OK, i have searched alot for this question and cant find a solution. My master drive boots up and then starts knocking or clicking, I assume this is from when i dropped it a while ago. I bought an IBM Hitachi Travelstar 80GN 60GB ATA-6 2.5in 4200RPM Mobile Hard Drive (model IC25N060ATMR04 part# 08K0634) from ZipZoomFly.com Hyperterminal can connect via my serial cable. I run the diskbuilder for the markII found on the empeg.com site. I follow the instructions to unplug power, run the disk builder upgrade and then apply power when it asks me to. I can hear the drive spin up but nothing hapens after that, i get the Disk Drive Not Found Contact Support message and the disk builder program continues to ask me to apply power and waits, then eventually times out and i get the failed at 0x00 part. Any suggestions?

Okay, it's important to separate the sub-problems you're dealing with here. For example, it's important to be clear that the "no hard disk found contact support" message may or may not have anything to do with the builder upgrade not working.

"no hard disk found" will appear on the player's screen when:

1. The disk drive is genuinely not found by the kernel software (for any of the hardware-related reasons listed in the FAQ). This includes simply plugging the cable in wrong, so definitely check that.

2. The disk drive is working just fine but it's hasn't been properly partitioned by the builder software and/or hasn't had the player software installed on it yet.

Your builder image doesn't seem to be working for you, it never even gets as far as flashing the kernel, it's not even getting to the hard disk yet. So it never gets to the point of trying to pump the partitions. So I'm guessing that the reason "no hard disk found" is appearing is because of #2 above, and there's every reason to believe the disk is fine.

Let's rewind a bit. You said hyperterminal worked, right? This is important, if hyperterminal doesn't work then you've got serial port problems and that's the reason none of this is working. So. Go back to hyperterminal and make sure it works.

If hyperterminal works, watch the boot log and see if the disk drive is detected at boot time. See if you get an error about the CS4132A chip. See if it detects the drive during the "probing primary interface" stage. That sort of thing. The stuff in the FAQ I linked above.

If the drive looks good and Hyperterminal works, then we're on to looking for a reason that the builder image refuses to apply. Are you using a docking sled at all? Click here if so. Beyond that, go through all the steps here and see if you can find any reason that the upgrader might not work.

Oh, and if you ever do get the builder image to work, there's a chance you might have to run it twice. Paul Grzelak reported that there's a problem with the largest drives. Depends on a few factors if I recall correctly.

Yup, there is indeed a bug, but it's not related to drive size. Apparantly it can happen to any drive, the size doesn't matter.

Last week I tried it with a 30gig drive (hardly a big drive nowadays), and ran into the same problem.

The only thing I can think of is that the bug might not happen with a completely new drive, so one that doesn't have any partitions on it. But I am not entirely sure, I haven't tried this enough to be able to say this with any degree of certitude.

But you're right : the problem is indeed easily enough fixed by letting the builder run two or three times, but it's still very annoying. Especially if you've already re-flashed your Empeg with the 2.0 kernel and then have to re-reflash it with the disk builder to actually get things done...

Greetings!

It is a good idea to upgrade using the builder image. As soon as the empeg reboots, pull the power. Exit the upgrader (or it already finished and exited) and run hyperterm. Plug power back into the empeg and watch the builder steps on your hyperterm session. If it reports any errors, repeat. See this thread for details.

Thanks Tony, I did have to run the builder twice b/c it couldn't mount the drive the first time. The problem was a bad serial cable, so I went to CompUSAss and bought a Belkin Pro 10' (smallest they had) DB9 fem2fem serial cable for $14.99 (that should be illegal) Originally i was using an old serial cable i found male2fem and used a fem2fem gender changer but apparently either the cable or the changer was bad. New cable works like a champ, and im now stress testing the drive on my 2nd attempt. if you want the log let me know.