C750 Won't Flash - Any Ideas?

[lardman]

Right, I've been doing this for a while so I hopefully haven't made any school-boy errors.

I've flashed a fair few times this week (perhaps 10 times) testing kernels, so my CF card was working as was the transfer method (sftp -> WinXP -> card reader -> CF card), likewise the updater.sh should be okay.

I press and hold the Okay button, then press the On button - I get the Japanese menu from which I choose option 4, then choose 2 to get the Cf card, then Y to confirm. Then rather than rebooting using the Sharp code, the screen just goes black. I considered the possibility that the backlight wasn't being turned on, so I've left it for 10min or so (which is enough time to flash a kernel) however it doesn't do anything.

When I get bored and then press the on button to see what's happening, there's a sort of flash across the bottom third of the screen (but not bright, it's black - it looks like the difference between the screen being powered and black and switched off).

I press the on button again and get back to the Japanese flashing menu, selecting option 1 will allow me to reboot.

I've no idea what's wrong, if anyone has any suggestions I'd be glad to hear them.

To sum up what I've done to check that I've not made a mistake:

* I've used the Cf card before, have tried another one too and also an SD card. I've also re-partitioned and formatted the CF card.

* I've replaced the updater.sh

* I've checked the md5sum of the zImage.bin file, and also tried one which flashed without troubles earlier in the week (just in case the zImage.bin was the problem)

* I've checked that there are no extra file extensions (using my Z to look at the contents of the card).

* Power is attached and battery is good.

* I've left the machine unpowered and without the battery overnight (on the off chance)

I'm at my wits' end, any ideas gladly accepted,

Thanks,


Simon

[rpurdie]

Right, I've been doing this for a while so I hopefully haven't made any school-boy errors.

I've flashed a fair few times this week (perhaps 10 times) testing kernels, so my CF card was working as was the transfer method (sftp -> WinXP -> card reader -> CF card), likewise the updater.sh should be okay.

I press and hold the Okay button, then press the On button - I get the Japanese menu from which I choose option 4, then choose 2 to get the Cf card, then Y to confirm. Then rather than rebooting using the Sharp code, the screen just goes black. I considered the possibility that the backlight wasn't being turned on, so I've left it for 10min or so (which is enough time to flash a kernel) however it doesn't do anything.

When I get bored and then press the on button to see what's happening, there's a sort of flash across the bottom third of the screen (but not bright, it's black - it looks like the difference between the screen being powered and black and switched off).

I press the on button again and get back to the Japanese flashing menu, selecting option 1 will allow me to reboot.

I've no idea what's wrong, if anyone has any suggestions I'd be glad to hear them.

To sum up what I've done to check that I've not made a mistake:

* I've used the Cf card before, have tried another one too and also an SD card. I've also re-partitioned and formatted the CF card.

* I've replaced the updater.sh

* I've checked the md5sum of the zImage.bin file, and also tried one which flashed without troubles earlier in the week (just in case the zImage.bin was the problem)

* I've checked that there are no extra file extensions (using my Z to look at the contents of the card).

* Power is attached and battery is good.

* I've left the machine unpowered and without the battery overnight (on the off chance)

I'm at my wits' end, any ideas gladly accepted,

Thanks,


Simon
[div align=\"right\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

I think I know what's wrong. You've flashed a kernel that was bigger than the space available in NAND and it overwrote the ajoining data area. Your NAND is now corrupt.

Thankfully, this is easy to fix. See [a href=\"http://pocketworkstation.org/files/recover/]http://pocketworkstation.org/files/recover/[/url] and follow the instuctions with the files for your model.

[zmiq2]

It could happen that your internal flash is degrading a little, thus you might need to increase your rom partition to allocate proper 'good' sectors. Once I had eflashing problems: while documentation  suggested to have like x MB,  I had to allocate like x+2 MB to have a good reflash.

[Greg2]

I think I know what's wrong. You've flashed a kernel that was bigger than the space available in NAND and it overwrote the ajoining data area. Your NAND is now corrupt.

Thankfully, this is easy to fix. See http://pocketworkstation.org/files/recover/ and follow the instuctions with the files for your model.

I agree with this diagnosis but I think it would be easier/safer to do a NAND restore from the service menus (if you can access them) as per the instructions here:
http://downloads.conics.net/pda/zaurus-sl-.../service-menus/

with the file C750-ENG-NAND-original from here:
http://downloads.conics.net/pda/zaurus-sl-...iginal-backups/

I've done this procedure with a 5600 and it's pretty easy, just be 'very' careful in the menus.

When you have finished you will have a sharp rom... but I believe you can fix that  

Greg

[lardman]

Thanks everyone for the ideas, I followed rpurdie's suggestion and I'm sorted now.

Phew!

Thanks again,


Si