Trying to flash from Linux

drKorf · Post by **drKorf** » Tue Oct 21, 2014 5:45 am

I recently bought an RCP from an acquaintance. When plugged in, the device does not show up in either RaceCapture or RaceAnalyzer applications. No idea what firmware is on there, so I thought I would update to version 2 and run RaceCapture.

I tried to flash from Windows 7 and two different Windows XP boxes, but can't get past the "waiting for USB......." stage. So I decided to try flashing from Linux. The flasher does not work however. It did not have executable permissions when un-tar-balled, and when I added them, I got a "cannot execute binary file" error message. I'm on a old-ish machine. Do I need to build flasher from source? I started installing the various dependencies, but it's a bit of a pain. I was able to get RaceCapture built under Linux, but the flasher looks more complicated and the directions are sparse.

redparchel · Post by **redparchel** » Sat Oct 25, 2014 1:24 am

Hi drKorf, two thoughts

1) did you make sure the RCP was in 'flashing mode'?
this is achieved by making sure the RCP is completely off (no power from car) and the usb is disconnected then holding down the button on RaceCapture/Pro, plug the unit into USB. You should see 3 green LEDs light up, let go of the button. if the 3 green LEDS are on you're in 'flashing mode'

2) next using the flasher utility should be as simple as cd'ing into the unzipped firmware directory and running the flasher, it sounds like you might be trying to execute the firmware itself. the process should look something like the following:

Code: Select all

cd Downloads/RaceCapturePro_Firmware
chmod a+x flasher 
./flasher RaceCapturePro-2.0.8.elf #substitute your firmware version here
# you should now see the update happening

NOTE: my understanding is the RCP uses a usb to serial chip that has been in the linux kernel for some time now, however it is possible your distro isn't loading it, doesn't have it, or some other issue, while possible i think this is unlikely. What linux version are you using and how old is it?

if the above steps don't work, try checking 'dmesg' output a few seconds after plugging in the RCP to see if your linux install sees the device at all

GL and let us know how it goes

Post by **brentp** » Thu Oct 30, 2014 10:27 pm

When you plug RCP in while holding down the button dmeg should tell you that the bootloader is active.

Normally, RCP shows up as a CDC-ACM device, which typically shows up under /tty/ACM0 - this is a generic usb-serial device.

If you have an older machine you could build from source, but likely it's a matter of Linux seeing the device properly when in bootloader mode.

Also, try running flasher as root (sudo flasher...) to see if there's a permissions problem.

Please let us know what you find out!

drKorf · Post by **drKorf** » Wed Nov 05, 2014 6:58 pm

My old box was a 32-bit Ubuntu install. The flasher executable works in 64-bit in a VM on my Mac. Not sure if the hardware will connect via the VM, but I'll give it a shot. Worst case, I'll install a 64-bit Ubuntu dual boot on my Windows box.

Post by **brentp** » Thu Nov 06, 2014 6:02 pm

Thanks for the update. Keep us posted!

drKorf · Post by **drKorf** » Sun Nov 23, 2014 2:41 am

brentp wrote:Also, try running flasher as root (sudo flasher...) to see if there's a permissions problem.

Yeah, that was it. If you don't run it as root, it will continually look for the device and never find it despite the fact that dmesg shows it has loaded.

I can now run the RaceCapture application from Windows. Thanks.

EDIT:

I also tried flashing to 1.2.8 and using the older RaceAnalzyer. That works fine too. I guess I'll stay in RaceAnalyzer and switch to RaceCapture as the 2.0 software matures.

Post by **brentp** » Thu Dec 18, 2014 11:21 pm

We're currently working on getting the official 2.0 firmware up and running on MK1 - stay tuned!