[user-forum] SOLVED: Blofeld USB (Was:MicroQ vs Blofeld revisited)

[Christopher Arndt]

Amazingly, I got my USB interface back to a working state yesterday 
evening by going back from OS V1.15 to V1.11 and then back again to 
V1.15! So, in my case this was almost certainly not a hardware issue. 
Details follow below, but the important part was to use the SLOWED DOWN 
MIDI files to load the previous firmware versions, otherwise the 
downgrade could not be carried out successfully.

Ok, here's what I did following Achim's instructions as closely as I 
could. Took me almost 3 hours!:

ASSI schrieb:
> 1. Make sure the USB port in question works.  Not any USB port, the
> very one you're going to plug the Blofeld in.  With "works" I mean you
> can plug in a USB stick or something and transfer data from and to the
> device at speed with no apparent problems.

Tested a USB port on my Mac mini, OS 10.4 with a CF-Card reader.
Transferred several megabytes to an from the card. No problems so far.

> 2. Plug a known-good USB cable into the port you've just tested.  Test
> again that it works by putting some other known-good device
> (preferrably a class compliant MIDI interface if you have one) at the
> other end of the cable.  Transfer a good amount of data to make sure
> it does not just "light up".  Unplug the device.

Connected my Fast Track Pro, which was recognised immediately as an
audio device, played several minutes of audio through it. Connected the
Blofeld to it via MIDI cable and played it with a virtual keyboard.
Dumped some single Blofeld sysex patches to it (which I had saved before
the USB interface broke), which were recognized. No problems so far.

> 3. Take your Blofeld, unplug _all_ connections including the power
> supply, put the power supply back in and switch it on.  If it boots
> OK, switch it off again.

Ok, no problems so far.

>  Then take the lose end of the USB cable from
> step 2, plug it into the Blofeld and switch the Blofeld back on.

Blofeld boots ok again, no Blofeld recognized on the Mac.

> 4. If the Blofeld is not recognized, you can maybe try from step 1 on
> another computer or from step 3 with another Blofeld (you may not have
> that luxury).

Tried the Fast Track Pro on my Eee PC with Ubuntu 8.04. "amidi -l" shows
the interface, I can play audio through it and play the Blofeld
(connected via MIDI cable to the FTP) via vmpk (a virtual keyboard) and
send a few sysex single patches and the whole MicroQ 2001 sound set for
the Blofeld to it. No problem so far.

Switched off Blofeld disconnected everything, connected power, switched
it on: boots ok, switched it off, connected USB, switched it on:

"amidi -l" shows no interface, but /var/log/messages shows the following
kernel message:

usb 5-2: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 7

but "lsusb" does not show a new device in the device list.

> 5. If you still get no response (or the other Blofeld worked), then
> you can concentrate on the Blofeld itself.  It could be a fault of the
> software or a fault of the hardware or a combination of both.

Nothing to do here. I don't have access to another Blofeld.

> 6. [...] If all that went OK, plug the MIDI into the switched
> off Blofeld and switch it on like the last paragraph in the
> instructions told you to.  Once it displays "send data!", send the
> rescue file to it (this is the point of no return).

So far so good...

>  It will then
> hopefully let you know that the rescue system is active and that you
> can send it the OS file via MIDI or USB.

Check. Now sending the V1.15 firmware... I get the success message at
the end, press "play", the Blofeld reboots, the serial number is
unchanged. I can still send sysex patches via MIDI. Good.

> That all done, go back to step 3.

Switched Blofeld off, connected USB, switched Blofeld on: still no MIDI
interface recognised.

> If still no joy you might try an
> older OS (like OS1.13) and see if USB works then, but it seems highly
> unlikely.

Ok, booted firmware loader again, sent the blofeld_rescue.mid and then
firmware v1.13. Blofeld shows screen "Receiving Blofeld Firmware Version
1.13" but then nothing more happens! I then sent the firmware v1.13 a
second time and the MIDI led on teh Blofeld lit up but the same screen
stays. I then had no alternative then to switch the Blofeld off, since
it didn't react to any button presses either. When I switched it on, the 
rescue OS screen came up again. Phew...

So I tried sending firmware v1.13 again but the same happened: no sucess
screen at the end :( I tried this also with v1.11 and v1.12 but no luck, 
the firmware update never finished successfully.

FINALLY, I looked at the firmware archives again and saw that that there 
are slowed down MIDI files for v1.11 and v1.12 (IIRC) so I started 
rescue modeagain, uploaded bloffeld_rescue.mid and then uploaded the 
slow version of v1.11, and, BEHOLD, the update finished successfullly 
and the USB INTERFACE WAS WORKING AGAIN! I then was able to 
progressively load all firmware updates (just to be sure) and when I 
finally updated to v1.15 again, USB was still working!

So, unlikely as it may seem, the broken USB interface seems to have been 
caused by something connected to the update procedure when I first 
loaded v1.15 and has been fixed again by downgrading to v1.11 via theh 
slowed down MIDI file.

I can't explain what happened when I first updated to v1.15 since the 
update procedure seemed to worked successfully. The only observations I 
can make is that I uploaded the version from 01/04/2010 with the April's 
fool joke and that after that the USB interface stopped working 
immediately, but then, after I switched the Blofeld on and off a couple 
of times, at one point it spontaneously resetted itself and the USB was 
working until I switched it off again. I  didn't use the Blofeld then 
for a couple of days since I was travelling and when I tried to use the 
USB interface again, it didn't work anymore up until yesterday.

Hope that helps somebody with similar prolems and the Waldorf guys to 
track this down.


Cheers, Chris