the WinXP side. For those wishing to flash your drive's firmware in OSX, you don't need to be running a Windows installation on your machine, but you'll need access to a Windows machine to utilize MCSE to patch the firmware for RPC2 Autoreset. See further down for steps for flashing in OSX.

For flashing firmware in WinXP:

1. Downloaded DISCInfo utility from viewtopic.php?p=214946#p214946
extracted it, and ran. It gives info about your region codes settings. Note the number of user changes left.

2. My version of firmware (JA18) was not available as an official distribution, so I downloaded devilsclaw's Flasher here:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/flasher/files/
There are a couple of versions that you can read about at viewtopic.php?p=224238#p224238
I used the console version, because it's pretty easy to run Flasher from the command line.
Flasher allows you to:

1. ID your drive(s)
2. backup/dump your original firmware (there are two kinds of firmware for the drive, the main firmware and the core firmware. Flasher allows you to back up both, but getting the Autoreset doesn't involve the core firmware, so you don't want to flash that unless something goes really wrong. But it's always good to back up, right?)
3. flash a firmware onto your drive


3. I extracted flasher.exe to the root directory of my hard drive where WinXP was installed. On my machine this was C: [BOOTCAMP]. I did this mainly for ease of getting to the directory from the command line. (the "cd \" command will always take you back to the root directory).

4. I followed devilsclaw's instructions at viewtopic.php?p=224744#p224744 to backup both my main firmware and core firmware. Both of these files need to have a .bin extension.

5. Downloaded and extracted ala42's MCSE software from http://club.myce.com/f61/mediacodespeed ... rs-114269/

6. Ran MCSE and loaded the dumped main firmware, checked the RPC2 Autoreset and Increase Speed boxes, and clicked Save. It doesn't overwrite your original firmware file, but saves the new file in the same directory, which should be the same directory where flasher.exe is located.

7. From command line, followed devilsclaw's instructions to flash the patched firmware onto the optical drive. You may get an error message saying that Self diagnostic failed and/or other failure messages. Don't believe everything you read.

8. Shutdown and powered off computer and then rebooted into Windows. A simple restart doesn't do the trick here.

9. Ran DISCInfo again, should have basically the same info as before.

10. In order to confirm that the firmware flash worked, you have to change the region on the drive by trying to play a DVD from a region other than the one it is currently set to. The DVD player software (e.g., PowerDVD) will squawk at you that you need to change the region. Go ahead and do so.

11. Run DISCInfo again. It should indicate that there is one less User Change Left than before.

12. Shutdown (i.e., power off) the computer and reboot. Run DISCInfo again. Voila! The User Changes Left has been restored to its higher number!

Flashing firmware in OSX:

1. Get the info utility DVD Info X from http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/16366
This gives RPC status similar to the way DISCInfo does in Windows. Extract to a place you can find it.

2. devilsclaw has created his Flasher utility for OSX as well as Windows and Linux. As of press time, you can get the OSX version at viewtopic.php?p=224495#p224495 or possibly on SourceForge. Instructions for use are in the post just above the one linked to here. Read these instructions carefully, and you probably want to read through the rest of the topic thread.

3. Run Flasher from the Terminal (aka console) utility in OSX to backup/dump your drive's original main and core firmware. The latter you are just keeping in case something goes horribly wrong (it won't).

4. Follow the instructions above (Steps 5 & 6) regarding MCSE to patch your main firmware with the RPC2 Autoreset (your drive may allow you other options as well, such as a speed increase). NOTE: MCSE only runs in Windows. If you don't have Windows installed thru Bootcamp or Parallels, etc on your Mac, you will need access to a Windows machine to extract and run MCSE. Have the .bin main firmware file on the Windows machine too and once you've saved the patched firmware file in MCSE, you'll need to port the patched file back to your Mac to the same folder that you are running Flasher from.

5. Again from the Terminal, use devilsclaw's instructions to flash the patched firmware file to your optical drive. You may get an error message saying that Self diagnostic failed and/or other failure messages. Don't believe everything you read.

8. Shut down and power off computer and then reboot into OSX. A simple restart doesn't do the trick here.

9. Run DVD Info X again, should have basically the same info as before.

10. In order to confirm that the firmware flash worked, you have to change the region on the drive by trying to play a DVD from a region other than the one it is currently set to. The DVD player software (e.g., the native DVD Player) will squawk at you that you need to change the region. Go ahead and do so.

