Where to find .pof file for programming with USB Blaster?

[pa0fot]

After a failed update to P2 firmware v1.5 the 7000 / Orion Mk II is not recognized anymore by either v2 web programmer or the bootloader.

The P2 web programmer showed "Erasing" for more then 10 minutes, and failed to start programming.
This may have been caused because I forgot to rename the .rbf file to metis.rbf, oops...

The 7000 worked fine with Metis and SDR console using P2 v1.2, with exception of having no output on Tx.
So I was hoping that would have been fixed in v1.5

After the failed update now is that with bootloader switch ON, the Ethernet interface in my PC reports 'disconnected', although the cable is clearly connected. With bootlaoder wswitch in OFF position, the Ethernet interface is connected, however the board is not found anymore., despite many hours of trying, and following all instructions.

So I tried to program using the USB Blaster, and installed Quartus v12 programmer. However in order to use Quartus programmer, I need a .pof (programmer object file), and I only find .qar and .rbf file for v1.5 on Github.

Questions:
1. Where to find the .pof file for P2 v1.5?
2. Should the bootlader switch be ON or OFF when programming with the USB blaster?

Thanks,
Folkert

[w-u-2-o]

After putting the Bootloader switch in the Bootloader position did you cycle power on the radio? It has to power up and boot into the Bootloader code.

[pa0fot]

Dear Scott,

Thanks very much for fast response!!

Yes, changed the Bootloader switch while powered off.
Then, after switching on, observed behavior is as follows:

Bootloader switch OFF (i.e. shifted to the right as seen from front of unit, jumper is OPEN):

As seen from the front: FPGA Heartbeat LED on Frontpanel lights 'Dim', Left green LED on Ethernet RJ45 is ON, Right green LED on Ethernet RJ45 is blinking irregularly, two green LED's near the Bootloader jumper on the Orion board, and PC reports Ethernet is connected.
So the FPGA Heartbeat LED seems abnormal, while the Ethernet connection seems OK, however the board is NOT found by v2 web programmer.

Bootloader switch ON (i.e. shifted to the left as seen from front of unit, jumper is CLOSED):

As seen from the front: FPGA Heartbeat LED on frontpanel regularly blinking slowly (as normal), Left green LED on Ethernet RJ45 blinks slowly, Right green LED on Ethernet connector shortly blips in same rythm as left green LED, two green LED's and 3 Red LED's near the Bootloader jumper on the Orion board (red LED closest to front of unit is permanently ON,second red LED next to it blinks slowly, the red LED farthest away from the front blinks once every third time that second LED blinks), and the PC reports that Ethernet is disconnected (Red Cross and Message: "Cable is disconnected").
So the FPGA Heartbeat LED seems normal, but the Ethernet connection refuses to connect, hence cannot initialize the Bootloader programmer.

Thanks,
Folkert

[w-u-2-o]

Folkert,

Darn, I was hoping it was something easy!

I'm not at all familiar with reprogramming the board using JTAG. I suggest you contact the factory to see what they say and if they can provide you with the .pof file you need.

Do you know who the closest factory rep. is to your location?

73,

Scott

[pa0fot]

Thanks for the advice.
I contacted Apache Labs Germany http://www.apache-labs.de/.
Joachim is always very helpful and responsive.
Vy 73,
Folkert

[pa0fot]

Got a very quick response from Joachim / Abhi:

The bootloader is OK and does NOT need to be reinstalled since the FPGA heartbeat LED is blinking in bootloader model,

Please ensure that:

The Radio is connected directly to the PC
He has not defined a fixed IP
All physical connections etc are OK

Try again with the bootloader, if no luck try a second PC as the bootloader is fine,

Regards,
Abhi

So I connected to another PC, and can confirm that now Ethernet connection was established while the Bootloader switch was ON.
So the update to P2 FW v1.5 using the HPSDR Bootloader v2.0.4.4. was very easy now.

After the update to v1.5 now Tx is also working in Thetis using Protocol 2, very happy!

Thanks to all for pointing me in the right direction!

Vy 73,
Folkert PA0FOT

[w-u-2-o]

Folkert--check the other threads, 1.6 just came out, give it a try!

BTW, you are the second person who had this problem and had to switch to another PC. My suspicion is that either a) both machines have multiple NICs (that includes WiFi) and you did not set your network metric manually as specified in the instructions or b) WinPCAP needed to be installed/reinstalled.

