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Flashing firmware in .sre format

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Atarii and Bogdanm for their helpful posts. The original post is here.

Introduction

Some firmware is only available as a .sre file. These files are firmware dumps and contain data for reserved memory regions. This data must be removed before flashing the file with Optiflash or it will give the error message ERR_BAD_SREC_ADDR and the flash will fail.

I have used the process outlined below and it was successful. However use it at your own risk. I take no responsibility for any damage which may result.

The process step by step

  • Download the win32 version of 'srecord' from Sourceforge here.
  • Extract the files from the archive. It's easiest if you extract into the folder where your firmware is located as it avoids having to specify pathnames.
  • Execute srec_cat from the command prompt. Assuming that you unzipped into your firmware folder and your .sre file is called "firmware.sre"and you want your new file to be called "newfirmware.sre" then enter the following at the DOS command prompt (Omit the quotes and type on one line):

    srec_cat firmware.sre -exclude 0x20000010 0x2000ffff -exclude 0x21ff0000 0x22000000 -exclude 0x29c00000 0x30000000 -output newfirmware.sre

  • This will create a new 'srecord' file called 'newfirmware.sre' which has all the 'reserved' areas removed. [This will take a while]
  • Now just use Optiflash with 'newfirmware.sre',following the guide to installing firmware and patches and all should be well.
Copyright 2007