Unofficial HD DVD firmware upgrade.

[teamerickson]

It's out there. I followed instructions in the following post from AVS. Here's a link to the topic. http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=681416. I watched two movies with no lockups. Didn't appear to speed up load times.



Originally Posted by yorkie2k
Great news! I was able to extract & save the image file. I then burned a new CD-R using the saved file (.nrg) and tested it in my HD-XA1. Worked like a charm.

The file is 48mb, so I can't post it here on the forum. I've uploaded it here:
http://www.savefile.com/files/7678296

To make the CD-R, I used Nero Burning ROM 6-SE software. I set the "recorder" drop down menu to "burn image" then pointed to the saved file. I then set the Burn speed to 4X (because I think its more reliable), then started burning.

After successful burn, load the disc into your HD-DVD player. Screen will show "Proceed with update? Yes/No". Select yes, then enter. Front panel display will show progess, and when finished will display " update successful" and show the new version #. Disc will then eject and unit will shut down. You are done!

Please don't attempt this if you don't know what your doing! Wait for Toshiba to release the "official" disc next week.

OK, now all you early adopters can get a head start & see if Toshiba has responded to your gripes. Best of luck! Enjoy!

 

[Ilya]

What's the new firmware version? I wonder if this is a Beta.
I think I will wait for the official release. Should be coming in a few days.

 

[CochiseGuy]

What's the new firmware version? I wonder if this is a Beta.
I think I will wait for the official release. Should be coming in a few days.

According to the AVS thread, the new version is 1.2/1.09/2.00. Posts in the thread indicates that fixes / improves players that had a lot of freeze / lockup problems. But no improvement in load time nor implement 1080p or any other of the "tehcnological leaps" some had hoped for.

As my XA1 has never had any problems except two discs from Netflix that were cured with washing, I think I'll hold off on this as well. The file appears to be from someone who received his XA1 back from Toshiba service with the new 1.2 firmware, and then extracted it to a CD-R. Since this is not an "official" firmware release from Toshiba, I would be very leary of trying to update with it. If the update fails & leaves your firmware corrupted & the play unusuable, I'm not sure how Toshiba warranty service would react to "Well, I found this file on the internet that was supposed to update the firmware, but when I tried it the player just stopped working completely!"

 

[teamerickson]

Just wanted to give an update about the firmware update.

Updated Friday and watched movies all weekend. Not one problem after update. Hopefully the official Toshiba update comes out soon. Good job Toshiba!

 

[Hoopnoop]

Just wanted to give an update about the firmware update.

Updated Friday and watched movies all weekend. Not one problem after update. Hopefully the official Toshiba update comes out soon. Good job Toshiba!

Did you have any problems before the upgrade? Also, does this upgrade help in terms of how finicky this machine can be with respect to certain HD discs that have small scratches and what not?

 

[teamerickson]

Did you have any problems before the upgrade? Also, does this upgrade help in terms of how finicky this machine can be with respect to certain HD discs that have small scratches and what not?

Yes, I was having problems before the update. The usual picture freezes and lock ups. When I first got the player (4-25-06) the problems were very infrequent and then it seemed to get worse. When watching Phantom early on it was perfect, then last week it started locking up. Van Helsing was unwatchabe and Unforgiven was bad. I cleaned the discs but they still gave me problems. I was at my wits end so I decided to do the unofficial update. It was a risk. After the update Phantom plays perfect, and I used it all weekend with no problems with any movies . I really think this fixed it. If your serious about doing it before the offical update please read the post at AVS. Good luck.

 

[Brewer4]

I downloaded the latest. Not sure what version. All I know even with my fast 6 mbps download speed almost took an hour. Ran Full Metal Jacket and looked great. Didnt really have problems before but it ran absolutely smooth.

 

[Ilya]

All I know even with my fast 6 mbps download speed almost took an hour.

Looks like the download speed (during the official firmware upgrade) is limited at Toshiba's side. No matter how fast your connection speed is, it takes more than half an hour.

 

[Ilya]

I renamed the thread to make it clear that teamerickson is talking about unofficial updade. The Official firmware updade is discussed in another thread.

Now, since the official updade is released, it's probably a good idea to use that instead of the one discussed above.

 

[vurbano]

Looks like the download speed (during the official firmware upgrade) is limited at Toshiba's side. No matter how fast your connection speed is, it takes more than half an hour.

Reminds me of Asus's website.

 

[teamerickson]

There are rumors that update version 1.3 is out already. Someone is claiming that Toshiba sent them an update disc with 1.3 as the version. Nothing about this at the Toshiba site yet. Interesting.

 

[CochiseGuy]

There are rumors that update version 1.3 is out already. Someone is claiming that Toshiba sent them an update disc with 1.3 as the version. Nothing about this at the Toshiba site yet. Interesting.

Yup, it was an absolute feeding frenzy over on AVS. Interestingly - aside from the fact no one at Toshiba acknowledges it's existence - no one who downloaded & applied it can document it does anything differently from the official 1.2 version. Also, a poster there - 'Armin", who claims to be with M$ HD DVD development - aluded that there will be a 'significant' update shortly that will 'please' everyone. The much sought after 1080p output? Not clear to me why 1080p out is so highly sought after, since very few HDTV's (including mine) can accept 1080p input. Perhaps only a psychological 'victory'? I read that Sony is marketing their BD player as "TRUE HD" because they output in 1080p - even though 99% of their own TV sets can't make any use of 1080p. :devil:

Another debate is whether it is necessary to do an "Initialize" in the Maintenance Menu to apply any update. I sent an email to Toshiba support, and they told me to refer to page 57 of the manual. Page 57 says all an Initialize does is reset customizable setting to factory default - akin to the "reset" feature in a PC's BIOS. I spent quite a bit of time customizing the speakers' distance and dB setting to get the right balance for 5.1 analog audio output just right for my system & room layout, so I see no reason to unecessarily resetting those to factory default.

 

[teamerickson]

Since the 1.2 update my Toshiba has worked perfectly. I'll wait until the official is released.