Preparing a USB stick for upgrading Platinum modules
Requirements
- A computer running Linux.
- A USB stick that can be erased, 1GB or greater.
- Some Linux knowledge.
If the instructions on this page cannot be followed, then please request a USB upgrade stick from Güralp Systems. We will provide a ready-made stick and adapter cable directly to you. The cable and stck together are part number CMG-ELP-0096. The cable on its own is part number CAS-DCM-0038.
If you would rather build your own, follow the procedure below.
Identify the device name
When you first insert a USB stick into a Linux computer, it is automatically be allocated a device name. The driver presents the USB stick as a SCSI disk, so the device name will begin "sd". This will be followed by an automatically-allocated letter. We will need to look at the kernel messages to discover which name has been allocated.
Insert the USB stick into a USB socket on the computer. Wait for ten seconds to allow the kernel to recognise the device, then run the command dmesg. The output should contain lines like
The device name in this example is sdb although the name on your system may well be different. Note that sdb refers to the physical device and sdb1 refers to a partition on that device. sdb is used throughout the remainder of this example: substitute the name that your system has used if it is different.
Prepare USB stick
Partition the USB stick. The partition table must be in DOS (MBR) format and not in EFI format (which is becoming the default on newer systems). It is normally sufficient to create a single partition covering the whole device.
Create an ext2 file-system on the new partition. The following commands should be suitable for creating the file-system:
(It is, of course, necessary to substitute sdb with the name of the actual device.)
These commands are interactive under certain circumstances so, if copying them, paste them onto the command line one by one so you can react to any prompts.
Now mount the stick somewhere it can be accessed, usually on /mnt:
Download required scripts and firmware
Scripts
Use the following wget commands to download the scripts to be run on the device. If you are using a mount point other than /mnt, substitute its path in place of /mnt.
Firmware
Use the following rsync command to download the required firmware, changing the italicised text (ARCH and mnt) as required:
This command can be run again at any time to update the firmware on the USB stick, only downloading files which have changed. To determine which architecture(s) you need:
| Name (ARCH) | Description |
|---|---|
| CMG-DAS | Affinity digitisers |
| CMG-DCM-mk4-eabi | EAM modules, DM24SxEAM digitisers and *TDE instruments (Platinum firmware, builds ≥10000) |
| CMG-NAM-mk2 | NAM-mk2 (1U rackmount) |
| CMG-DCM-mk4 | EAM modules, pre EABI upgrade (Platinum firmware, builds ≤3801) |
| CMG-NAM | Legacy NAM (original 3U rackmount, with or without serial ports) |
| CMG-NAM64 | Legacy NAM64 (original 3U rackmount) |
| CMG-DCM-mk2x | Legacy DCM modules running Platinum firmware |
If you need more than one architecture, run the rsync command above several times: once for each required architecture, using the correct name in place of ARCH each time.
The difference between CMG-DCM-mk4-eabi and CMG-DCM-mk4 is in the build number. If you know the units being upgraded are already at build 10000 or greater, then only the eabi version is required. Otherwise, get both versions.
The upgrade scripts automatically know which firmware they need so, if unsure, simply download all the architectures.
Finally, dismount the USB device with the command
substituting the name of the actual device used in place of sdb1.
For more information, first contact your local distributor or email .