Spinpoint F4 HD204UI 2TB 5400 RPM working good so far

It hung several times and canceled out of the program. I tried it in Windows 7 and eventual tried Windows XP. XP worked the first time. So if I were you I'd use XP if you can.

Once I got it booted via the thumb drive it's a full screen DOS prompt. No windows involved at all. Have you ever used DOS before? It does not have a UI as it's all text based.

Once you run the Samsung EXE it only takes a few seconds. It searches for the hard drive, updates it then shows a confirmation that it's been updated and returns back to the DOS prompt.

Hi mattseattle

How long did the HP program hang for?
How long did you give hanging before you rebooted and tried again?
How many times did you go through the hang process?
How quickly did it go into a 'dos' screen when it did work properly, so I know what to expect?
And when you say you got a confirmation, I take it that would've been in the 'dos' screen? It actually says 'hdd updated'?

Probably should've done the same with a sata pc. It cost me that off of work yesterday.

The PC I bought was about $275.00 before taxes. I knew the frustration I would encounter if I tried to do it any other way so to me it was just easier to buy a PC that supports SATA. I used my USB thumb drive and used the HP program to create a bootable thumb drive and copied the Samsung patch EXE onto the thumb drive. For some reason the HP program kept hanging but finally it worked. After I was able to accomplish that I just hooked up each of my Samsung drives and ran the Samsung patch. It shows you confirmation on the screen that it's updated the firmware. After that you just go on to the next drive....

Believe me I know it's frustrating...

My friend is dropping round a pc tower he's got spare tomorow. I bet once rigged up, and I've already gone through the thumb flash process last night, so easy now. I bet it takes me 5 minutes to flash a drive. What a joke. I've just lost a days wages yesterday, just because my poxy xp laptop couldn't manage what it should've. Motherboard is probably whafty like eco001 said.

You think you've got things covered because you've got the xp laptop as backup...............IT eh.................

I've had it. I've got the raving hump.

Been at this little project all day and night. Gone from bad to worse to bad to maybe to sheer frustration. I couldn't get the 'usb bootable' to work. My laptop is too old, no bios usb boot up. In fact couldn't even get into bios. Don't ask.

After pulling my laptop every way till Sunday and restoring 6 images and a fresh install of xpservicepack2. Which couldn't even connect to my network. I stumbled across Plopboot, which looked the answer. Makes a usb bootable with Dos and all you've got to do is follow the program that the others have stuck up and you in. Only trouble was, it wouldn't read the usb. It just froze.
I've given up for now. It's defeated me.

It's not much of an option Samsung have given us here. Also I was wondering, how does one know it's accomplished. Do you actually see anything in the dos window of confirmation? Or is it just a case of check the firmware on the disk after?

Anyone got any other ideas? How bad do we need this patch?

mattseattle

How cheap was the pc you bought and what spec did it need? I take it all new pc's will boot into usb mode on the Bios these days? I can see I'm going to have to cart this stuff over to someones, or I'm going to have to buy a pc or something. I dunno.......I'm going to bed. Got the right hump.

eco001, I couldn't see an easy route to Putting Dos files on a cd. And maybe my laptop woudn't read the usb anyway. I dunno........ going to bed with a cup of tea and biscuits at 6 in the morning.........

update

I put the disk back into the Duo last night after I'd given up. It's still re-syncing now, 9 hours later. I'm not sure how on one of the previous posts 'didn't loose data, up and running again' happened. With the Duo the disk gets re-synced once put back into the Duo. Maybe because I had it in a hdd dock, altered the structure slightly? Enough for it to be out of whack and has to be re-synced from scratch. If one just pulls out a disk and puts it back in without tampering with it, I guess the Duo reads it quick and if not messed it's good to go?
If so how could someone pull the disk, attach it to another sata port/usb and update the disk without it being different within the file structure? As I type this, I'm not sure who put that in a post...............

airs

airs wrote:
FYI, the fix installed on all of my HD204UI and I was able to put them back in the readynas without losing data. One thing of note is that the fix failed twice with an unknown error. When this happened, I shut down the computer and changed to a different SATA port/cable, which worked.

