You are viewing an article about an obsolete product. Information on this page is provided as-is and not supported.

How to upgrade the firmware on a Digi TransPort router using a USB flash drive to a version earlier than 5.2.9.13

 

This article explains how to upgrade firmware on a Digi TransPort or Sarian router using a USB flash drive to a version earlier than 5.2.9.13.

There are two different methods available:

Method A is simpler, but will erase any existing configuration files on the router.

Method B is more complicated, but will allow any existing configuration files on the router to be retained.


Method A: Loading a complete flash memory image onto the router, in the form of a '.all file'

Please note: upgrading the firmware using a '.all file' will erase any existing configuration files on the router.

1) Obtain the latest '.all file', which can be found at one of the following links depending on your model:


Digi TransPort .all files

Sarian .all files

It is very important that the correct firmware file is used for the model number being upgraded. If you attempt to load firmware designed for one model onto a different model the router may cease to function and will be difficult to recover.

To locate the correct firmware for your model, after clicking on a link above, select the subdirectory containing the version you wish to download (the newest version is recommended) then the subdirectory relating to your model. Select the .all file to download it. The format of the file name is as follows:

<model name>-<firmware version>.all

As an example, the file called WR44-5162.all is firmware for the WR44 model and is firmware version 5.162.

2) Rename the .all file to adhere to the '8.3' filename format that the router expects - i.e. a maximum of 8 characters before the '.' plus a maximum of 3 characters for the extension. You can see that WR44-5162.all has 9 characters before the '.' and so will not be recognised by the router's file system. In this example WR44-5162.all is renamed to WR44.all - this step is important as most downloaded .all files will not by default adhere to the 8.3 filename convention.

3) Create a file named autoexec.bat and edit it in a text editor (for example Notepad in Windows) to contain the following lines. Lines in bold will always need to be present; the 'copy' line should be amended as appropriate to reflect the name of the renamed .all file being copied (although the destination filename should be always be 'all.all' so that the existing .all file on the router is replaced. It is important to include a blank line at the end of the file after 'flashleds'. For the example file 'WR44.all':

ERROR_EXIT
copy u:WR44.all all.all
scanr
flashleds

< BLANK LINE>

4) Using your PC, format a USB flash drive. Note that this will erase all data on the USB drive. Not all USB drives work with Digi TransPort or Sarian routers. Older firmware supports only FAT16 formatted drives but newer firmware supports FAT32. NTFS is not supported.

5) Once formatting is complete, perform a 'safe hardware removal' of the USB drive from your PC to ensure that any delayed writes have finished.

6) Check that the TransPort router recognises it by inserting it into a USB port on the front of the router, then connect to the router's CLI (command line interface) via one of the following methods:

a) A Telnet or SSH session to the router's IP address
b) A terminal emulator session (for example using Hyperterminal or TeraTerm) to the router's ASY (serial) port

Issue the following command:

dir u: <enter>

If the USB drive is recognised, the CLI should report its size and other parameters. Remove the USB drive from the router.

7) Insert the USB drive back into your PC, and copy the .all file and the autoexec.bat file into the root directory of the USB drive.

8) When the file copying has finished, perform a 'safe hardware removal' of the USB drive from your PC to ensure that any delayed writes have finished.

9) Insert the USB drive into a USB port on the front of the router once more.

The firmware upgrade process should now begin. During the process, two or three of the LEDs on the front of the router will flash repeatedly to indicate that the files are being copied. After a few minutes, these LEDs should stop flashing, and most of the LEDs other than the original two or three on the front panel will flash repeatedly. This indicates that the upgrade process is complete, i.e. that the autoexec.bat file has finished with no errors.

10) Remove the USB drive from the router's USB port.

11) Power cycle the router.

Please note, if the LEDs did not flash as expected, this could indicate a problem with the upgrade. In this case please do NOT reboot the router, instead connect to the router and determine if there is a problem by issuing the "scan" and "dir" commands.

12) Once the router has restarted, enter the following CLI command: ati5 <enter>

The CLI will return a lot of information about the router, and the second and third lines will show the firmware image and bootloader version numbers. This can be used to verify that the upgrade process has been successful - for example:

ati5
Digi TransPort WR44-U4T1-WE1-XX Ser#:160601 HW Revision: 7902a
Software Build Ver5162. Aug 13 2012 05:12:25 SW
ARM Bios Ver 6.75 v39 400MHz B512-M512-F80-O0,0 MAC:00042d027359
Power Up Profile: 0


Method B: Upgrading individual firmware files

Please note: this method should be used if any existing configuration on the router needs to be retained.

