Is Notecard FW update currently impossible?

Firmware
1

We’re having trouble getting Notecards up to the latest LTS firmware. If we try to update them through Notehub, it normally fails due to MD5 check error, which requires changing to a different firmware version to clear out the bad download, then try again, and it’s taking sometimes 5+ attempts this way to get the firmware updated. We have product to ship and it is taking an hour or more to get a single Notecard firmware updated, which is really making life difficult.

  • The cards in question are SKU NOTE-NBGLN
  • They currently have notecard-8.2.1.17285
  • I am trying to install notecard-u5-8.2.3.17326$20250812122356.bin

So, I tried using the Notecard CLI to update the cards using the instructions here:

For both my setup and my co-worker’s, we get the same error:

retrying after error: dfu.put: JSON object expected: kwGTAJUzaAFGAPAd+TCxACMAIgFGWEb/90T… {io}

This will keep retrying and failing until I hit Ctrl-C. If I then do notecard -info, it confirms that the firmware version did not change.

I next tried running notecard -factory to reset the card to factory defaults, which it seemed able to do, but the firmware update still fails with the same error message.

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Is there any clean way to update the firmware on these cards? Am I going about it all wrong?

Scott

Update:
I tried the third method on the page above, the STM32 Programmer software, and after getting that downloaded and installed, I was able to successfully update the Notecards. So for anyone else struggling with this issue, that may be the ticket for you too. That helps get us past our immediate problem. I’d still be interested in any info or suggestions for getting the official Blues firmware update mechanisms working.

3

Hi @scase,

I’m glad you found at least a temporary solution using STM32CubeProgrammer. However, the other methods should of course work just fine. I don’t have an NBGLN device handy, but as soon as I do I just wanted to let you know that we will look into replicating this issue to see if we can find the root cause. Will be in touch!

Thanks,
Rob

4

Hi again @scase,

On the off chance you have an FTDI debug cable (per this guide), you could monitor the trace logs coming from the Notecard and it may help you to debug while sideloading a firmware update. Still planning on debugging this when I’m back in the office though too!

Thanks,
Rob

5

Thanks Rob,

I attempted the sideload while monitoring the serial debug output. I am attaching a log here of the full attempt. The stuff in this log scrolls repeatedly as it keeps re-trying. Here is the bit that seems most eye-catching to me:

U17:31.08 Max contiguous free blocks:8469 bytes:67752 @ 8 bytes/block
U17:34.08 *** WARNING: LARGE ALLOCATION size:74164 remaining:144528
@@@@@@@@@@@@ ALLOCATION FAILURE (74164 bytes)
@@@@@@@@@@@@ ALLOCATION FAILURE (74164 bytes)
@@@@@@@@@@@@ ALLOCATION FAILURE (74164 bytes)
R17:43.09 << {“err”:“JSON object expected: kwGTAJUzaAFGAPAd+TCxACMAIgFGWEb/90T… {io}”}

sideload_log.txt (7.1 KB)