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[smakusdod]

I dont want to spam, but i see a lot of people having problems with dosflash, and being stuck at reading bank 0, etc.

Please see, this thread, but below is the conclusion:  

Well, using a combination of the advice of a few individuals on the board, I was able to sucessfully dump, hack, and re-flash the benq drive with the modified firmware.

Here are my exact steps to solve my problem of dosflash being stuck at "Reading Bank 0..."

1) create a bootable USB key. - this is harder than it sounds, because there is no universal tool out there that we all should use. I wound up downloading the HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool, located here:

http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=197

Note, this is NOT the HP USB drive utility tool!

then i downloaded an image of a boot disk from bootdisk.com, dos 6.22 did the trick:

http://www.bootdisk.com/bootdisk.htm

Once i had the key working, i copied DOSFLASH to it (so there is nothing but a bootable DOS 6.22 files, plus DOSFLASH on the usb key). Note, i am talking about DOSFLASH 16, lastest version off of xbins.


Now that I had that there, via windows XP, i confirmed what I/O address range my VIA card was using. I found that it has 2 channels, in my case, channel 0 started at x00006860, and channel 1 started at x00006870.

Then, i turned off the computer, unplugged everything from my VIA card, except the Benq, which i moved to the first channel, channel 0, starting at 6860 (zeros removed, for use with DOSFLASH)

Went into the BIOS, disabled onboard SATA and IDE, set to boot from USB, then reboot into DOS using the USB key.

then i followed the flashing guide listed in the DOSFLASH nfo file, substituting the address of my VIA card's channel 0 where it should be in the command string, i.e.:

dosflash r 6860 1 a0 1 4 c:\backup.bin 0

Note: i left the xbox360 power (and hence, the Benq drive) OFF until after i typed in the DOSFLASH command, then i powered on, off, then on again, while the command was waiting (after hitting Y for retry). i used this powering method EVERY SINGLE TIME i used DOSFLASH.

Everything worked as it should, i had to power the xbox360 on, off, then on again, and it started reading and dumping the firmware to my USB key (which was c:\).

From here, i re-enabled my hard drives, boot into windows XP, copied the backup.bin file off of my usb key, and ran it through the c4eva's firmware-creating batch file that comes with the latest benq firmware, and it created the benq-ix.bin file that i now copied over to my USB key.

reboot the computer, disabled sata, ide, hard drives, made sure nothing was plugged in except for the BENQ, then boot to the usb key again, and erased the firmware on the benq using DOSFLASH. After that was complete, i reboot AGAIN to the usb key (just to be safe), and wrote the modified firmware to the benq using DOSFLASH.

After this, everything worked perfectly, backups and all.

Here is what i learned the hard way (in my setup, anyway, with my Mobo and VIA card):

Once you've used DOSFLASH once, you have to reboot for it to work again. You cannot dump the firmware twice in the same session without a reboot, regardless of if it shows you that it is working, it isn't.

Reboot after EVERY use of DOSFLASH, even if you are just erasing the firmware, do this:

read firmware, reboot, erase firmware, reboot, write firmware, done!

In order to get DOSFLASH to actually read/write the firmware, i HAD to have the benq drive on the first and primary channel of the VIA card, with NO OTHER DRIVES ATTACHED TO THE VIA CARD, OR ANYWHERE ELSE. Channel 0, benq drive there. Nothing else attached. If i had any hard drive attached to the VIA, or if i enabled my on-board sata for hard drive access, DOSFLASH would not work. That is why i had to use the USB key, so i had some kind of storage to dump the firmware to, because i could not have hard drive access otherwise DOSFLASH would not work (and i dont have a floppy drive on this box either, but i suspect a floppy would probably work, especially if it is a usb floppy drive).

Other than those caveats, dosflash worked great, the firmware plays backups great, and the skills of some of the people on this board and community are truly amazing. Thanks everybody who helped out, i hope this post can save you some time, it took me a good 15 hours to figure this out, because my DELL mobo and VIA card obviouisly don't work very well with DOSFLASH, but following these steps and guidelines, it should work for you.

[nevernow]

QUOTE(smakusdod @ Oct 31 2007, 06:27 PM)

[...] Went into the BIOS, disabled onboard SATA and IDE, set to boot from USB, then reboot into DOS using the USB key. [...]

Didn't you mean RAID and IDE? Thanks for the guide, by the way!  (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cool.gif)

[smakusdod]

QUOTE(nevernow @ Oct 31 2007, 07:28 PM)

Didn't you mean RAID and IDE? Thanks for the guide, by the way!  (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cool.gif)

No, i mean SATA.   Whether or not RAID is used is independant of the SATA bus.  If your motherboard settings call your SATA ports RAID ports, that is a bit if a misnomer.

