I decided to JTAG my unit. I am writing this little guide so you can follow my steps and fix your unit - or at least give it a good shot. There are instructions all over the site but I wasn't able to find it all in one place for easy reference.
I opened up my unit and found that the motherboard has the following markings: GSR3500 Rev. D_1 2005.06.01. I found the flash chip and it is a 29LV160CBTC-70. A 2MB flash rom chip.
I needed to make a JTAG cable or buy one. Since one is usally in a rush to get their machine back up and running, I decided to build my own cable based on instructions from 'Adversary' in one of his forum posts.
Here is what I bought from RadioShack: (5) 100 Ohm Resistors at $1, A shielded hood from my DB25 connector at $2.50 and a Sub-DB25 male solder plug for $2. So I spent $5.50 instead of $20 on eBay (plus waiting time).
I also grabbed an old 40-wire 40-pin IDE cable.
I cut the IDE cable in half length-wise so that I ended up having a 20-pin 20-wire cable.
My 3500s already has a 20-pin JTAG header which makes it easier. I understand from other posts that sometimes you will need to solder stuff onto the board...
3. Plug in your JTAG connector and then carefully connect the DB25 male connector to your parallel port on the back of your computer. I suggest using a real LPT1 port, not a USB to parallel DB25 converter. You also want to make sure your printer port is configured to allow bi-directional communication. Mine was set as an ECP...
4. Turn on your receiver. You will see the dreaded b-70 or it might be totally blank if you flashed it with the wrong firmware or the upgrade process was interrupted etc.
5. OS = Windows XP Home Printer Port = LPT1
a) Run the SkyMax up2.2. Click on 2 MB (7FE00000) then click on Start to check connectivity of Printer Port PRT1 to the receiver. Check that the initialization is ok. INIT OK should display.
b) After initialization is complete. Click on Erase. c) After erase is completed. Click on Write then browse and load (select All files option) PANSAT 3500S - Flash 1(29LV160CBTC-70) -- Full. Wait until load is completed. Power off and disconnect JTAG cable then power on. Your receiver should be back and running and B-80 should be displayed on the receiver panel. Upgrade to B-80 from B-70 Version. Attached Files wallnSkymax.zip (594.8 KB, 36 views) PANSAT3500S_29LV160CBTC-70.zip (450.2 KB, 20 views)