O Canada! > Canadian > TekSavvy > Upgrading Firmware on Thompson DCM475

reply to yu130960

Re: Upgrading Firmware on Thompson DCM475

What are they doing with the (perfectly good if updated) old one?

reply to DL

reply to mlord

I would think they will send me an updated one and send mine out to be updated.

I doubt they would send me a different model since it's the DCM475 i purchased from them.

reply to yu130960

I read that as saying they don't update the old ones.

reply to DL
Mine expired in June and their reply to me was to find Teddy Boom and get the firmware upgraded through him - so I don't think they have a policy. I mentioned that other customers were being upgraded but mine is apparently too far out of warranty. (June instead of July). All I can say is wow, tech support second to none.

reply to yu130960
Well it has been a week since I plugged in my Teddy Boom flashed DCM475 (flashed to 2.16) and no drop outs at all. It solved my problems and I love my Teksavvy service again. Like I said I was prepared to go back to Rogers as the drop outs were so annoying.

Nice to see that Teksavvy is trying to help people out (even outside of warranty), but for $10 (if you are close to mlord or Teddy Boom) it is just worth getting it done.

Thanks to mlord and Teddy Boom for hacking up a solution when no one else would.

I too got my DCM475 firmware upgraded this weekend at mlord's and I have no more dropped connections. Thank you again mlord! I think mlord and Teddy Boom deserve many kudos for this. And I hope Teksavvy recognize and acknowledge the amount of help they are getting from the community.

reply to CHRoNiCWiLL

This just started happening to me too in the last week or so. I posted a Direct topic for it, I hope there's some official communication on how to resolve this though - it seems weird to cover a modem for a year and then it has issues that require you to either manually update firmware on it with a JTAG kit or outright replace the device.

In digging through some stuff in my basement I found a buffered jtag unit that I wanted to repurpose and do some teksavvy firmware upgrades for the guys north of the GTA. Can Teddy Boom or mlord post the windows software and a copy of the firmware? Just want to give back.

I use a USBJTAG NT, but it isn't really being used as a JTAG in this application. It is just functioning as an SPI FLASH programmer. Is yours a buffered parallel port JTAG, or is it something more sophisticated? I wouldn't be surprised if software was available to use it as an SPI programmer.. However, I'm pretty much certain the USBJTAG NT software wouldn't do you a lot of good. It is downloadable from their site if you want to take a look, and certainly it is helpful to get familiar with how the file systems are organized.

mlord's project may be more useful for you, he has done a lot of the low level work to get his working, and you could use that as a guide to develop something from scratch if you are motivated
--
electronicsguru.ca

reply to yu130960

I just ran into this knitting machine video:

»www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiTTrT29HI0
Which uses these instructions to adapt a USB to Serial cable to emulate a Tandy floppy drive:
»learn.adafruit.com/electroknit/cable

The Serial cable includes an SPI flash, and the company has released utilities for using the cable itself to reprogram other copies of the cable. So, it looks like these might be a great inexpensive SPI programmer for our purposes
»www.ftdichip.com/Support/Utilities.htm

And who knows, maybe even other USB to Serial cables that are even cheaper than $20:
»www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_···1b0259d6
--
electronicsguru.ca

reply to Teddy Boom
Yes, I have a buffered parallel port jtag. I tried it last night and it worked well, but I take your point that it may not work as the SPI FLASH programmer. I will keep digging as I do recall seeing some rudimentary schematics on how to build your own SPI Flash programmer.

reply to CHRoNiCWiLL

reply to yu130960
Yeah, the cheapest, easiest way to assemble a rig, is to clone my setup.

The SPI portion is the simplest -- just need a 3.3V Arduino compatible chip (eg. Atmega328p, cost $3.50). that by itself will do everything needed that any JTAG rig would otherwise do at greater cost.

Where the expense comes into it, are the clips ($3/each, need 6), and a 12VDC to 3.3VDC power supply (simple tab regulator + 2 high-grade capacitors, about $5), a breadboard ($4), some "dupont cables" for the clips ($5-20, depending on the source), an SD-card socket (to hold the new firmware) ($10), a couple of LEDs, resistors, and that's mostly it.

I'm more than happy to provide the code, or even a programmed Atmega328p chip. Or even the fully assembled rig. But when I add up the itemized parts list for the full rig, it's in the $40-$50 range. Stuff adds up.

But this rig does have a huge advantage: turnkey. No PC, or PC software required. Just hook it up, plug in the power, and it flashes the modem.

Hello mlord, could you provide a couple of stores in the Ottawa area that sell those items?

reply to dra6o0n

Modem -> Router -> SPA
                -> Computer