1) Obtain the latest firmware zip file, which can be found at one of the following links depending on your model:


Digi TransPort firmware files

Sarian firmware files

It is very important that the correct firmware file is used for the model number being upgraded. If you attempt to load firmware designed for one model onto a different model the router may cease to function and will be difficult to recover.

To locate the correct firmware for your model, after clicking on a link above, select the subdirectory containing the version you wish to download (the newest version is recommended) then the subdirectory relating to your model. Select the zip file to download it.

2) Extract all of the files, from the downloaded zip archive, to a directory on your PC.

3) On your PC, rename the following two files as follows:

Rename the *.dwn file (the main firmware image) to image (with no extension)
Rename the *.rom file (the bootloader) to sbios1 (with no extension)

4) Create a file named autoexec.bat and open it in a text editor (for example Notepad in Windows). Add some or all of the following lines - the lines shown in bold will always need to be present, but the other lines should be amended as appropriate so that all of the files from the original firmware zip file are copied to the router. It is important to include a blank line at the end of the file after 'flashleds'. For the example firmware version referred to, the autoexec file needs to contain the following lines:

ERROR_EXIT
del *.web
copy u:image image
copy u:sbios1 sbios1

copy u:logcodes.txt logcodes.txt
copy u:image4.c2 image4.c2
copy u:S5162w#D.web S5162w#D.web
copy u:python.zip python.zip
copy u:wizards.zip wizards.zip
move sbios1 sbios
scanr
flashleds

< BLANK LINE>

5) Using your PC, format a USB flash drive. Note that this will erase all data on the USB drive. Not all USB drives work with Digi TransPort or Sarian routers. Older firmware supports only FAT16 formatted drives but newer firmware supports FAT32. NTFS is not supported.

6) Once formatting is complete, perform a 'safe hardware removal' of the USB drive from your PC to ensure that any delayed writes have finished.

7) Check that the TransPort router recognises it by inserting it into a USB port on the front of the router, then connect to the router's CLI (command line interface) via one of the following methods:

a) A Telnet or SSH session to the router's IP address
b) A terminal emulator session (for example using Hyperterminal or TeraTerm) to the router's ASY (serial) port

Issue the following command:

dir u: <enter>

If the USB drive is recognised, the CLI should report its size and other parameters. Remove the USB drive from the router.

8) Insert the USB drive back into your PC, and copy all of the firmware upgrade files into the root directory of the USB drive. The files should include all those from the original firmware zip file (with the image and bootloader files renamed as above) plus the autoexec.bat file.

9) When the file copying has finished, perform a 'safe hardware removal' of the USB drive from your PC to ensure that any delayed writes have finished.

10) Insert the USB drive into a USB port on the front of the router once more.

The firmware upgrade process should now begin. During the process, two or three of the LEDs on the front of the router will flash repeatedly to indicate that the files are being copied. After a few minutes, these LEDs should stop flashing, and most of the LEDs other than the original two or three on the front panel will flash repeatedly. This indicates that the upgrade process is complete, i.e. that the autoexec.bat file has finished with no errors.

11) Remove the USB drive from the router's USB port.

12) Power cycle the router.

Please note, if the LEDs did not flash as expected, this could indicate a problem with the upgrade. In this case please do NOT reboot the router, instead connect to the router and determine if there is a problem by issuing the "scan" and "dir" commands.

13) Once the router has restarted, enter the following CLI command: ati5 <enter>

The CLI will return a lot of information about the router.The second and third lines will show the firmware image and bootloader version numbers. This can be used to verify that the upgrade process has been successful - for example:

ati5
Digi TransPort WR44-U4T1-WE1-XX Ser#:160601 HW Revision: 7902a
Software Build Ver5162. Aug 13 2012 05:12:25 SW
ARM Bios Ver 6.75 v39 400MHz B512-M512-F80-O0,0 MAC:00042d027359
Power Up Profile: 0
 
Last updated: Mar 05, 2019

Filed Under

Cellular/Transport

Recently Viewed

No recently viewed articles

Did you find this article helpful?