100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Forum for discussions about UHD-capable dives
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anger98
Posts: 2
Joined: Mon Aug 27, 2018 4:25 am

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by anger98 »

Hi, here is my firmware dump, I tried this guide but I don't understand where I can find the clean firmware, so here is mine, v1.03 unable to read UHD disks, LG WH16NS40, thanks a lot:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1b9o3J ... br472saqV2
Billycar11
Posts: 3766
Joined: Sun Aug 24, 2014 5:49 am

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by Billycar11 »

anger98 wrote:
Mon Aug 27, 2018 4:35 am
Hi, here is my firmware dump, I tried this guide but I don't understand where I can find the clean firmware, so here is mine, v1.03 unable to read UHD disks, LG WH16NS40, thanks a lot:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1b9o3J ... br472saqV2
so are you looking for someone to modify it for you remotely you will be able to flash it i assume since you dumped it i'll do it for you if you can flash it
Buy a UHD drive from the guide and how to video maker: https://www.makemkv.com/forum/viewtopic ... 20&t=17831
UHD Drives Guide: https://www.makemkv.com/forum/viewtopic ... 16&t=19634
Auto flash kit $25 Email me for one Billycar5924@gmail.com
turtounet
Posts: 3
Joined: Mon Aug 27, 2018 11:36 am

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by turtounet »

Hi,

This is my first post here, just wanted to say thanks to the OP about the clear instructions :D
The most difficult part for me was to find a computer with SATA IDE mode, so I ended up buying a used tower desktop from a local computer repair store, then it took me only a few minutes before the drive was ready to operate :o
bodieiv
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri Aug 24, 2018 9:53 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by bodieiv »

does anyone know how to downgrade if you are on a Mac?
aaronwt
Posts: 25
Joined: Fri Dec 28, 2012 10:10 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by aaronwt »

Thanks again Teddy for all the info. I just got a third Asus BW-16D1HT from Ebay today. Using your instructions and programs with the Windows method it only took me around four minutes to do everything with the drive. What takes a long time is booting to windows from the slow USB drive I'm using.

But this Asus drive is working great like the last one.

i was wondering though about the LG drives? About whether an LG UH12NS40 is capable of becoming UHD friendly with this method? I had ordered one earlier this week from Newegg since they were only $35. And I had read conflicting info about whether it was UHD friendly or could be made UHD friendly. But I figure for only $35, worst case i'll just use it as another drive to read my 2K BD titles. Since I only use my Asus UHD Friendly drives to read UHD BDs.
Last edited by aaronwt on Thu Aug 30, 2018 3:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.
63TB unRAID1-49TB unRAID2-76TB unRAID3-56TB unRAID4-50TB unRAID5-50TB unRAID6-56TB unRAID7
Wombass
Posts: 3
Joined: Tue Aug 21, 2018 2:25 am

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by Wombass »

Hi, can someone help me old and confused with all this Hex, so here is mine Asus BW-16D1HT dump

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1SWFYr ... Qak-fcn9Qn
Cheers
anger98
Posts: 2
Joined: Mon Aug 27, 2018 4:25 am

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by anger98 »

Ok, so after some time, I finally solve the puzzle (because those instructions), first, you have to understand what you are going to do:
  1. Download all required sofware.
  2. Create a bootable Windows 7 Live USB.
  3. Copy all required software to a folder inside the USB drive.
  4. Copy a clean version of the previous firmware to the USB drive.
  5. Connect both, the drive and the USB stick.
  6. Boot a computer with the SATA controller set to IDE and USB boot enabled.
  7. Using the modified DOSFLASH32_BH16NS40.exe, dump your current firmware (1.03) to your USB drive, required for serial and other information extraction.
  8. Using EEPROM Data Mover, merge the information of the older (clean) firmware (1.02) to your dumped firmware to create a new mixed firmware.
  9. Using the modified DOSFLASH32_BH16NS40.exe, delete the current firmware from the drive, and install/flash the merged firmware.
  10. Reboot.
Requirements with links to downloads :
Steps: (Windows Live Method)
  1. Download the Windows 7 Live ISO, Rufus, DOSFLASH with EEPROM and the Clean 1.02 firmwares (URLs in the list above).
  2. Use Rufus to create the Windows 7 Live USB stick.
  3. Then, unzip into the USB stick root, the Dosflash_Windows7.zip contents, DOSFLASH folder.
  4. Unzip the Clean_NS50_compatible_firmwares.7z file and copy the clean firmware into the DOSFLASH folder, in this case, the flash_HL-DT-ST_BD-RE_WH16NS40_1.02_NS50.bin file.
  5. Reboot the computer making sure SATA is set as IDE (not AHCI) and boot priority is on the USB stick.
  6. When Windows 7 Live starts, go to your USB drive in My Computer, find the DOSFLASH and run the DOSFLASH32_BH16NS40.exe.
  7. Dump the drive firmware, save it in the same DOSFLASH folder.
  8. After dumping the firmware, run BH16NS40_EEPROM_Data_Mover.exe, it will ask for your dumped firmware first, then for your clean firmware, and last, the destination and file name for your new merged firmware.
  9. After merging the firmware information, open DOSFLASH32_BH16NS40.exe again, this time, choose to delete the firmware from the drive, then, choose to flash the new merged firmware.
  10. Reboot.

    It is quite easy, but the original instructions are a mess, hope this helps someone.

