Making Matshita DVD-writers region free running Windows

chef · **Posted:** Sat May 08, 2010 7:07 am

MDHZ wrote:

I've heard that there is flashable firmware out there - it was made by Sony:

KMFOPD-01041900-US.exe

but the update doesn't work on an IBM.

Is it possible for someone to use the dump utility and get the file off of the new firmware (v1.51) so that we can use the winflash utility? Would that work?

Thanks!
MDHZ

That is just correct because its for SONY OEM, nothing else!

fp944s2 · **Joined:** Mon May 03, 2010 6:09 am **Posts:** 5

No disc in drive, AHCI turned off, Administrator - still getting

Windows dumper for Matshita DVD drives V1.01 by ala42, based on ben11's dump_mat
shita

Enter the drive letter of the Matshita drive to backup the firmware: d:
You have selected the source drive d:

dump_matshita V 0.1
Appear to have a matshita device MATSHITADVD+-RW UJ890 1.01
dump 1
change_vendor_mode: rc -2 tries 101
error during attempt to read memory from device \\.\d:

Press any key to continue . . .

What am I doing wrong???

ala42 · **Posted:** Sun May 09, 2010 8:27 pm

Richjn wrote:

Just a bit of an update.
I was curious if Toshiba maybe crippled the ability to read the DVD memory in their custom XP image's (they add plenty of other crap) So I took a disk image of my current installation then started a clean install afresh with AHCI off and a stock Windows XP disk with SP3 slipstreamed but no other changes. As soon as the install was over I tested both from safe mode and a normal login, .......and....... same result both time's other than the error code for both was RC -258 whereas previously I was getting RC -2.

No help to anyone I know but thought I'd post here to save others the time involved in trying. Guess Toshiba do something "special" to these drives.

It is a help as the question is if the problem is firmware or windows related. Did you make a copy of the output ? What was the value printed behind "tries":
change_vendor_mode: rc 256 tries 1
change_vendor_mode: rc -2 tries 101
Is there a official Toshiba firmware update for the UJ-890 available ?

Richjn · **Joined:** Sat Jul 26, 2008 10:01 pm **Posts:** 7

Hi
I'm going from memory but I think the "tries" were both 101.
I have noticed an error in my original post, however, the 'change_vendor_mode: rc -2 tries 101' was generated when AHCI was on (not off as per my original post) and the 'change_vendor_mode: rc 258 tries 101' was from AHCI off (both safe mode and normal login with a clean XP install)

My laptop (Toshiba Tecra P11) is quite new with the only update from Toshiba being a bios update (no release notes) I have no idea if they have used this drive on previous models or for how long they may have done so. A previous poster quoted the same drive number but appeared to have a later firmware so its possible, perhaps regional ? (I'm in Australia)

Regards
Richard

gurivan · **Joined:** Sat Oct 04, 2008 2:41 pm **Posts:** 1

Just made my UJ-831S in Toshiba Satellite M45 laptop RPC1 regardless of the warning that UJ-83X drives are not supported.

fp944s2 · **Joined:** Mon May 03, 2010 6:09 am **Posts:** 5

No disc in drive, AHCI turned off, Safe Mode, Administrator - still getting error as below:

Windows dumper for Matshita DVD drives V1.01 by ala42, based on ben11's dump_mat
shita

Enter the drive letter of the Matshita drive to backup the firmware: d:
You have selected the source drive d:

dump_matshita V 0.1
Appear to have a matshita device MATSHITADVD+-RW UJ890 1.01
dump 1
change_vendor_mode: rc -2 tries 101
error during attempt to read memory from device \\.\d:

Press any key to continue . . .

What am I doing wrong???

ala42 · **Posted:** Fri May 14, 2010 6:24 pm

Either the UJ890 uses a different "change vendor command sequence" than the other UJ drives or some software is blocking the commands. The dumper still works with UJ898 drives. The command sequence is still in the two UJ890 firmwares I have, but that does not mean they still work or are in all UJ890 firmwares.
Anyone here who can dump a UJ890 firmware ?

florini · **Joined:** Sat May 15, 2010 4:38 pm **Posts:** 1

Hi,

Thanks for doing this great work.

Having read the thread I know that my Matshita BD-MLT UJ235AS is not supported yet and that I have to be patient. I just wanted to ask if there was anything I could do to help the development (as in, run information tools or such).

