omf Posted May 26 Share Posted May 26 so, my atari2600+ was working earlier as best it did earlier today when i was testing my newly acquired games. the quantity that was working wasnt great, so i decided to update to the latest experimental firmware and dumper (update-052024-1.1x-r3.img, dumper-052024-x.01.exe) the updates appeared to work fine based on the original guide. however after restarting, after the atari logo i saw a android robot logo with a box and an arrow for a moment then the machine restarts. after allowing this to occur several times without change i attempted to reflash the latest official firmware. the dumper flashed ok, but on attempting to flash the firmware image i get an error 'Test Device Fail' does anyone know what the process is to flash the firmware from fresh to bypass this error to reactivate my 2600+ ? 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dionoid Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 For the upgrade, did you use the USB cable which came with the 2600+? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
omf Posted May 27 Author Share Posted May 27 4 hours ago, Dionoid said: For the upgrade, did you use the USB cable which came with the 2600+? yes i did indeed i have kept all the parts together, i had been waiting to use it on mass for more games support so its spent most of itslife in its box Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
omf Posted May 27 Author Share Posted May 27 on the rockchip PCB there is a recovery button, what does this do / how do you use it? is it to enable jtag mode? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrChickenz Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 On 12/31/2023 at 5:52 PM, Ben from Plaion said: Here you go AtariDumper1.0.0.0.exe 5.26 MB · 76 downloads update.img 68.85 MB · 70 downloads Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrChickenz Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 (edited) These are the factory installed firmware files. Not sure if this will help. If this works I would redownload the Experimental firmware again maybe the file didn’t download correctly. Just try installing the Image file again if that doesn’t work try installing the factory Image and dumper. Then install the Experimental files again. Edited May 27 by MrChickenz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
omf Posted May 27 Author Share Posted May 27 just tried it again. it still fails on the on the device test (image above) so doesnt actually get to the flashing stage i am using the same computer and cable (the origina cable) and the same usb port that has worked previously the dumper updates fine, its the img file thats the issue. seems like the RKDevTool cant see the chip properly any more Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrChickenz Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 (edited) 10 minutes ago, omf said: just tried it again. it still fails on the on the device test (image above) so doesnt actually get to the flashing stage i am using the same computer and cable (the origina cable) and the same usb port that has worked previously the dumper updates fine, its the img file thats the issue. seems like the RKDevTool cant see the chip properly any more Was it the same image file? Try a different image file and see if that works. If you can flash one of the Atari 2600+ image files then you can try the Experimental image again. But I would download the Experimental image again to be sure it’s a working file. Edited May 27 by MrChickenz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
omf Posted May 27 Author Share Posted May 27 1 hour ago, MrChickenz said: Was it the same image file? Try a different image file and see if that works. If you can flash one of the Atari 2600+ image files then you can try the Experimental image again. But I would download the Experimental image again to be sure it’s a working file. i have tried the original image attached above, and the two previous betas and the experemental image again, all of them give the above error. I dont think it is the image, the image flashing process does not get to the point where it is written to the chip. when it tests the chip the chip is failing to send back the correct information and it fails and does not cintinue to flashing of the image to the chip. it seems the experimental image (corrupt or not) that was oringinally flashed overwrote something on the chip and now its not responding as expected by the flasher program. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrChickenz Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 39 minutes ago, omf said: i have tried the original image attached above, and the two previous betas and the experemental image again, all of them give the above error. I dont think it is the image, the image flashing process does not get to the point where it is written to the chip. when it tests the chip the chip is failing to send back the correct information and it fails and does not cintinue to flashing of the image to the chip. it seems the experimental image (corrupt or not) that was oringinally flashed overwrote something on the chip and now its not responding as expected by the flasher program. Maybe someone from the Experimental Thread can be of assistance. Hopefully you get it working again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RevEng Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 I'm pretty confident the problem isn't the flashed firmware. When you turn the console on with TV=COLOR and RESET held down, it actually does "press" the rockchip recovery button, which throws the board into bare metal recovery mode. That's the maskrom mode mentioned in your flash logs. At that point the device is running the non-updateable bootloader, and should be the exact same code as when you previously flashed the device. This reddit thread seems to have some fixes for the same error, albeit with a Retron 5, which seem to target the driver. Maybe Windows went and updated the driver, or maybe it's spotty on your system for some reason. Before you go through the fixes in that thread, I'd first try with different cables, ports, and/or PCs, since that's easier and quicker to do. 1 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shane857 Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 I think maybe the Atari 2600+ needs an easier update method? I know it's pretty straight forward, thou you actually need to have the driver installed and enabled/detected to completely install firmware/dumper updates... Maybe too confusing for users who are not PC/tech savvy? 🤔 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
omf Posted May 27 Author Share Posted May 27 44 minutes ago, shane857 said: I think maybe the Atari 2600+ needs an easier update method? I know it's pretty straight forward, thou you actually need to have the driver installed and enabled/detected to completely install firmware/dumper updates... Maybe too confusing for users who are not PC/tech savvy? 🤔 an easier update would be good yes, but this isn't the issue here as i am a competent computer user 3 hours ago, RevEng said: I'm pretty confident the problem isn't the flashed firmware. When you turn the console on with TV=COLOR and RESET held down, it actually does "press" the rockchip recovery button, which throws the board into bare metal recovery mode. That's the maskrom mode mentioned in your flash logs. At that point the device is running the non-updateable bootloader, and should be the exact same code as when you previously flashed the device. This reddit thread seems to have some fixes for the same error, albeit with a Retron 5, which seem to target the driver. Maybe Windows went and updated the driver, or maybe it's spotty on your system for some reason. Before I go through the fixes in that thread, I'd first try with different cables, ports, and/or PCs, since that's easier and quicker to do. thanks for the explanation, with this i realised that the Evercade uses the same chip family and might be causing me grief so after commandeering the wife's laptop, i managed to do the update process again (successfully to the latest experimental firmware and dumper) thank you to all who have tried to help me, it is much appreciated... 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shane857 Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 5 minutes ago, omf said: an easier update would be good yes, but this isn't the issue here as i am a competent computer user thanks for the explanation, with this i realised that the Evercade uses the same chip family and might be causing me grief so after commandeering the wife's laptop, i managed to do the update process again (successfully to the latest experimental firmware and dumper) thank you to all who have tried to help me, it is much appreciated... I had the same issue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gabe Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 2 hours ago, omf said: thanks for the explanation, with this i realised that the Evercade uses the same chip family and might be causing me grief so after commandeering the wife's laptop, i managed to do the update process again (successfully to the latest experimental firmware and dumper) I've seen a few people mention problems having to do with this very thing, where they've flashed the firmware of a device, then when using the same computer the flashing of a different device fails. I've also seen it mentioned that deleting the drivers used for flashing the previous device prior to flashing the new one resolves the issue, but that can be a bit of pain, as you've got to know exactly which driver(s) you're purging, and that can be tricky when it's not actively being used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Stamos Mullet Posted May 28 Share Posted May 28 Glad you got this sorted. When Atari finally releases a fully official updater, they should make not of potential Evercade cross compatibility issues. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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