Not your typical firmware update issue...

A

a.saliga

Member
We have an HVX-200 that has been mainly used with miniDV or a FS-100 drive.

We've tried several times in the past to update the firmware to allow higher capacity P2 cards. (This is an old, old update.) This update process has never been successful, so today I looked back into it since the FireStore drive is a pain to work with.

I downloaded the firmware from Panasonic, added it to an SD card that was freshly formatted in an HVX-200, initiated the menu operations, etc., but the camera will not see the card and give the "Update" option.

This particular camera wasn't able to format the SD card, so I formatted it in our other HVX-200 (which has never had a problem with a firmware update). Attempting to format in the troublesome camera gives me the error message "Warning, cannot format!". The write protect tab is not locked on the SD card.

Is this a hardware issue? Has anyone experienced this or this there a hidden diagnostic menu of sorts in the HVX?
 
You likely need an older generation SD card. I had a similar problems several months back and that wound up being the issue.
Jim
 
Odd solution, but it's always the odd solutions that fix the odd problems I guess. Is that as simple as finding an older card or should I look for something specific?

(Current firmware on this cam is 2.03.)
 
Any chance it'd need to be a card smaller than 512MB?

I'm hesitant to say it's hardware because the camera sees the card. When the card is inserted I can perform card "Operations" on it through the menu, but when I remove the card, it's grayed out as I would expect it to be.
 
Thanks Barry.

I've tried 3 different cards, all different sizes, all SD. I've formatted them as FAT32 on a Mac and a PC. I've unzipped the firmware update and copied to SD card on a Mac and on a PC. I've formatted them on a working HVX200 and with the SD formatting utility from Panasonic's site.

The camera sees the card, but won't allow me to perform any functions on it.
 
Well I've sent Panasonic a support request. Below is the most detailed description of the problem as well as troubleshooting steps I've tried.


" I have an HVX200 that has not had a firmware update in a few years. It is currently running version 2.03. I would like to update the firmware so the camera can accept higher capacity P2 cards, but the camera gives me errors with any SD card I use.

I am using SD cards, not SDHC, and I've tried a 1GB and a 512MB card. Neither work in the HVX200 that is running the old firmware, but my HVX that is running 4.06 has no problem with these cards.

It seems the "problem" camera detects these cards because I see the menu option for "SD Card" in MCR Mode>Operation>Format>SD Card go from gray to black when I insert the card. When I attempt to format I get the error "Warning - Cannot Format!". In VCR Mode in Card Functions>SD Card Format>Yes I get the error "SD Card Format NG Error" The user manual mentions "Write NG Format Error", and says to format to correct this problem. This obviously does not work.

I have formatted each of these cards several times on a Mac AND on a PC in the FAT32 filesystem. I have also formatted each of them in the functional HVX200 and then tried to use them in the "problem" camera. All saving, restoring, and formatting functions work in the functional camera, but not in the problem camera. "
 
I got some response from Gary Adcock on the Creative COW forums. He had an old user manual that shipped with the early HVX200s. The max allowable size for the SD card is 64MB for the early models with the factory firmware. I was able to find one online.

Assume that this update went well if you don't hear back from me on this thread.

Thanks for your help guys.
 
Make sure you're copying the firmware update file to the right directory. It needs to be in an FW directory within the P2SD directory.
 
Well as much as I wanted the 64MB card to be the fix, it wasn't.

I got the card in today and formatted it on PC with the SD card formatter program from Panasonic's site. Then I unzipped the update on the PC, transferred it to the SD card via USB on the PC and tried to update. Same errors. I know it's not my process that is wrong because I updated our other HVX200 yesterday with the exact same process to go from version 4.06 to 4.10 of the firmware.


Any, and I do mean any, troubleshooting suggestions are welcome.
 
Sounds like the SD card slot on your camera may be faulty. If you've successfully done a firmware update on one camera, and the exact same procedure fails on another... and the failing camera can't format SD cards either... then yeah, I'd suspect a hardware error in the SD slot.
 
Thanks Barry. I successfully used the 64MB card to update the other HVX200 we have, but nothing on this one. I'm shipping if off for repair, as it seems to be a hardware issue.
 
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