SOtM smS-200 unveiled at Munich Hi-End

[5-pot-fan]

10 hours ago, PnL said:

Thank you for your participation. I updated the system twice, each time I rebooted SOtM, but the system version did not change - 4.18.19-215.fc27.armv7hl (SMP) armv7l.

If you have no other issues with your sms200 then, if it was mine, I would ignore it. if you do have other problems then try a fresh SD card.

Perhaps not a very helpful suggestion, but I have had 2 instances with my sms200 where anomalies have disappeared after using a new card.

[PnL]

I have already changed the standard card to another. I will wait for the 5.0 image and then install it on the memory card.

[andy nicholson]

5c worth here; In case anyone finds it useful: I had similar issues with my sms200ultra Neo. Tried several different SD cards, none of which made a noticeable difference, and I almost gave up on the product.

 

However, since coming across it by chance, (and feeling I had nothing to loose) I have had real success with using a 32GB SanDisk MAX ENDURANCE SDHC (memory card for dashcams). SanDisk states they are:

 

"Designed with long-lasting endurance so you can record and re-record for up to 120,000 hours (over 13 years).

Built for and tested in harsh conditions; temperature-proof, waterproof, shockproof and X-ray-proof."

 

I seriously doubted it would make a difference, but I have now had a card in place for five months without further issues (at most two or three crashes, instead of two or three per day) and have updated firmware a couple of times.

[MGX-UK]

On 11/20/2020 at 11:38 AM, andy nicholson said:

5c worth here; In case anyone finds it useful: I had similar issues with my sms200ultra Neo. Tried several different SD cards, none of which made a noticeable difference, and I almost gave up on the product.

 

However, since coming across it by chance, (and feeling I had nothing to loose) I have had real success with using a 32GB SanDisk MAX ENDURANCE SDHC (memory card for dashcams). SanDisk states they are:

 

"Designed with long-lasting endurance so you can record and re-record for up to 120,000 hours (over 13 years).

Built for and tested in harsh conditions; temperature-proof, waterproof, shockproof and X-ray-proof."

 

I seriously doubted it would make a difference, but I have now had a card in place for five months without further issues (at most two or three crashes, instead of two or three per day) and have updated firmware a couple of times.

I have tested sd cards until the cows came home! The faster they operate is the best experience you'll get. My favourite is the Lexar Professional 1800x microSDXC 16G. I also found that you don't want to go bigger than this size. 

[stefano_mbp]

I’ve always used Sandisk Ultra A1 16GB on my Sotm sMS-200 and two raspberries without any issues.

.... be careful when you shut down your sMS-200, like any SBC (Single Board Computer) you should first shut it down by software (eunhasu) and then unplug from the psu, if you do not respect this sequence you seriously risk corrupting the microsd card

[Confused]

I too use a Sandisk Ultra 16GB.  This has worked with zero issues in my sMS-200ultra Neo.

[Ron Ippolito]

I recently bought my SMS-200, so upgrading to v5 will be the first time I'm going through the process.

 

I've got a few questions that I hope some of you good people can help me with...

 

• I have a mac, and downloaded the v5 image (sMS-200_20201123-V0.5.0.img) per the SOTM documentation.  The downloaded .img file is 8.07 GBytes.  Is this file in the final format that I'm going to write to the microSD card, or does it require additional decompression?
  • If it does require additional decompression, what tool must I use (eg, 7-zip)?
• How should I format the microSD card - FAT32 or exFAT?
• The instructions said to use ddUtility to write the image to the microSD card.  Any gotchas I should be made aware of?
• After this is done, is the process as simple as doing an orderly shutdown of the SMS-200, removing the existing card, inserting the new one, and powering up?
• Last question...will I have to re-install all my settings, or will they be preserved across the upgrade?

Thank you, in advance, for any help you can give me...

Ron

[5-pot-fan]

As I use Windows I can only respond the qu 5.

You will lose all your settings because you intend to do a fresh install.

