Boots, Won't load Home, Need help!

[begem0t]

So, guys, need some help here.

I'm relatively nooby, some experience with linux, long time windows user, and now I've got to play with android, for about a week so far.

So, what I did:

1. Installed new home application (dxTop 2.7). All looked good. Played a bit, rebooted. Still OK.
2. Decided that would like to go back to the default Home. For this installed HomeSwitcher 1.4. Selected default Home. Still looking good.
3. Rebooted

And now the tablet boots to the "ARCHOS entertainment your way" screen, and stays there (blinking from time to time, I think this is normal behaviour for Archos, maybe changing stages during load, I'm not sure)

Trying to recover:
1. Tried copying update.img to the SD card hoping to be offered and update on startup. No Go (to be expected, I'd say)
2. Tried to connect to a Windows 7 PC. The PC senses an Archos device, but the two Archos disk drives are not accesible (only drive letters, but no access to the partitions)
3. Tried ADB tool from Archos website - no device. (From win7 and winXP)
4. Tried the RKAndroidTool - "No USB device available". (From win7 and winXP)

I must admit that I'm not sure I did everything properly with ADB and RKAndroidTool.

So, guys, any help will be appreciated.

Edit(Allen): Changed Topic title for Front Page Link

[Himself]

So, guys, need some help here.

1. Installed new home application (dxTop 2.7). All looked good. Played a bit, rebooted. Still OK.
2. Decided that would like to go back to the default Home. For this installed HomeSwitcher 1.4. Selected default Home. Still looking good.
3. Rebooted

And now the tablet boots to the "ARCHOS entertainment your way" screen, and stays there (blinking from time to time, I think this is normal behaviour for Archos, maybe changing stages during load, I'm not sure)

Trying to recover:
1. Tried copying update.img to the SD card hoping to be offered and update on startup. No Go (to be expected, I'd say)
2. Tried to connect to a Windows 7 PC. The PC senses an Archos device, but the two Archos disk drives are not accesible (only drive letters, but no access to the partitions)
3. Tried ADB tool from Archos website - no device. (From win7 and winXP)
4. Tried the RKAndroidTool - "No USB device available". (From win7 and winXP)

I must admit that I'm not sure I did everything properly with ADB and RKAndroidTool.

So, guys, any help will be appreciated.

Not sure how to fix that issue, but I can share some info.

For 3. Did you just turn the device off and back on, or did you use the reset switch on the back?

Recovery:
For 1. update.img has to be on the root of the Archos7 usb drive.
For 2. the usb devices have to be mounted on the a7ht before they are accessible. Sounds like it isn't getting that far in the boot process.
For 3. that adb tool is for the archos 5 internet tablet, there are no adb drivers for the a7ht available.
For 4. that tool only works with the apad unless you flash your tablet with the apad firmware so that the usb drivers work, or that is my understanding of it.

My tablet blinks once during boot that I have noticed.

[begem0t]

At fist I tried a normal shutdown of the device. When that did not work - I used the Reset pin.

One more question - could there be there some way to plug a keyboard and use some key combination there to control the boot process?

[Himself]

Possible, I am waiting on a. Usb adapter so I haven't tried using a keyboard yet.

[archosfans_nando]

I think you'll need a 5pin mini usb adapter like this one:

http://www.amazon.com/USB-Female-Mini-M ... 200&sr=1-2

to connect a keyboard, from there you could try hit the "esc" key or "next -->" key and see what happens; also, for how long do you wait for the blinking Archos boot screen? I mean, just leave it on and watch a 30 minute sitcome come back and see what happens... maybe it finally loads...

[begem0t]

I did wait quit long.. well, not 30 minutes, but maybe 20 :)

I think I'll need this usb adapter: http://www.amazon.com/Your-Cable-Store- ... 296&sr=1-1

cause the archos connector looks iPhone-type mini USB to me, I'm not sure

[begem0t]

Ok, one further step.

If booted with the slider key in locked position and pin reset the RkAndroidTool sees the device.

As I'm not sure at all what the RkAndroidTool is going to do, I did not experiment any further.

It's strange why the ADB tool does not see it. Maybe I need some driver for ADB to work? Or because this is ADB for Archos 5? Or because I never enabled Debug mode (after all, I was NOT going to do anything out of ordinary, so why would I need it, haha)

[MrFoo]

The device-side ADB stuf is disabled at boot unless you're running on an emulator, it seems.

[me1ne]

Ok, one further step.

If booted with the slider key in locked position and pin reset the RkAndroidTool sees the device.

As I'm not sure at all what the RkAndroidTool is going to do, I did not experiment any further.

