RT3S firmware won't run

VK3KYY
Posts: 7478
Joined: Sat Nov 16, 2019 3:25 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VK3KYY » Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:03 am

There is also a way to package the opengd77 firmware to make it compatible with the official loader using something called RadioTool (which I think is located here https://github.com/v0l/radio_tool)

But its Linux and Mac command line only, and I don't think I've ever used it to package the open firmware to make it compatible with the official loader

VE2NCK
Posts: 38
Joined: Tue Jan 17, 2023 4:24 am

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VE2NCK » Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:14 am

VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:03 am
There is also a way to package the opengd77 firmware to make it compatible with the official loader using something called RadioTool (which I think is located here https://github.com/v0l/radio_tool)

But its Linux and Mac command line only, and I don't think I've ever used it to package the open firmware to make it compatible with the official loader
yes i've done multiple radios on this pc,a bunch of fm ones, anytones, HD1, md2017 and those rt3s

i'll take a look at openTRX and radio_tool i don't mind using command line on linux i have one available on a vm somewhere on this machine

VK3KYY
Posts: 7478
Joined: Sat Nov 16, 2019 3:25 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VK3KYY » Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:21 am

VE2NCK wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:14 am
VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:03 am
There is also a way to package the opengd77 firmware to make it compatible with the official loader using something called RadioTool (which I think is located here https://github.com/v0l/radio_tool)

But its Linux and Mac command line only, and I don't think I've ever used it to package the open firmware to make it compatible with the official loader
yes i've done multiple radios on this pc,a bunch of fm ones, anytones, HD1, md2017 and those rt3s

i'll take a look at openTRX and radio_tool i don't mind using command line on linux i have one available on a vm somewhere on this machine
Did you do any other RT3S or MD9600 on the same PC ?

I'm trying to isolate whether this is a DFU driver problem or perhaps a problem with the firmware loader in the CPS.

I think one other person may have posted that they were unable to load the firmware, but English was not their first language, and from what I recalled they stopped replying to my questions

VE2NCK
Posts: 38
Joined: Tue Jan 17, 2023 4:24 am

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VE2NCK » Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:24 am

all 3 rt3s are done on the same windows 10 pc / session
OpenTRX loaded like a charm on the non GPS RT3S

VE2NCK
Posts: 38
Joined: Tue Jan 17, 2023 4:24 am

Re: RT3S use different display?

Post by VE2NCK » Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:28 am

as for the DFU driver (yes i'm running a french version of windows)
2023-01-24 23_26_34-Propriétés de _ STM Device in DFU Mode.png
2023-01-24 23_26_34-Propriétés de _ STM Device in DFU Mode.png (5.22 KiB) Viewed 1178 times
;)

VE2NCK
Posts: 38
Joined: Tue Jan 17, 2023 4:24 am

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VE2NCK » Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:32 am

VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:00 am
Which official version were you using to reinstall ?

Did you say that you have installed the firmware using the same PC onto different RT3S radios ? and that it worked OK ?

One other thing you could try is downloading and installing the OpenRTX firmware, which I think possibly can be loaded using the official loader and see if that works.

Probably try their previous release

https://github.com/OpenRTX/OpenRTX/releases/tag/v0.3.4
official firmware V19.06(CSV)
retevis cps v1.12
to flash i use DMR Firmware DownLoad v3.04

VE2NCK
Posts: 38
Joined: Tue Jan 17, 2023 4:24 am

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VE2NCK » Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:36 am

VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 3:03 am
VE2NCK wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 2:53 am
all 3 of them are RT3S
1 with GPS S/N2201R03S11xxxxx
2 without GPS S/N2105R03S11xxxxx
all are hardware v3 (reported by the retevis cps)
umm. Possibly some display type that we don't handle. From what I can recall the UV380/RT3S has at least 2, possibly 3 different types of display that can be fitted, and potentially your versions have a display type we've not seen before.


After you have installed the firmware does the radio appear as a USB Serial device.
The CPS installs a driver, so that the serial device will be named OpenGD77.


If you load the voice prompts using the CPS, does it sound like the radio is actually working, e.g. the menu's will announce, as will the VFO and channel screens, and you can try to control the radio based on what you can hear.

If its only the display that doesn't seem to be working, we'd need to send you a special version of the firmware where we could look at the calibration data, where I think it stores a number related to the display type.

However, as we've never seen a radio where the display doesn't work, its difficult to know whats happening and also the exact type of display in your radios.
according to OpenRTX its Display Type 1 so this might not be the issue

VK3KYY
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Joined: Sat Nov 16, 2019 3:25 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VK3KYY » Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:51 am

So OpenRTX is running ?

I've checked and our code has checks for Screen type 1, but I don't know what screen type is in my radio

Anyway, it sounds like the firmware is not running at all, or may be crashing and rebooting, its hard to know

From what I can remember the bootloader does some checks of the firmware and won't run it if those checks fail.
One check was the location of the stack pointer in memory, but I think there are other checks.
However we don't have the source code for the bootloader, and reverse engineering it from binary / assembly language would take hundreds of hours of work

VE2NCK
Posts: 38
Joined: Tue Jan 17, 2023 4:24 am

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VE2NCK » Wed Jan 25, 2023 5:15 am

VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:51 am
So OpenRTX is running ?

I've checked and our code has checks for Screen type 1, but I don't know what screen type is in my radio

Anyway, it sounds like the firmware is not running at all, or may be crashing and rebooting, its hard to know

From what I can remember the bootloader does some checks of the firmware and won't run it if those checks fail.
One check was the location of the stack pointer in memory, but I think there are other checks.
However we don't have the source code for the bootloader, and reverse engineering it from binary / assembly language would take hundreds of hours of work
yes OpenRTX is running, i'll try and set it up tomorrow, channels are there, but none of the DMR ones are working.
i will take a look at radio_tool to see if i can manage to make this work i'll keep you updated
thx for your help

VK3KYY
Posts: 7478
Joined: Sat Nov 16, 2019 3:25 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: RT3S firmware won't run

Post by VK3KYY » Wed Jan 25, 2023 5:29 am

VE2NCK wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 5:15 am
VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Jan 25, 2023 4:51 am
So OpenRTX is running ?

I've checked and our code has checks for Screen type 1, but I don't know what screen type is in my radio

Anyway, it sounds like the firmware is not running at all, or may be crashing and rebooting, its hard to know

From what I can remember the bootloader does some checks of the firmware and won't run it if those checks fail.
One check was the location of the stack pointer in memory, but I think there are other checks.
However we don't have the source code for the bootloader, and reverse engineering it from binary / assembly language would take hundreds of hours of work
yes OpenRTX is running, i'll try and set it up tomorrow, channels are there, but none of the DMR ones are working.
i will take a look at radio_tool to see if i can manage to make this work i'll keep you updated
thx for your help
OpenRTX does not support DMR and AFIK never will, because the AMBE codec is not open source and the whole project is super-open source to the point of not using proprietary codecs


Try using RadioTool to wrap or even upload the opengd77 firmware to the radio and see if that works, as that would isolate a problem with the loader in the CPS

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