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I found this great fix from Juro Janosik on Resco.net for those who are having trouble updating their ROMs on their iPAQs. Check it out!
Intro: Several month ago I was trying to reflash our iPAQ hx4700 but the ROM upgrade failed after 18% reporting the message message "ERROR 606: USB timeout communicating with the bootloader". We were no longer able to fix this problem trying all versions of ActiveSync and several desktop computers – the result was always same – crash after 18%. The iPAQ wasn’t able to boot and it only showed the bootloader screen with HP logo and “Serial”/”USB” text. This info is for those having the similar problem (maybe also with other type of iPAQ) and having no chance to solve this problem via HP service (which is ready to replace the main board in this case). Please do not try this if you are not skilled user and if you are not sure that your problem is same as mine.
Merging these sources helped us to repair the device.
All you need is a desktop computer with MS Windows, at least 256 MB SD Card, other functional iPAQ hx4700 which can be hard-reset (or nb0 ROM image instead) and Multi-port/USB TTY utility (available here - or other terminal utility being able to connect via USB).
The steps are following:
How to put the ROM image on the SD card:
Put the working device the Bootloader mode (see the section below).
WARNING: this action will hard-reset the device and all the programs and data will be lost. Do the backup if you need to have them back.
Put it into the cradle and connect it to the USB.
Put the empty 256 MB SD Card into iPAQ’s SD slot.
Kill the ActiveSync process (wcecomm.exe) on desktop computer.
Run Multi-port/USB TTY utility and choose the port \\.\WCEUSBSH00x (where x may be any number – I experienced 1,2 and 3). Do not change anything else. See this screenshot.
When the program starts press enter a couple of times until the prompt USB> will be shown
WARNING: this will erase all data from your SD card
The working ROM image should start copying to the SD card.
When it will be finished (can be seen on both device and TTY window), take the device out of the cradle and soft-reset it. It will start as after hard-reset. You can install all the programs or restore the backup (which I am not a fan of).
Mind that the SD card contains the raw data and cannot be read in the card reader (but you will be able to format it later).
How to load the ROM image from SD card to iPAQ:
Take the battery off the broken iPAQ.
Take the SD Card with ROM image and put it into iPAQ’s SD slot.
Put the battery back and activate the Bootloader mode (see the section below).
Put the device into the cradle (to make sure it will have enough power) but do not connect its USB cable.
You will see as the ROM flashing starts – the percentage should be increasing (very slowly).
Apply the hard-reset.
How to put the iPAQ hx4700 into Bootloader mode Press the POWER + iTASK + CONTACTS buttons at the same time and hold all of them. Then shortly press the Reset button on the bottom and release all of them. The screen with HP logo in the middle will appear having the bootloader version at the bottom and the text “Serial” on the top. If you will connect the device to USB, the text “Serial” will change to “USB”.
How to do this all without having another iPAQ The ROM update utility contain the NBF file. This file contains the header and the ROM image data. I inspired with http://www.tweaks2k2.com/portal/forum/viewtopic.php?forum=8&showtopic=61 and found that for hx4700 you need to delete leading 2600 bytes to obtain the raw ROM image (there should leave 64 bytes and then the text signature ECEC). Unfortunately the steps described there also failed on the USB timeout.
If you have the same problem, you will need to find the utility which will write this image on the SD card (I mean raw write – without any file system) but I didn’t go this way and I am not sure if it works.
Nice one Tim....
1
For those who have Axim x50/x51 series, i found this from Aximsite.
How to put the ROM image on the SD card:
OK, as many people want to know how to make their own nb0 files for the X50 and X51 series here is a short tutorial on how to make them.
DISCLAIMER: I do not take any responsibility for any damage caused to your devices.
This tutorial is only intended for advanced users.
First of all you will need a ROM Dump of a working device. You can obtain this using the Grab it tool, which can be downloaded at http://forum.xda-developers.com/view...er=asc&start=0 . You can either use the 64 or 128 MB version of this tool.
To make the tool work you will have to do the following modification to the registry:
1. Goto this registry Section [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\StorageManager\Profiles\ SDMemory]
2. Change the String Value of "Folder" to "Storage Card"
3. Then Soft Reset using a RESET Utility Program lke PHM Reset or psShutXP, don't use the Reset Button
4. Run the grabit dumper program from the SD card. If the axim is in the cradle you can monitor the dump progress by hitting refresh on the SD folder from your PC. The Axim will also beep when the process is done.
Then you will need to copy the file to your PC and open it in a Hex Editor. I personally use Hex Workshop 4 (BreakPoint Software, Inc. - Home of the Hex Workshop Hex Editor) for this and will therefore describe the exact process of creating the flash files for this Hex Editor. Any other Hex Editor will work as well, but the menus and dialogs may be different.
Let me first of all describe the process of how to extract the bootloader:
1. Open the dump file in Hex Workshop
2. Make sure that the cursor is right at the beginning of the file, this can be achieved by pressing "Home" or "Pos1" on your keyboard.
3. Select "Edit --> Select Block" from the menu. A dialog will appear, use the following options:
-Block: 40000
-Hex
-Size of block
Then hit OK
4. Select "File --> Save Selection" and give the extracted bootloader image a name that matches the conventions mentioned in the Flashing tutorial.
OK, and this is how to extract the OS image from a ROM-Dump:
1. Open the dump file in Hex Workshop
2. Make sure that the cursor is right at the beginning of the file, this can be achieved by pressing "Home" or "Pos1" on your keyboard.
3. Select "Edit --> Goto..." from the menu. A dialog will appear, use the following options:
-Offset: 40000
-Hex
-Beginning of file
Then hit OK
4. Select "Edit --> Select Block" from the menu. A dialog will appear, use the following options:
-Block: 21c0000
-Hex
-Size of block
5. Select "File --> Save Selection" and give the extracted OS image a name that matches the conventions mentioned in the Flashing tutorial.
Well, now you also need the appropriate CRC files for your images.
Obtaining them is very easy, this is how to do it:
1. Create a CRC file on your computer that matches the naming conventions, the file content has to be any 8 digits (e.g. 12345678)
2. Copy this dummy CRC file to a FAT32 formatted SD-Card along with the image you want to calculate the CRC for
3. Insert the SD-Card into your Axim and start the flash image loader.
4. Select the image you want to create the CRC for by pressing the action key twice
5. The Axim will read the image from the SD-Card into its RAM. After that you will see an error message, telling you that the CRC is not correct.
6. The Axim developers were so generous to tell us the correct CRC at the bottom of the screen at this time. You now can enter this correct CRC into the CRC file on your computer, recopy the files to your SD-Card and flash your Axim.
EDIT:Howard - If create your own ROM image, upload it to your device and it trashes your Axim, it will OBVIOUSLY not be covered by warranty.
Murduck
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