11. Run DVD Info X again. It should indicate that there is one less User Change Left than before.

12. Shutdown (i.e., power off) the computer and reboot into OSX. Run DVD Info X. Voila! The User Changes Left has been restored to its higher number!

If you run into problems, try reading through this entire topic thread. If all else fails, ask for help. There are some really wise, generous, and talented folks here.

-kymyrra

Hi!
I have exactly the same burner GA11N on my new imac. I followed this thread with interest(!) and I think I understand exactly what to do, thanks to your accurate explanations

My problem is: when I try to dump the original firmware: ./flasher -d 1 -m main_firmware.bin (I tried both Bootcamp XP and MacOS), flasher returns:

cmd_drive: Opening Drive: 1.
cmd_dumpmain: Starting dumping process
get_firminfo_drive: failed to find pattern
cmd_dumpmain: failed to get firmware info

flasher -D under XP shows:

drive_inquiry: failed to inquiry drive info
drive_inquiry: failed to inquiry drive info
drive_inquiry: failed to inquiry drive info

AVAILABLE DRIVES AND IDs:
Drive ID: 1 Name: DVDRW GA11N

Any idea?

xorb83,

you need to post the discindo output in this request thread.

Thanks for replying! Here is the discinfo output (looks the same as kymyrra's?):

DISCINFO VERSION : 1.6.1.6
VENDOR : HL-DT-ST
MODEL : DVDRW GA11N
REVISION : JA18
VENDOR SPECIFIC : 
LOADING MECHANISM : Caddy
SERIAL NUMBER : XXXXXXXX
NUMBER VOL. LEVELS : 256
BUFFER SIZE : 2048KB
INTERFACE : ATAPI
RPC2 SCHEME : YES
STATUS : Set
USER CHANGES : 4
VENDOR CHANGES : 4
CURRENT REGION : 2
ANALOG AUDIO PLAY : YES
COMPOSITE OUTPUT : NO
DIGITAL PORT-PORT1 : NO
DIGITAL PORT-PORT2 : NO
READ UPC CODE : YES
MULTISESSION READ : YES
MODE 2 FORM 1 : YES
MODE 2 FORM 2 : YES
READ ISRC CODE : YES
READ BAD CODE : NO
BUFFER UNDER-RUN : YES
MT. RAINIER : NO
CAN READ CDR : YES
CAN READ CDRW : YES
CAN READ CDRM2 : YES
CAN WRITE CDR : YES
CAN WRITE CDRW : YES
CAN TEST WRITE : YES
CAN READ DVD-ROM : YES
CAN READ DVD-R : YES
CAN READ DVD-RW : YES
CAN READ DVD-RAM : YES
CAN READ DVD+R : YES
CAN READ DVD+RW : YES
CAN WRITE DVD-R : YES
CAN WRITE DVD-RW : YES
CAN WRITE DVD-RAM : NO
CAN WRITE DVD+R : YES
CAN WRITE DVD+RW : YES
MAX CDR READ SPEED : 24
MAX CDR WRITE SPEED: 24

Oops!

After rebooting, flasher worked OK and I could dump the firmwares!

Sorry!

xorb83,

thanks for your discinfo (its necessary to be really sure what to advice) and further thanks for your success report.

Just for info, here's the end of the story

After patching the main firmware in MCSE (Bootcamp XP), I flashed the patched firmware using Flasher (Mac version 2010 01 23).
Flasher went:

firm_flasher: Drive should be flashing its light.
firm_flasher: This indicates its flashing its self.
firm_flasher: This can take a while, Please be patiant.

... and then stalled...

A quarter of an hour later(!) I thought it was time for me to take action I shut down the mac then switched it on again, had a few tests that showed that the drive was oK and actually flashed (RPC2 AutoReset was working).

My conclusion (logical!): as you have to be in Windows in order to use MCSE, simplest thing is to stay in Windows to use Flasher: you wouldn't worry about your drive health as the Windows version doesn't seem to stall after flashing

you dont have to be in windows use MCSE, you only need a windows environment to run it which WINE happens to be and happens to work on linux and Mac OS X (Intel), as for the flasher problem its the command after the flashing actually happens which is supposed to test and reboot the drive, does not work on some drives so i need to remove it and will.

Thanks for your explanations...

By the way, with RPC2 autoreset on, does flashing happens each time the computer is re-powered, and in that case isn't there a risk for the flash memory (and for the drive) in the long term?

no flashing happens on reboot, once you flash the autoreset firmware, that is it, the counter is reset on the drive itself, no flashing involved

OK, Thanks. I 'll continue learning!