Keep up the good work!

ala42 · **Posted:** Sat May 15, 2010 5:21 pm

Not yet. I can dump the firmware in the mean time, but have not modified the RPC1 patch yet.

duffy98 · **Joined:** Sun May 16, 2010 3:07 pm **Posts:** 3

Hi ala42 or anyone ...

Just found out about the Matshita Drive RPC1 Update Tool for Windows just a few hours ago. I am having a problem that no one else has brought up yet. I have an IBM T42 and I bought a Matshita DVD-RAM UJ-862 ... FW (RB01) to go with it, it just came with a CD burner only. The computer came with Win XP Pro installed but I took that off and installed Win 98SE. I use the updates from the MSFN Win 98SE forum ... unofficial newer updates that various people from around the world have done to take Win 98SE further than when MS stopped with their updates.

When I click on the 2010-03-14 MatshitaWinDump tool, it starts up and only goes so far. I can see the first line:

Windows dumper for Matshita DVD drives V1.01 by ala42, based on ben11's dump_matshita

... that's as far as it will go. I do not see the next line to put my drive letter in as below.

... Enter the drive letter of the Matshita drive to backup the firmware:

Any ideas on my problem ... is the Mashita tool only for XP, Vista and such or should it also work with Win 98SE ?

thanks ...

chef · **Posted:** Sun May 16, 2010 3:34 pm

Probably win9x lacks of some system library support.

duffy98 · **Joined:** Sun May 16, 2010 3:07 pm **Posts:** 3

Thanks chef ... I got the Matshita Drive RPC1 Update Tool for Windows to work ... had to go about it in a round-about-way ... I have my Win 98SE and also XP on Ghost backup cds, just put XP on for 30 minutes and ran the Matshita tool, all went well ... everything removed for the burner and then I put my Win 98SE back on the hard drive. All is well. As I said earlier, I have the Matshita DVD-RAM UJ-862 model with Firmware RB01. I have not been able to find a newer firmware ... I thought I would throw this extra question in, in case someone also has this burner with a newer firmware. Just let me know if there is one that also worked with this tool. thanks

ala42 · **Posted:** Sun May 16, 2010 9:43 pm

Win98 SE does not support the SPTI interfaced used to access the drive.

duffy98 · **Joined:** Sun May 16, 2010 3:07 pm **Posts:** 3

ala42 ... thanks for the answer to the Win 98SE problem ... I did get your tool to work with a fix on my part, which you probably read. As a poster said earlier ... Thanks for all your good work on this project.

fp944s2 · **Joined:** Mon May 03, 2010 6:09 am **Posts:** 5

Has anyone got this to work on a UJ890??

Richjn · **Joined:** Sat Jul 26, 2008 10:01 pm **Posts:** 7

Just a bit more info:

I took the drive (UJ890AS) out of my Toshiba Tecra P11 and installed it in my June 2009 MacBook Pro, well partially installed it as its a bit thicker than the std Apple drive, I then ran the Mac version of the dumper tool with very similar results to the Windows tool

[code]bash-3.2# pwd
/Users/richard/Downloads
bash-3.2# ./matshita_mem_dump
compiled at Jan 25 2010 00:02:51
Appear to have a matshita at device index 0: MATSHITADVD-RAM UJ890AS 1.00nJ??
error during attempt to read memory from device 0, continuing
bash-3.2#
/code]

I guess this probably confirms that there is something different about this drive rather than a Toshiba or Windows based issue.
We will need to wait till a firmware update is released to know for sure. The only firmware close to this drive I could find was from Asus for the UJ890A version 100.1(no "S") which I can post if anyone wants it.

Richard

cheefer420 · **Joined:** Sun May 23, 2010 8:48 pm **Posts:** 1

Hello, I have an old laptop with a matshita UJ-820S and when i ran the MatshitaWinDump.bat it gives me one file named MATSHITADVD-RAM_UJ-820S_1.00_dump.dat and says that "The file cannot be flashed directly and must be converted first."

I'm new to this.. how do I convert this file?
(Okay I have Read the entire post and saw that there isnt a way to do this yet for this firmware)

I will wait patiently!

Thanks! for all the hard work you put into this!