How did you manage it without losing data do you think? Let me know how and what you used for hardware for instance.

soulseeker
I've just gone back and read your post

soulseeker wrote:

5. plugged the 1. drive on a sata-port, changed bios boot settings to usb, booted from stick 6. typed patch.exe, it found the disc automatically and patched it within seconds 7. did it again with the second disc 8. back in the nas - booting and waiting for my networkshare to come up 9. they appeared - now I'm listening to anathema (from my nice 2X2tb-share) and wonder if any files are damaged (I don't think so) but still feel annoyed about the waste of lifetime. at least it worked.

Did the disks need a 12 hour resync? Reading the your post, it sounds like you just whipped the pair of them out. Was that what happened? Or did you have other disks in a 4 bayer for instance. I'm working with a Duo, and I wouldn't be able to whip 2 disks out like that unless I planned on restoring from a backup once both disks back in the Duo and re-synced. Let me know for my mental state, I think I'm missing something......

Hi eco001

I've been banging away all afternoon. Laptop is old and hardware could well be the fault. I've tried lots of variations and images and keystrokes, i.e. del, F2, esc....

No good. But I managed Bios this morning.....I've just given up the ghost. I'm just loading a stable copy of XP home. Fresh install. After all of that, I've come to the conclusion with the help of google that my laptop probably doesn't have 'usb boot' option in it's bios. So it's going to have to be the cd option you suggested.
So now for the rest of however long I'll be looking into making a bootable cd. Any suggestions help?

I keep coming across articles in google stating an .iso should be bootable. Do you agree with that?
I'm going to try with toast on mac. I'm d/loading nero from somewhere, but it's slow. In case xp doesn't like the toast iso.

I'm not sure how to get all necessary files burnt onto disk. Do I just iso 'DOS files' aswell as 'samsungpatch.exe' in one hit. And the cd will boot into the Dos files and then I execute the patch file from the disc? I've just realised the DOS files I'm thinking of are from the 'flashstick usb bootable' program. So they might be useless with the cd. So I need some program that'll give me DOS files for cd to iso?

Give me a holler people. Links anything to push me the right way to pull off this 'bootable cd, dos files,, samsung patch debacle'.

Mutley, your options depend upon the age and manufacturer of your laptop. Business machines usually keep those options to a minimum.

Are you sure you're using the right keystroke to enter the bios? Common ones are F2 or "del", and you often have to rapidly and repeatedly press the key at the start of boot. If you're not sure of the key, google it. If you're doing it correctly, maybe your keyboard is going flaky.

You still have the boot CD option. Did you check your burn software?

Ok people need your assistance

I'm having trouble accessing the bios on my xp laptop. Tried restoring an image I had saved, and it let me in this morning (middle of the night for me). I checked settings and there wasn't an option to move 'boot from usb' in the config. Only usual suspects, hard drive , cd, floppy and one other can't think of. I now can't seem to get back into the bios. Something's wrong somewhere. I don't know if a fresh install of xp will work or not.
Anyway, is there supposed to be a 'usb boot' option within the bios boot config? Using xp pro, service pack 3. Have got other variations, xp home service pack 2 etc....

How does one enable the usb flash to be bootable from the bios?

Or better still, tell me I'm wasting my time because it doesn't need any config from the bios as it's in the program airs put up for us to use? And will automatically boot from usb flash drive somehow.

Mutley wrote:
Is the cd booter easy to do? I've had a quick look at the usb bootable website/instructions. I guess it's the same, need Dos files to make it bootable and then copy the patch.exe file onto the cd via the program.

The theory is the same, but you have to deal with cd standards. Burning software usually comes with an easy canned routine. Go check the help file in your software. Just remember to add the Samsung utility file to the burn list. Failing that, there are numerous websites with tutorials and shared files like for the usb boot drive. Which reminds me, the dos disc will need to provide usb support in order to see the disk caddy. It should be the default, but it's something to look out for.

Mutley wrote:
I was hoping you'd be just like the sexy fox from Dollhouse. Never mind, I took a shot.

A foxy chick messing with her NAS and firmware upgrades. A very long shot, indeed!

Yeah I love my imac, but you definitely need access to a windows machine. I'm trying to get organized enough to put Bootcamp on my imac. But hard drive too fragmented at the mo. Christmas time I'll probably manage it.
I'm off for a siesta before tackling the streets of London Town.