    P.D. I forgot to add, I wanted to learn how different was ripping old blu-ray disk vs. new 4K disks, I bought a copy of Terminator 2: Judgement Day 4K Ultra HD from Amazon for this test, after finally downgrading the drive, I used three methods, MakeMKV, AnyDVD with EAC3TO, and DVDFab, all worked. The tracks inside .TS main movie file in the 4K disk were; 1-HEVC/H.265 10-Bits HDR10 track, 2-DTS-HD audio, the core audio track can be extracted and converted to AC3 or AAC, 3-.SUP subtitles/captions that can be converted to SRT using OCR in less that two minutes with Subtitle Edit. The real issue was with the HEVC/H.265 10bit HDR video track, the latest FFmpeg versions didn't have the filter for color conversion from Rec.2020 to Rec.709, I googled all day without finding how to encode HDR10 having the possibility to view the content in non HDR10 displays, but I find that Adobe Premire CC could open and recognize the color profile of the movie, so I used Adobe Premiere CC to convert the movie to an intermediate codec and then, I encoded that huge 200GB+ file using FFmpeg, then I used MKVMerge to get a 6GB file with HEVC/H.265/AC3/SRT tracks, it was even compatible with the latest iFlicks-beta so it can be converted to a M4V video compatible with the latest iTunes/Apple TV. If anyone know how to reencode a HDR10/Rec.2020 movie that is backwards compatible with Rec.709 displays, drop me a line.
Digital moe
Posts: 67
Joined: Thu Aug 30, 2018 12:03 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by Digital moe »

After struggling with my very old (12+ years) PC to get it into non AHCI and get DosFlash to read the drive in the Windows 7 USB stick I now have a dump of my drive. My PC doesn't have a setting to labelled IDE or ACHI I actually had to enable Auto Detect / Raid, I vaguely remember having to change this to RAID when I put a SSD drive in my PC about 8 years ago to enable AHCI. Also couldn't read the drive in the Win 7 environment until I connected the drive to SATA port 0.

I have looked at the HEX editing and that has just totally gone over my head. Can any one help merge this with a working firmware for UHD ripping that I can then flash my drive with please?

https://www.dropbox.com/s/sacfx40ejnmr6 ... p.bin?dl=0
d00zah
Posts: 1414
Joined: Mon Jun 06, 2016 8:23 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by d00zah »

From the post prior to yours...

"After dumping the firmware, run BH16NS40_EEPROM_Data_Mover.exe, it will ask for your dumped firmware first, then for your clean firmware, and last, the destination and file name for your new merged firmware."

This eliminates the need to manually hex-edit.
Digital moe
Posts: 67
Joined: Thu Aug 30, 2018 12:03 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by Digital moe »

d00zah wrote:
Thu Aug 30, 2018 1:36 pm
From the post prior to yours...

"After dumping the firmware, run BH16NS40_EEPROM_Data_Mover.exe, it will ask for your dumped firmware first, then for your clean firmware, and last, the destination and file name for your new merged firmware."

This eliminates the need to manually hex-edit.
Thanks for that I must have missed that in the original post, why would one manually edit the HEX if you can do it automatically?

Also does anyone have any links to working firmware, the zippy share link in the original post only seems to want me to download addons for my browser and no download button for the firmware.
d00zah
Posts: 1414
Joined: Mon Jun 06, 2016 8:23 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by d00zah »

True 'geeks' dig that sh-t :shock:

See if there is an available 'script blocker' extension for your browser. Enabling scripts AFTER the initial page load can help.

Or create an acc't for the 'Club MyCE' forum. They offer (or did) 'locally hosted' versions alongside the zippyshare links for members.
Digital moe
Posts: 67
Joined: Thu Aug 30, 2018 12:03 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by Digital moe »

d00zah wrote:
Thu Aug 30, 2018 2:03 pm
True 'geeks' dig that sh-t :shock:

See if there is an available 'script blocker' extension for your browser. Enabling scripts AFTER the initial page load can help.

Or create an acc't for the 'Club MyCE' forum. They offer (or did) 'locally hosted' versions alongside the zippyshare links for members.
I guess I am only 1/8 geek.

Found a copy of a clean 3.02 from one of TeddyRaspins Posts. Done the EEPROM Data mover and now have my Test.bin file. Just waiting for the current Blu-ray I am ripping to finish and will give it a whirl afterwards.

I will either have a working drive or will be looking for any UK suppliers of a new one with UHD Friendly firmware lol.

Thanks for all your help.
Digital moe
Posts: 67
Joined: Thu Aug 30, 2018 12:03 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by Digital moe »

Thanks everyone, just did the reflashing of the drive and had a heart attack moment when my first attempt to flash the drive produced an error, tried it again and it completed successfully and now the drive is detecting UHD discs.

next task is to figure out how to rip the commentary track from the Blu-rays and add them to the UHD mkv file. But that should be a piece of cake compared to the flashing.
d00zah
Posts: 1414
Joined: Mon Jun 06, 2016 8:23 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by d00zah »

Digital moe wrote:
Thu Aug 30, 2018 5:02 pm
next task is to figure out how to rip the commentary track from the Blu-rays and add them to the UHD mkv file. But that should be a piece of cake compared to the flashing.
"I guess I am only 1/8 geek." indeed. :wink: Look into 'mkvtoolnix'.
bw001
Posts: 76
Joined: Fri Aug 12, 2011 6:33 pm

Re: 100% Firmware Downgrade for ASUS BW-16D1HT and LG BH16NS55

Post by bw001 »

Digital moe wrote:
Thu Aug 30, 2018 5:02 pm
Thanks everyone, just did the reflashing of the drive and had a heart attack moment when my first attempt to flash the drive produced an error, tried it again and it completed successfully and now the drive is detecting UHD discs.

next task is to figure out how to rip the commentary track from the Blu-rays and add them to the UHD mkv file. But that should be a piece of cake compared to the flashing.
I have yet to find a UHD that didn't have the same commentary tracks as what's on the Blu-ray. It's the other extras that are usually not on the UHD.
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