[pa0fot]

Scott - I can't find P2 Firmware v1.6 on Github.
Any hint where to find it?
73, Folkert

[w-u-2-o]

Folkert--check the other threads, 1.6 just came out, give it a try!

Quoting my self from my post above..."check the other threads". As in check the other threads in this forum. More specifically:

https://apache-labs.com/community/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=2993

Discussion on the performance of the 7000/8000 firmware has kind of settled into that one thread. Look a the bottom for a link to 1.6. It won't be posted to Git until you intrepid explorers tell Rick it works!

There is a similar thread for the 200D.

[pa0fot]

BTW, you are the second person who had this problem and had to switch to another PC. My suspicion is that either a) both machines have multiple NICs (that includes WiFi) and you did not set your network metric manually as specified in the instructions or b) WinPCAP needed to be installed/reinstalled.

Both machines had dual Gigabit Ethernet interfaces, WinPCap installed, and no WiFi interfaces.
I did adjust the network metric, although that was probably not relevant.
Both PC's running Win10 64-bit.
The Anan 7000 was configured with a fixed IP address, which actually was still present after updating to v1.5.
The PC that caused trouble used a Realtek RTL8111D onboard Ethernet NIC.
The PC the worked fine used an Intel 82579 onboard Ethernet NIC.
Maybe the Intel NIC is more forgiving?

[pa0fot]

Quoting my self from my post above..."check the other threads". As in check the other threads in this forum. More specifically:

viewtopic.php?f=32&t=2993

Discussion on the performance of the 7000/8000 firmware has kind of settled into that one thread. Look a the bottom for a link to 1.6. It won't be posted to Git until you intrepid explorers tell Rick it works!

There is a similar thread for the 200D.

Great, thanks!
Going to try right away and will report back.
-Folkert

[w-u-2-o]

Folkert,

I wonder if I could impose upon you to try "windump -D" on your problem machine and see if it reports the problem adapter.

From the WinPcap faq's:

Q-4: The XXX WinPcap-based application doesn't run properly on my system. Is it a WinPcap problem?

A: Try WinDump. In particular, "windump -D" reports the list of valid adapters and shows if WinPcap is able to detect correctly your hardware. If WinDump works, the problem is in the XXX program and not in WinPcap, so contact the authors of XXX for help.

Link to WinDump:

https://www.winpcap.org/windump/

[Paco]

Hi all,

For those who cable their Angelia card, are there other versions of the bootloader EEPROM, for Angelia, Orion?

I only found Mercury_EU_V3.4.pof on http://openhpsdr.org/download.php and nothing on https://github.com/TAPR.

Thank you

Paco

[w-u-2-o]

I do not understand what "cable their Angelia card" means. However, there is only one version of the Bootloader image for each card type. Those images are not posted publicly as far as I know.

What exactly are you trying to achieve?

73,

Scott

[Paco]

This is an Angelia Pcb bought from Apache Labs.

After having built it, you have to program the EEPROM bootloader (.pof) with the USB Blaster, before programming the firmware.

73 - Paco

[w-u-2-o]

Contact the factory or your local service rep. for the image file.

[Paco]

Thank you Scott.

73 - Paco

[w-u-2-o]

Paco,

I found the file. They are all on the Github TAPR repo. It's just may not be obvious where they are stored.

For the Orion MKII look here:

https://github.com/TAPR/OpenHPSDR-Firmware/tree/master/Protocol%201/Orion_MkII%20(ANAN-7000DLE_ANAN-8000DLE)/Orion%20Bootloader_v2_source

73,

Scott

[Paco]

Hi Scott,

thank you very much for looking.

I asked Phil (VK6PH) who just answered me the same thing.

I did not think that these files are in directories "source", and I had not looked !! Sorry.

Regards.

Paco - F6DET

[vu2mb]

Finding .pof files for anan8000DLE original version with 200W is a daunting task and I find it very confusing and it may be a readymade recipe for disaster. I was looking for the file as I needed it for my radio and the earlier location where it used to be was recently changed. All the confusion was probably created from there.

