[SunHELP] Sun Ultra 60 flash-update

[Kevin Stevens]

Damn, I was hoping that you were writing me with the solution!

Well, it's pretty clear WHAT the problem is, but not how to fix it.  The
issue is simply that some of the flash sectors are write-protected;
apparently a number of third-party vendors do this for various reasons.  I
bought my U60 used, so don't know what its history is.  The flash memory
is apparently soldered to the motherboard, so there is no easy method to
replace it short of exchanging the board.  However, I haven't even been
able to get confirmation of this from Usenet.

Upon reviewing the flash update guide, a couple of thoughts come to mind,
though.  One is that the U60 has two separate blocks of boot flash, with a
jumper to select between them.  I was wondering if I jumpered the machine
to boot from the "high" block, if THAT section would be the one
reprogrammed with a flash update. and if it might NOT be write-protected.
Another would be if there were some "unofficial" way of replacing the
flash memory.  It's frustrating because if that flash is write-protected,
there must be some way of turning off the write-protection.

I'm in the process of moving and haven't had time to work on this since I
discovered the above a couple of weeks ago.  I do have and recommend the
complete Sun flash update document, which is somewhat more complete than
the notes that come with the flash update patch.  If you want it, let me
know and I'll send it to you, it's a Postscript file.

Please keep in touch with any further info you may find, I'd like to get
this thing updated into the current century!

KeS

On Fri, 24 Aug 2001, Zonji Enterprises wrote:

> I noticed on a search from Google that you had the same problem I am
> having when updating the flash on a Sun Ultra 60.  Errors out with
> protected sectors 12 13 14.  Did you ever figure out what the problem
> was?
>
> Regards,
>
> Juan Staalenburg
> Zonji Enterprises
> auctions at zonji.com
>