[Van Royal]

I've tried everything you said, but I still have the bank 0 problem. I've tried making the bootdisk just like you did, but then - for some reason - i can't boot to DOS. If I use the other HP tool, then everything works fine: I just select the USB drive as first boot device in drive boot order. If I use your HP tool, my USB key doesn't show up in the drive boot order list and selecting USB-FDD as first boot device doesn't help either.

Perhaps you can check out my post and see if you have any other suggestions?

[nevernow]

QUOTE(smakusdod @ Oct 31 2007, 07:35 PM)

No, i mean SATA.   Whether or not RAID is used is independant of the SATA bus.  If your motherboard settings call your SATA ports RAID ports, that is a bit if a misnomer.

I see. I just thought it was weird to disable SATA ports, since you are going to use one of them.

[Payback001]

QUOTE(nevernow @ Oct 31 2007, 07:44 PM)

I see. I just thought it was weird to disable SATA ports, since you are going to use one of them.

See, what i got from that is.... he disabled the ONBORD (the SATA ports built into his motherboard) SATA ports and was useing the SATA ports off a card that was connect to the motherboard.


If thats not what you u did mybad just trying to help

[nevernow]

QUOTE(Payback001 @ Oct 31 2007, 08:12 PM)

See, what i got from that is.... he disabled the ONBORD (the SATA ports built into his motherboard) SATA ports and was useing the SATA ports off a card that was connect to the motherboard.
If thats not what you u did mybad just trying to help

Yes, that makes sense, since he wrote he was using his VIA card (not motherboard). I didn't notice that the first time I read the article.

[smakusdod]

QUOTE(Payback001 @ Oct 31 2007, 08:12 PM)

See, what i got from that is.... he disabled the ONBORD (the SATA ports built into his motherboard) SATA ports and was useing the SATA ports off a card that was connect to the motherboard.
If thats not what you u did mybad just trying to help

this is exactly correct... i disabled ONBOARD sata (sata built into the motherbaord, which is separate from the VIA card that the benq is plugged into)

QUOTE(Van Royal @ Oct 31 2007, 07:44 PM)

I've tried everything you said, but I still have the bank 0 problem. I've tried making the bootdisk just like you did, but then - for some reason - i can't boot to DOS. If I use the other HP tool, then everything works fine: I just select the USB drive as first boot device in drive boot order. If I use your HP tool, my USB key doesn't show up in the drive boot order list and selecting USB-FDD as first boot device doesn't help either.

Perhaps you can check out my post and see if you have any other suggestions?

The only thing i can reccommend (to make it closer to my exact setup) is to buy a VIA card, and then disable your onboard SATA.  It sounds like DOSFLASH is having a problem with your specific onboard motherboard SATA ports.

You can get a compatible via card from newegg for like 14 bucks.

[warlock110]

QUOTE(smakusdod @ Oct 31 2007, 09:03 PM)

this is exactly correct... i disabled ONBOARD sata (sata built into the motherbaord, which is separate from the VIA card that the benq is plugged into)
The only thing i can reccommend (to make it closer to my exact setup) is to buy a VIA card, and then disable your onboard SATA.  It sounds like DOSFLASH is having a problem with your specific onboard motherboard SATA ports.

You can get a compatible via card from newegg for like 14 bucks.

some board you can't disable SATA without disabling ATA because they run off the same chipset, so he'll have to use USB boot into dos. It's really annoying, most of the new mobo (intel chipset) has only 1 IDE and they simply convert their SATA into IDE because it's cheaper, therefore you can't disable one without disabling the others. The old days were much easier (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Van Royal]

QUOTE(smakusdod @ Oct 31 2007, 09:03 PM)

The only thing i can reccommend (to make it closer to my exact setup) is to buy a VIA card, and then disable your onboard SATA.

I bought a VIA card (conceptronic) at my local pc store, put it in my PCI slot and 5 minutes later I had a flashed and working Benq drive (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) Didn't even have to disable my onboard SATA drives etc.

[smakusdod]

QUOTE(Van Royal @ Nov 1 2007, 02:25 PM)

I bought a VIA card (conceptronic) at my local pc store, put it in my PCI slot and 5 minutes later I had a flashed and working Benq drive (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) Didn't even have to disable my onboard SATA drives etc.

congratulations!  that's what the community is all about...

[pwcracker2002]

after following all the other tuts i found that yours worked for me and supplying those usb key files was a tremendous help for me. Thank You so very much.