Puma · **Posted:** Mon May 24, 2010 10:38 am

cheefer420 wrote:

Hello, I have an old laptop with a matshita UJ-820S and when i ran the MatshitaWinDump.bat it gives me one file named MATSHITADVD-RAM_UJ-820S_1.00_dump.dat and says that "The file cannot be flashed directly and must be converted first."

I'm new to this.. how do I convert this file?
(Okay I have Read the entire post and saw that there isnt a way to do this yet for this firmware)

I will wait patiently!

Thanks! for all the hard work you put into this!

please read the opening post of this thread, you should of anyway.

Quote:

Matshita BD drives and the old UJ-81x, UJ-82x, UJ-83x drives are not supported yet

wbs · **Joined:** Thu Jun 03, 2010 10:13 am **Posts:** 13

I tried to flash my UJ862AS in an Asus X5DIJ Series Laptop but i keep getting an error. I tried it in Safe Mode and as Administrator. There is no disc in the drive.

Quote:

Enter the drive letter of the Matshita drive to backup the firmware: d:
You have selected the source drive d:

dump_matshita V 0.1
// sptxSay.DeviceIoControl: x1 (1) Incorrect function.
// sptxSay x 0 0 29 E (ioctl status length senseLength)

I cannot disable AHCI in the BIOS because by switching it to "compatible" Windows doesn't boot. It's Windows Seven Professional N 64bit BTW. Do I have any chance to flash it? Should I try Windows XP or something?

Thanks in advantage.

carsten12345 · **Joined:** Fri Oct 08, 2004 8:00 am **Posts:** 7

This is outstanding work. Two thumbs up for the OP and the others who have done this amazing work. It has turned my X301 into something really useful now.

Mrs. carsten12345 has the same laptop (running W7 instead of XP) and firmware dump worked like a charm. But flashing hadn't finished after 2 days (!) so she aborted and now the drive doesn't recognize DVDs anymore. Any suggestions? Trying to flash the original firmware back?

ala42 · **Posted:** Fri Jun 04, 2010 4:13 pm

carsten12345 wrote:

This is outstanding work. Two thumbs up for the OP and the others who have done this amazing work. It has turned my X301 into something really useful now.

Mrs. carsten12345 has the same laptop (running W7 instead of XP) and firmware dump worked like a charm. But flashing hadn't finished after 2 days (!) so she aborted and now the drive doesn't recognize DVDs anymore. Any suggestions? Trying to flash the original firmware back?

With which drive id and firmware revision does the drive identify after the failed flash ?

carsten12345 · **Joined:** Fri Oct 08, 2004 8:00 am **Posts:** 7

ala42 wrote:

With which drive id and firmware revision does the drive identify after the failed flash ?

After getting my hands on the laptop I was able to solve the problem of the drive not reading DVDs anymore. However flashing still doesn't work. The simple reason is that W7 won't start in Compatability mode and in AHCI the flash doesn't work. I am not sure whether one can make W7 start in compatability mode and if not, no idea what Plan B is.

aleboco · **Joined:** Wed Dec 10, 2008 1:19 pm **Posts:** 2

Hi all.

Is the UJ-841S supported (Toshiba Satellite)?

If yes, since I'm on linux at the moment, would it be possible to flash the drive from a virtualized XP? Alternatively I have a second hard disk with XP installed which I could pull in just for the flashing.

What do you suggest?

Thanks a lot and keep up with the excellent job!!!

wbs · **Joined:** Thu Jun 03, 2010 10:13 am **Posts:** 13

You could just try it, I don't think it will work.

shager · **Joined:** Fri Jun 18, 2010 12:09 pm **Posts:** 8

I bought a Sony Vaio E laptop with the Matshita UJ890AS drive, and I confirm that it does not work - I get the same error message :

Windows dumper for Matshita DVD drives V1.01 by ala42, based on ben11's dump_mat
shita

Enter the drive letter of the Matshita drive to backup the firmware: e
You have selected the source drive e

dump_matshita V 0.1
Appear to have a matshita device MATSHITADVD-RAM UJ890AS 1.00
dump 1
change_vendor_mode: rc -2 tries 101
error during attempt to read memory from device \\.\e:

Press any key to continue . . .

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Making Matshita DVD-writers region free running Windows

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