AZBox Ultra HD Resurrection

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execution of programs at any RAM address. The procedure is always to interrupt the startup of YAMON with CTRL- C. Now the network interface is configured and activated. Finally, a TFTP server is started on the computer with which you can load an recovery image into RAM. You start with this and the receiver boots in a minimized Linux operating system. Next you copy, as you would 1 3 4 Putty 1. Before starting Putty you need to figure out which COM-port was assigned to the USB adapter. The easiest way to do so is to open the device manager and check on the Ports (COM & LPT) section, what the port attributed to the Prolific USB-to-Serial is. 2. Open Putty and configure the session to use the Serial port. Configure it to match the port number and set the Speed normally, an recovery image together with the update program to /tmp. The rights of the program must be changed so that it can be executed. When you start „update“ using the name of the recovery image, the receiver is reflashed after which the desired firmware can be flashed normally via USB and AZUp. No sooner said than done; I was successful in the first attempt: my AZ- Box Ultra HD started up like I initially 150 TELE-audiovision International — The World‘s Largest Digital TV Trade Magazine — 07-08/2013 — www.TELE-audiovision.com 2 to 115200 baud (bits per second). Then click the Open button to start the session. Finally, you can turn on the receiver. 3. If the boot loader has not been whipped you should be greeted by YAMON. You can stop the boot procedure of the receiver with CTRL-C, but if the kernel is corrupt or erased YAMON will stop anyway. 4. The next step is to setup the network. You need three commands: - “setenv ipaddr 192.168.xxx.yyy” will set the receiver’s IP address. Replace wanted with the current E2 OpenRSI firmware. Yes it was nice, but I still wasn‘t satisfied. I felt that the recovery procedure was far too complicated. There had to be a simpler way. I mean, if you already have the YAMON Bootloader, it should be possible to use it to directly burn the Flash. So, I tried to do exactly that. My plan: load the recovery image into the RAM, delete the Flash and then reflash xxx and yyy with suitable values for your network. Remember that xxx must be a unique value. - “setenv subnetmask 255.255.255.0” will set the receiver’s subnet mask, which usually is 255.255.255.0. - “setenv gateway 192.168.xxx.zzz” will set the gateway. This is normally the IP address of your router. If these three steps have been correctly done you can initialize the network with “net init” and start it with “net up”.
1 2 3 5 4 TTL Recovery 1. To do the recovery, you need to enter YAMON as described before and then it is essential to configure and start the network adapter of the AZBox. 2. Now we want to load the recovery image called “vmlinux.bin” contained in the recovery archives. Do not press enter, yet! 3. You need to copy the required files to a folder, first. 4. Now it is time to start PumpKIN, the freeware TFTP server. 5. Configure the path to the folder were you placed the recovery files for your AZBox. 6. Now you can press ENTER on the Putty window and hopefully the “vmlinux.bin” file will be loaded into the RAM of the AZBox. 7. Type the “go” command inside the Putty window to start the recovery Linux from RAM. The usual start-up messages appear… 8. …and only a short while later, you will be prompted for the AZBOX login. Use “root” for login and you may or may not have to enter the password, which will be “azbox”. using the image in the RAM. This would somewhat simplify the recovery procedure. First test: Image loaded into RAM, Flash deleted. But when I tried to flash the RAM with the image, YAMON refused to cooperate. At this point it wasn‘t clear why this happened. It didn‘t matter, I thought. So, I restarted the receiver and performed the above described procedure again. Yeah, right! In the heat of the moment I managed to delete the EN- TIRE Flash memory including the Bootloader. So, it looked like my receiver would be a paperweight after all. Then again… What about JTAG? I wrote about incorporating a JTAG interface back in the 10-11/2011 issue of TELE-audiovision. Would it work with that? It didn‘t take me long to figure out everything that would need to be done: • The JTAG pin holes are not occupied and need to be unsoldered. First you have to remove the existing solder and then solder pins in place. • A jumper has to be added that deactivates the writeprotection on the Flash memory. It involves bridging R309 located near the processor. • Two SMD type 103 resistors (quad version) need to be soldered in. • The necessary JTAG interface with the parallel port must be crafted. Four 100K resistors are needed as well as a DB25 connector. No problem, I thought, so I immediately sat down at my work bench. The solder is removed using a soldering iron and a desoldering pump. There‘s a little trick to clearing out 9. If everything went well, you are now logged in. 10. Change to the “/tmp” folder with “cd / tmp”. 11. And then confirm your network configuration with the command “ifconfig”. It is good to have the rooter configured as a DHCP server, which automatically provides the network configuration. 12. Use your favourite FTP client (we like the free FileZilla) and transfer the backup kernel and the “update” file to “/tmp” of your AZBox. Use the IP address obtained in the last step and don’t forget to specify the password, if required. 6 7 8 9 10 11 152 TELE-audiovision International — The World‘s Largest Digital TV Trade Magazine — 07-08/2013 — www.TELE-audiovision.com www.TELE-audiovision.com — 07-08/2013 — TELE-audiovision International — 全球发行量最大的数字电视杂志 153 12 the hole: first you have to add solder. Because of the larger amount of solder, it remains in a liquid state a little longer when heat is removed so that the pump is able to suck the solder out. If there‘s only a little solder, it will solidify before the pump has a chance to suck it out. Soldering in the pins was easy. For the jumper I used a thin bendable wire. You need only the solder already on the circuit board to attach the jumper wire. Lastly, the resistors. Where on Earth am I going to get these from? Here it pays not to throw out old motherboards. The required resistors can usually be found on those kinds of circuit boards; all you have to do is unsolder them. But you won‘t get far using a normal soldering iron. You‘d be far better off using a hot air soldering station. They‘re really not that expensive and will quickly pay
Page 1 and 2: AZBox Ultra HD Recovery AZBox Ultra
Page 3: 1 2 3 4 5 The older AZBox receivers
Page 7 and 8: 1 2 3 4 Flash Dump with Yamon 1. Th

AZBox Ultra HD Resurrection

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