1841 Flash Memory Card Problem

milkboy33 · ‎07-24-2013

Hello Community,

We're in a bit of a small pickle here. So we have a 1841 router. It's got a 32MB flash card. We bought a 64MB Cisco flash card. We hot swapped the cards while the router was still running. Then we formatted the 64MB flash card. Then we uploaded the new BIN file. We do a 'dir' and the file shows ok, so we configured the configuration to use the new BIN and rebooted the router. When the router boots up it gives us this error:

==================================================

System Bootstrap, Version 12.4(13r)T, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)

Technical Support: http://www.cisco.com/techsupport

PLD version 0x10

GIO ASIC version 0x127

c1841 platform with 131072 Kbytes of main memory

Main memory is configured to 64 bit mode with parity disabled

Readonly ROMMON initialized

program load complete, entry point: 0x8000f000, size: 0xcb80

open(): Open Error = -66

loadprog: error - on file open

boot: cannot load "flash:c1841-advipservicesk9-mz.124-25g.bin"

==================================================

Can anyone tell us what's going on?

Thanks,

Tom

Leo Laohoo · ‎07-24-2013

Then we uploaded the new BIN file.

Hmmmm ...

open(): Open Error = -66
loadprog: error - on file open

Sounds like the CF is fine but the IOS you've "uploaded" (from where to the new CF) is corrupted.

Compare the MD5 hash, Cisco CLI command "verify /md5 flash:filename.bin" against the one in the Cisco website. High chances the MD5 hash values do NOT match. If this is the case, then you need to re-download the IOS again from the Cisco website.

milkboy33 · ‎07-24-2013

Thanks for the reply Leo, unfortunately this is not the case. I've gotten three different copies of the BIN. The latest direct download link from TAC themselves.

Something interesting I should add is that I read through some forums and I think this may be because our flash card had been formated as fat32 before. Cisco ROMMOM only can read fat16 whereas once booted it can read both fat16 and fat32. The format command (according to another poster) is not smart enough to reformat the flash to fat16. Instead it will maintain the fatxx every time you issue the format command.

I will confirm this shortly and post an update in my thread.

Leo Laohoo · ‎07-24-2013

Thanks for the reply Leo, unfortunately this is not the case. I've gotten three different copies of the BIN. The latest direct download link from TAC themselves.

Let's just say that I am wrong (wouldn't be the first time this has happened). Compare the MD5 hash values against the ones in the Cisco website. See if they match.

Something interesting I should add is that I read through some forums and I think this may be because our flash card had been formated as fat32 before. Cisco ROMMOM only can read fat16 whereas once booted it can read both fat16 and fat32. The format command (according to another poster) is not smart enough to reformat the flash to fat16. Instead it will maintain the fatxx every time you issue the format command.

I must say I've been using CF/USB stuff with Cisco routers and switches but I've never heard of this before. Cisco routers and switches understand FAT16. If you reformat, from a router, a CF (previously formatted as FAT32), it should show up as FAT16.

milkboy33 · ‎07-24-2013

Yea the MD5 checks out and we verified even after we format flash when the card was in the Cisco router that the FAT partition is still 32. We reformatted the card using a PC to FAT16, installed it on the router and now it works. Rebooting the router the ROMMON reads it fine. Thanks for all the input!