Uninstalling iBoot on a HS8200

[Audioniek]

To run Titan(Nit) on a receiver, part of the installing procedure is to change the boot loader from the current one to iBoot. Some time ago, I came across a HS8200 with iBoot, but needed to have the factory boot loader 6.00 installed.

No problem it seems. After getting the required .ird file and starting the flash procedure by powering up with channel up on the front panel depressed, … nothing happened: the loader was not reflashed.

In the end I ended up with JTAG to put the original loader back. In the meantime, I learned it is possible to flash the loader back to original using iBoot. For this, you need to add something to the boot arguments.

The procedure is a follows.

• First power down the receiver using the power switch on the back.
• Connect a PC with a terminal program to the serial port.
• Start the terminal program and set it to the COM port used to connect to the receiver and set the baudrate to 115k2, 8 bit data, 1 stop bit, no parity.
• On the PC start tapping the Enter key and switch on the receiver.
• After iBoot has started, it should stop the boot procedure and show its prompt in the terminal program: am7600>
• Now enter these two lines (on at the time, copy/paste recommended):

setenv flashloaderallow 1
saveenv

• If you want, you can check the result by typing printenv <Enter>. The output should have the text flashloaderallow=1 at the end.
• Power down the receiver using the power switch on the back.
• Locate an .ird file with only a loader 6.00 in it, for example this one here (about halfway in the first posting). iBoot has the reseller set to 230300A0 on a HS8200. Use a reseller changer program to change the reseller of the file to 230300A0.
• Copy the thus prepared .ird file to blank FAT32 formatted USB stick.
• Insert the stick into one of the USB ports on the receiver.
• Press and hold the channel up key on the front panel, and while doing this, power on the receiver with the power switch on the back.
• Flashing the original loader is done a split second after which the receiver will reboot, showing LOADER 6.00 as its sign on: basic job done.
• After all this the receiver will have the reseller ID contained in the boot loader flashed. If you used the file in the link above, it is 230200A0 (Octagon SF1028 with loader 6.00). Please note that it is NOT the reseller ID that was put in using the reseller changer!
• After the reboot, the newly flashed loader 6.00 will find an incorrect boot environment and cannot start an image. To fix this, the current boot arguments need to be erased. Power down the receiver with the power switch on the back, and start tapping Enter again in the terminal program on the PC. Switch the receiver back on and wait until you see the boot loader prompt: PDK7105>.
• Next, enter these three lines (on at the time, copy/paste recommended):

protect off a0040000 +20000
erase a0040000 +20000
protect on a0040000 +20000

• Restart the receiver again using the power switch. The boot loader will now find no boot arguments and automatically write a default set. This will enable running the factory firmwares, and any other firmware requiring the factory boot loader.

CAUTION: work carefully and completely understand the above before attempting this. If anything goes wrong there is a great chance you will brick the receiver, and the only one responsible for that is you and only you.

This procedure may be the same (apart from the reseller numbers and erase commands involved) for other receiver models but I have not tested this. The crux of course is adding flashloaderallow=1 to the boot arguments.

Regards,


Audioniek.