If you attempt to do an in situ upgrade this would preserve your settings. However it may work only if your existing version is reasonably close to v5 - perhaps v4.7. Why not do both - make a copy of the existing SD card first, try the upgrade, then do the new install if you want to?

 

[stefano_mbp]

8 hours ago, Ron Ippolito said:

I've got a few questions

Download Balena Etcher on your Mac then launch it and select the microsd card and the sotm  image you’ve already downloaded, you don’t need to decompress the img file nor to format the card.

Once the burning process is ended eject the card from you Mac and insert it in the Sms200 and power it on.

Starting from a new card will not preserve your settings, to have them preserved you should proceed with an “on the air” update: insert the original sd card in the sms200, power it on, when the web page (eunhasu.local) will be available tap on the System Setup icon, then tap on the up arrow (the third starting from the left) and verify if any update is available, follow the instructions on the page (if updates are available the arrow should be yellow)

[Ron Ippolito]

44 minutes ago, stefano_mbp said:

Download Balena Etcher on your Mac then launch it and select the microsd card and the sotm  image you’ve already downloaded, you don’t need to decompress the img file nor to format the card.

Once the burning process is ended eject the card from you Mac and insert it in the Sms200 and power it on.

Starting from a new card will not preserve your settings, to have them preserved you should proceed with an “on the air” update: insert the original sd card in the sms200, power it on, when the web page (eunhasu.local) will be available tap on the System Setup icon, then tap on the up arrow (the third starting from the left) and verify if any update is available, follow the instructions on the page (if updates are available the arrow should be yellow)

Do most of you do the 'on the air' upgrade from the SMS-200 and preserve your settings?  How often does it fail and leave your system in a bad state?

 

Thank you...

Ron

[stefano_mbp]

10 minutes ago, Ron Ippolito said:

How often does it fail and leave your system in a bad state?

I own my sms200 since a couple of years and the OTA update has been always reliable .... till now ....

 

[Ron Ippolito]

1 hour ago, stefano_mbp said:

I own my sms200 since a couple of years and the OTA update has been always reliable .... till now ....

 

stefano_mbp,

 

What happened?  Did your last upgrade fail somehow?

[stefano_mbp]

1 minute ago, Ron Ippolito said:

Did your last upgrade fail somehow?

No, it was just a little bit of superstition ....

[bmoregnr]

12 hours ago, Ron Ippolito said:

I recently bought my SMS-200, so upgrading to v5 will be the first time I'm going through the process.

 

I've got a few questions that I hope some of you good people can help me with...

 

• I have a mac, and downloaded the v5 image (sMS-200_20201123-V0.5.0.img) per the SOTM documentation.  The downloaded .img file is 8.07 GBytes.  Is this file in the final format that I'm going to write to the microSD card, or does it require additional decompression?
  • If it does require additional decompression, what tool must I use (eg, 7-zip)?
• How should I format the microSD card - FAT32 or exFAT?
• The instructions said to use ddUtility to write the image to the microSD card.  Any gotchas I should be made aware of?
• After this is done, is the process as simple as doing an orderly shutdown of the SMS-200, removing the existing card, inserting the new one, and powering up?
• Last question...will I have to re-install all my settings, or will they be preserved across the upgrade?

Thank you, in advance, for any help you can give me...

Ron

• They download to .img now so good to go. Older instructions note a decompression step not needed anymore so far. 
• I use sandisk cards as is. 
• The thing I’d note on Mac is you get an error message after ddUtility is done I think because Mac can no longer read it after loaded. You can’t really eject it normally so just pull the card and proceed
• Yep that’s it
• As was noted you have to reset things when re-imaging and I was reminded that includes returning IP address to static setting and possibly renaming it back to what it was. OTA have been working a lot better last 4-5 including this one for me; sometimes it pauses on say 30% for longer than the others but that’s been known to happen for some so just be patient. 

[PnL]

The image of firmware version 5.0 is already available. Installed after formatting the flash drive - now everything is ok, system version is 216.