It's strange why the ADB tool does not see it. Maybe I need some driver for ADB to work? Or because this is ADB for Archos 5? Or because I never enabled Debug mode (after all, I was NOT going to do anything out of ordinary, so why would I need it, haha)

You can use the Rockchip flasher to copy an update.img to the HT. But it's weird that your unit won't get past the boot screens o.O

The device-side ADB stuf is disabled at boot unless you're running on an emulator, it seems.

adbd (the service) is running without me doing anything fancy, guess it's always there. Putting the HT in dev mode opens an additional IN and an OUT USB channel (try usbview.exe). But only the rockchip image has allowed me to use ADB so far.

[begem0t]

Thanx, guys, for you help.

Btw, I've tried connecting a keyboard to the USB port, and, obviously, the keyboard is not operational. Maybe the OS does not load a driver at this point, maybe the port is intended only for debug and file-transfer usage, maybe the power is not enough :) - I'm not sure, though trying to read the RKtool SDK doc I'm under impression that this port is intended for debug purposes, not for a keyboard.

Anyway, I did not get very far reading the RK2808SDKv1.0.pdf machine translation :) Obviously, the Chinese is not an easy language.

Me1ne, how should I copy the update.img to the HT? Is there a way to just copy the update.img to the root folder (and IS it the root folder or the user folder?) and than hope that on reboot the tablet will find it and start it?

Or I have to flash the device directly using the RKtool? (this looks like the more dangerous option). This one should be done using the RKAndroidDM.exe. My worry is that it says Android device found, but cannot show any Software or Loader information. For me this means it's not properly recognized?

[begem0t]

To finalize the topic, after reading some more this forum and this: http://hiapad.com/?p=158&lang=en#more-158, and getting mighty inspired from the brave deeds of people like Me1ne and Knightdominion :) I reflashed the 7HT and now it's back to normal.

To help some other noob, here is the tool that I used (added english to the chinese tool, and also put in a quick guide).
http://www.mediafire.com/file/zylyyutez ... hos7ht.rar

And here's the guide:

==========================================
(I'm not a native english speaker, so bear with me)

If you have a device which is not recognizable by the PC:

You need a 32-bit Windows (I used WinXP VMware player image from my Win7 64-bit)

In my case connecting the device to the PC did not resulted in access to the memory, only the drive letters appeared, but could not be mounted.
At the same time, the RKandroid tool did not recognize the device at all.

So, we need to reflash the archos 7ht. For this we need to enter update mode - and here is the trick:

1. Shutdown the tablet (in my case - pin reset shutdowns it)
2. LOCK the sliding button (for me this was the tricky part to find out)
3. Connect the USB cable and the powercable.
4. The winXP should detect a new USB device. Make him happy - give him the rk28usb-new drivers to install.
5. Now the RKAndroidTool.exe should be able to detect the RKandroid USB device.

Ok, if you've got this far, now we need to re-flash it. For safety, let's do this with the default Archos 7HT update image (which can be downloaded from the Archos website)
I think that the RKAndroidTool.exe needs extracted files from update.img. For this, extract them using AFPTool.exe:

AFPTool.exe -unpack update.img .
(or use the extractupdate.bat)

Now, we can finish the reflashing:

6. Start RKAndroidTool.exe.
7. If the extracted files from update.img are placed in rockdev folder and in image subfolder, the RKAndroidTool.exe should find them automatically.
8. Execute. Make sure the device is plugged to AC, because the process takes some time. IF THE PROCESS STOPS UNEXPECTEDLY YOU GET A HIGH-TECH BRICK (or so everyone says, I didn't test it).
9. You should see the device responding and starting the update process. It will take some time, dont ruch it.
~20 seconds ÔÇô copy firmware to device,
~30 seconds ÔÇô device firmware installation,
~3-8 minutes - First boot
10. The Archos Tablet should ask you to recalibrate the screen, and load the OS.
That's it. Good luck!

==========================================

[Himself]

Glad you got it working, congrats!

[AllenPapapetrou]

Thanks begem0t!

I edited the title a little for grammar and placed a link to this topic in Front Page.

Allen

[xaueious]

Using the Rockchip SDK is unnecessary in this case. All you need is the RKandroidDM update tool described here:

http://www.slatedroid.com/vbulletin/sho ... .php?t=602

Here it is:
http://www.multiupload.com/LQ95U1YY24

[frankslan]

sweet wish i knew this ten minutes ago. I just sent mine to archos to be repaired.

[frankslan]

I went back and got the tablet form ups. but i couldn't get it to work. I started the andriod tool it found my device but when i started the program it tested the system and failed.

[AllenPapapetrou]

Bummer, Frank!

Allen

[frankslan]

I think it was because i was running it in vista. I should have tried to run as xp i thought 32 bit was good enough.

[knightdominion]

If it failed, I would guess it was an actual hardware problem on the tablet.

[frankslan]

nah i just didnt get it right