TOOL Software/Hardware Update & Rebuild Project

if some one got T15K, please take internal picture

 

Ok, RPM recovery completed on 23 drive dumps I have on hand.
List of recovered RPM's:

 

I'd image my T10K drives for you, but some of the screw heads impacted in and stripped. I'm handy with a drill, but I need the right bit yet, and I blew the rest of my free cash adding the hard drive PCI card to the unit, set to arrive tomorrow.

 

well if you do get around to it, it'd be welcomed- you can always leave the drives in the machine and image them with something like: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812196455
just plugged directly into the hdd's. If you do get an adapter and want help imaging, drop me a line and i can send you over part of the documentation i'm writing that will help you get going.

 

I have dumps of the 10k 815ve version running the 3.0 SDK flash (whatever it's called? It's been a long time since I've looked at it)

 

PM sent

I haven't finished up the reinstallation disc/netinstall yet, I've been getting my T14K installed and running stable this last week, so I'll be able to test that fully before signing off on the first build.

 

Just asking, since I don't have a proper way of extracting this package from my TOOL's HDD yet: has anyone already extracted the ee_powctrl package and doesn't mind sharing it with me?

I think that I've found out what the "WS mode" software is: it's PS2 Linux:

1. The WS mode boot ROM is also flashable and its content is independent on the TOOL mode's boot ROM.
2. Sony wrote that the software for WS mode is not installed by default. So whatever they planned was never found on any TOOL unit so far, and it was probably designed as an optional add-on.
3. The AIF of the TOOL unit has a RTC and HDD unit, conveniently provided for supporting a full OS like Linux.
4. PS2 Linux has support for the AIF's peripherals. I think that as of the retail release, it's complete and functional.
5. There is code in at least the PS2 Linux beta (I don't have the retail version to check) for controlling the WS mode LED ("// for POWCTRL_IOC_WLED_COLOR (Workstation Mode for EE)".
6. Why would they create a development environment as complicated as PS2 Linux, to only sell it to a handful of end-user developers? They must have some important anchor customers, who they think would like to purchase such a feature!
7. Sony didn't seem willing to give their licensed developers access to the SBC-side of the TOOL. The password was never revealed and they probably never intended anyone to use the SBC-side for development because of that.

About #1: I found it weird. If they wanted a fail-safe mode, wouldn't it have been cheaper to use a PROM chip instead (not to mention safer too)? Since it can be flashed to contain another boot ROM image, it might have been designed to be paired with another program that gets loaded from the SBC side of the TOOL. Like how gstitle and gsopening are loaded by the SBC side, for the TOOL mode.
About #5: the TOOL LED control code is missing from the ee_powerctrl kernel module, although it seems like it originally had code for controlling the TOOL LED's mode and colour too.

The WS mode LED only has one colour: dark green. It is controlled with the power control register, at offset +1C. The blinking of the LED is done in software that runs on the EE.

From the definitions within the PS2 Linux powctrl_ioctl.h file ("for POWCTRL_IOC_TLED_COLOR"), the TOOL LED probably has 4 possible modes: off, green, orange and yellow.

The bit definitions of this register is something like this:
0 -> WS mode LED (1 = OFF, 0 = ON)
1 -> Shutdown request (Writing 1 here will shutdown the TOOL)
2 -> Power-off acknowledge (1 = TOOL will not automatically power-off when the power button is held down, 0 = power-off automatically)
8 -> DVD mode selected (On the front panel of the TOOL), read-only.
9 -> TOOL mode selected (On the front panel of the TOOL), read-only.
10 -> Power-off request (Triggered if the power button is held down, with no known way to be reset via software)

It doesn't seem like the power control mechanism has an interrupt, but is managed from a timer callback instead. Stopping the timer with the "-ts" argument effectively suspends all power control functions (LED and power-off acknowledgement from the kernel).

I haven't figured out what the other bits do, since they don't seem to do anything.

It was mentioned on Wikipedia that the PS2Linux is similar to the Linux build that is used on the TOOl, and somehow I think that there's some truth in that. Other than the fact that the version is similar, I think that at least the ee_powctrl library was based on the SBC side one: it is a "lite" version of it that can control the WS mode LED, but it doesn't seem like the MPU board exposes controls for controlling the TOOL LED from the PS2 side.

It seems like newer versions of the PS2 Linux beta (and the final version) do not seem to have this ee_powctrl module anymore, so they probably scrapped support for the WS mode implementation at some point.

The ee_powctrl package has rc.sysinit.tool, which seems to be the system initialization script. Compared to rc.sysinit, it doesn't toggle the WS LED during initialization, but the TOOL LED's colour (like how it goes during bootup, from off to orange, before turning green). Perhaps this was the original version? I tried poking around the MPU registers at 0xBF803800 (up to offset 0x38), but none of the registers seemed to control the TOOL LED... making me think that controlling the TOOL LED is only doable from the SBC side.

Therefore, if it's possible for me to get a copy of the program(s) that set up the MPU/MRP from the SBC side, that might help me with finding out how the TOOL LED can be controlled.

EDIT: I've extracted /sbin/toolled and /sbin/powctrldmod, but I'm still trying to see how the system runs the scripts under /usr/local/sony.
EDIT 2: Nevermind, I've found it: it's in the ifup-post script. This post shall serve to share what I've found regarding the WS mode then.

 

Any update on building the first image?

 

Sorry for necrobump Does anybody have PS2TOOL HDD images with diag version 3.1?