AT-X didn't work system dead

[auEric]

I did an AT-X to a SOE DT unit due to unknown password. This caused the unit to go into a loop yesterday and was unusable. Today I tried again, all I get is:-

Programming FPGA ...
FPGA Version 89
Ethernet Switch: PortId=0520, PhyId1/2=01410C1F
P6 Loader 1.1
CPU Revision 0x0502

on the terminal and the power light is red. Nothing from the lan.

Thanks

 

[jml2665]

did you keep hitting the escape key after powering it up?

 

[auEric]

Yes I pressed ESC several times. What came up on the terminal came up almost instantly and then nothing.

 

[PrivateBuild]

Check the TFTP log ,or on the bottom task bar, in Manager . Are there BootP requests? Is there a bootp entry for the MAC address and default IP address of the SoE with the correct .bin file (IP401ng.bin).

 

[auEric]

This is from the TFTP log

Tue 19/12/2006 14:51:37 : Received BOOTP request for 00e007015aff 192.168.42.10 , unable to process

 

[PrivateBuild]

Ok, make sure there is a Bootp entry for MAC address 00e007015aff and the IP address is 192.168.42.10. The .bin file is IP401ng.bin. Since the SoE is a DT, make sure you are using the bin file supplied with the 2.1.xx versions.
Also, confirm that the PC that is running Manager has a static IP address of 192.168.42.xx (make xx higher than 10)

 

[PrivateBuild]

Oh, and also make sure "enable" is ticked on in the Bootp entry

 

[disturbedone]

Why did you run AT-X?? That removes the bin file in the system. There are other AT commands that remove the config by itself without removing the software. If you don't know the password, just remove the config and restart and it's working in seconds. The other posts hopefully have helped you reload a bin file into the system. Ensure you have a static address on your laptop and gateway is 192.168.42.1.

 

[auEric]

Thanks for the answers. This may be a dumb question, where do I enter the bootp entry? The reason I did AT-X I asked a tech at the vendor instead of asking here first.

 

[disturbedone]

Hmm, dodgy vendor if they don't know the difference between the AT commands. Send them a bill for your wasting time! AT-X removes the bin file, AT-X2/3/4 delete the config but don't run X4 on anything other than an IP403 or you'll screw it! This is taught in the course too, or at least was on the courses I ran. The course manual describes this and I'm sure the Engineer's Toolkit does too.

BOOTP is in Manager. One of the top entries in the Config tree. This is one of the most important things to know when recovering a system and is taught in the 5 day course.

To make things easier, delete all other entries and just create the one for your MAC address. Some versions of manager (around 3.0 & 3.1) had a bug (surprise, surprise) and would show errors when deleting these and would crash Manager. It makes life easier with only one in there and stops any confusion about which one might be active.

 

[auEric]

Thanks for the prompt response. Found and set bootp, never had to do it before. I am interstate tomorrow, so will try again when I return. I will post in a day or two.

Thanks

 

[sizbut]

Don't blame just the vendor, AT-X is considerable more dangerous that AT-X2, AT-X3 and AT-X4 but much easy to type, hardly good design, should have been AT-X99. Its a design that has no inbuilt crash barriers.

 

[disturbedone]

True. Very dangerous to have such commands so close together. But if you ring a vendor for technical support and they tell you to type that because they don't know what they're doing then it's the vendors fault. That's what they're there for - to help you when you're stuck. Telling you the wrong thing when you're on site with the customer breathing down your neck isn't gonna help anyone!

Training courses that tell you these things (AVA00140H00 5 day course goes into detail about how to do this and what the commands mean). Unfortunately, the course is only as good as the instructor.

ps I'm an ex instructor and vendor and saw a lot of 'competing' vendors & instructors who would take resellers money and provide less than helpful support and leave big chunks of vital info out of courses! That's not gonna help anyone get anywhere especially the end user.

 

[sizbut]

True true, I'll not argue that. Just that good design includes designing for what will go wrong rather than assuming people will do the right thing. A small warning prompt "This will wipe your config and software, are you really sure, do you have backup,..." etc. would help for example.

And I bet we've all had conversations where we've said "Have you done ATX?" meaning the X2 X3 process

 

[disturbedone]

Hasn't really been thought about has it? The DTE port is pretty dumb, it just accepts commands blindly. If it ran a command line access to the OS (eg like a router) then it would supply prompts and request confirmation.

I worked on a similar, and in my opinion better, product years ago that was all command prompt programming (that's my preference for anything) that ran FTP & Telnet services so accessing the system was easy if it lost it's brains. Just FTP/Telnet in to the default IP address and upload the file rather than muck around with a GUI that can be a bit flakey at times and relies on a rather complicated series of commands in different areas (DTE then GUI) to get it working again. Unfortunately the small manufacturer couldn't compete with a big company like Avaya and has since closed (not before being the only system of it's kind on Microsoft's website and the Alchemy not even being mentioned!).

 

[Escorthosis]

Don't forget to set the preferences to 255.255.255.255 and not to a specific IP-Adres. Otherwise you'll bootp-requests but Manager.exe will not be able to answer them to the IPOffice.

 

[auEric]

Thanks for the help, all fixed. TFTP worked and the unit restored to original state, lost password and all. Then I reset with AT-X2 and AT-X3 the config was deleted and the default password worked.

Thanks