I landed at the following page
https://github.com/TAPR/OpenHPSDR-Firmw ... -Andromeda

OpenHPSDR-Firmware-Protocol-1-ANAN-7000DLE_ANAN-8000DLE-Andromeda-at-master.png (125.24 KiB) Viewed 32610 times

I clicked on the middle folder for my fpga and now landed at the following page

OpenHPSDR-Firmware-Protocol-1-ANAN-7000DLE_ANAN-8000DLE-Andromeda-Orion-MKII-Cyclone-IV-EP4CGX150F896-FPGA-at-master.png (73.01 KiB) Viewed 32610 times

Now I clicked on Bootloader source V2

and landed at the following page and this is the page that creates all the confusion. This page is for Cyclone-IV-EP4CGX150F896-FPGA
but against every file, its mentioned that
adding firmware for Cyclone V

I don't know if I am understanding it wrongly or if this is a confusion to be sorted out. Why can't be folders created like earlier separately?

OpenHPSDR-Firmware-Protocol-1-ANAN-7000DLE_ANAN-8000DLE-Andromeda-Orion-MKII-Cyclone-IV-EP4CGX150F896-FPGA-Orion-Bootloader_v2_source-at-master.png (376.92 KiB) Viewed 32610 times

Thank you

73
Bhanu VU2MB

[w-u-2-o]

So do you still have a problem, Bhanu, or just registering a complaint?

I'm also curious as to why you need the bootloader .pof file? It takes a concerted effort to brick a board.

[vu2mb]

Dear Scott,

My card stopped working after a P1 firmware downgrade as the heartbeat stopped in normal mode and it was working in bootloader mode.
So I was advised to upload .pof file and I was looking for it.

I got it from Doug after spending a lot of time and the radio is alive again.
I am just registering what I have felt and if there is indeed confusion, it should be sorted out so that no one goes through
that confusion.

Thank you.

73
Bhanu
VU2MB

[w-u-2-o]

My card stopped working after a P1 firmware downgrade as the heartbeat stopped in normal mode and it was working in bootloader mode. So I was advised to upload .pof file and I was looking for it.

I'm confused. You wrote " heartbeat stopped in normal mode and it was working in bootloader mode". If that was the case then the Bootloader was still good and you wouldn't need a .pof file. Did you accidentally mistype something in that statement?

The reason I'm curious is because if you can describe how you bricked your 8000 (and it's not clear that it was really bricked yet) it might save someone from making the same mistake.

[vu2mb]

It was not a typo. Even I thought thst bootloader was good as heartbeat was normal in bootloader mode. I tried uploading.rbf files P1 & P2 and bootloader program shows that it was progrmmed properly and after power cycle it wouldn't work as there was no heartbeat in normal mode. So I was advised by Doug to go for .pof file.

73
Bhanu
Vu2MB

[w-u-2-o]

Understood.

So theoretically it could have been a mistake on your part with Bootloader, or it could really have been bricked.

It seems so unlikely that it was bricked. Had you ever successfully used Bootloader previously with this 8000?

[vu2mb]

Yes Indeed, bootloader programme numerous times on 8000/200d and 100d for updating firmware
and also for setting up static ip.

[w-u-2-o]

So what do you think bricked it?

[vu2mb]

So what do you think bricked it?

I really don't know.
This is the second time during the last couple of years.
Bootloader worked properly.
It erased the earlier firmware and then programmed the P1 Metis_Orion_MkII_v2.7_K5SO_5-4.rbf
after the power cycle and moved the jumper switch to off There was no heartbeat. I programmed again
and then changed the firmware to P2 without any success.

finally used Altera programmer and uploaded a file with .pof and also P1 V1.5 together.
it worked like a charm. then updated P2 V1.9 without anyissues.

That's what I know.

73
Bhanu

[K1LSB]

To Whom It May Concern,

The term "bricked" is incorrectly used when describing any device that can be recovered by any means. The term originally meant (and still means) a device that has somehow been rendered completely and permanently disabled, i.e., rendered as useless as a brick. Something that has been bricked can by definition never be recovered.

If a device is able to be returned to a usable state then it was never "bricked" in the first place.

[/rant]

Mark

[w-u-2-o]

Well then nothing is well and truly bricked, ever, unless there is some sort of cryptographic or hardware self-destruct like you might find on a cable box. Nevertheless, "bricked" is the common term for when firmware (or we can also discuss whether it should be called "gateware", another super fine point to argue) can only be reloaded by means by of JTAG or other specialized programming, typically only at the factory. Of course, in our open source world the user can be an adjunct to the factory, so the definition of "bricked" is definitely blurred in this case.

At any rate, in this case I choose to be lazy and call anything that requires a JTAG pod (aka "byte blaster", "USB blaster", etc.) as bricked. Until it's not