[Ron Ippolito]

So following advice from 5-pot-fan, I was going to make a copy of my existing microSD card, and try the in situ upgrade.

 

When I inserted the microSD card into my mac, it says that it can't read it, and gives me the options to 'initialize', 'ignore', or 'eject' it.

 

The SOTM docs show two alternatives versions to download:  v0.4.22 or v0.5.0.  My current info shows a user interface version of v0.4.91.

 

Does anyone know where the .iso for v04.91 is located so I can download it?

 

Thank you, in advance...

Ron

[ronfint]

3 hours ago, Ron Ippolito said:

So following advice from 5-pot-fan, I was going to make a copy of my existing microSD card, and try the in situ upgrade.

 

When I inserted the microSD card into my mac, it says that it can't read it, and gives me the options to 'initialize', 'ignore', or 'eject' it.

 

The SOTM docs show two alternatives versions to download:  v0.4.22 or v0.5.0.  My current info shows a user interface version of v0.4.91.

 

Does anyone know where the .iso for v04.91 is located so I can download it?

 

Thank you, in advance...

Ron

No problem — just choose ‘ignore’ and continue.

[Ron Ippolito]

Thanks for the suggestion, but after I chose 'ignore', I went to Disk Utility, selected the Apple SDXC Reader Media (which contains the microSD card) and hit 'Image from Apple SDXC Reader Media', chose a location, gave it a name, and hit 'Save', it gave me the following error...

 

I tried dd Utility, but it does not see the SDXC card reader as a valid external device.

 

So, back to one of my earlier requests...does anyone have a location for the v0.4.91 image file from SOTM?

 

Thank you, again...

Ron

[ronfint]

Give Balena Etcher a try. It's free and easy to use.

[Ron Ippolito]

When I open Balena Etcher, it gives me three options...

• Flash from file (assumes I have an image file already on my hard drive
• Flash from url
• Clone drive

When I select 'clone drive', it asks me for the source drive, which I can point to the SD Media slot on the iMac.  Then, it asks me for the destination drive, and lists all the internal and external drives I have connected.  I don't want to select any of these, ,because I am assuming it will overwrite that destination drive with the contents of the microSD card, which is not what I want.

 

Is that assumption (overwrite the destination drive) correct?

Ron

[ronfint]

Flash from file (the one you downloaded from SOtM). Destination drive is your microSD card.

[Ron Ippolito]

ronfint,

 

In the SOTM docs, there are two downloads listed with urls...

• v0.4.22
• v0.5.0

I'd like to make a backup of the version that was in the SMS-200 when I bought it, which is v0.4.91.

 

Is there a 'downloads' page somewhere that SOTM maintains that has all the released firmware, and if so, can someone please point me to where it is?  I would have thought that SOTM would have such a page, but I can't find it.

 

Thanks, in advance...

Ron

[ronfint]

No such page now. 

[Ron Ippolito]

So in the firmware history, SOTM lists many firmware upgrades, the most recent was v0.4.91.

 

Did their SOTM docs list two firmware releases at that time, v0.4.22 and v0.4.91?

Ron

[5-pot-fan]

To the best of my knowledge sotm usually provide only 2 images for downloading at any one time. Recenty these have been 4.2.2 (quite good and very stable) and the latest known working one. I asume this is so they don't have to handle problems and queries across multiple versions and only have to run maintenance on 1 version at a time.

I recall that 4.2.2 and 4.9.0 were shown together in the recent past, as I downloaded 4.9.0 as a test (even though I ended up doing an in situ upgrade). I did not look afterwards, but assume that 4.2.2 and 4.9.1 were shown together subsequently.

I have also had confusion with Balena Etcher and use WinDiskImager when I want to make a copy/image for backup purposes. Not directly helpful to you I realise, but perhaps there is an equivalent alternative for the Mac? Clonezilla is an option shown when I googled 'Windiskimager for Mac'

HTH