QDX appears as a removable USB Flash device named “QDX”, and the folder two files. The
firmware file in this example is named shows a single file which is the firmware version file,
1_00_001.QDX in this example. The EEPROM file is always named EEPROM.QDX. You can read
and write EEPROM files in order to make and restore backup copies of your configuration etc.
The firmware file name must not be longer than 8 characters
, and cannot contain punctuation
or spaces; the file extension must be no more than 3 characters. This is because the file system
emulation is FAT16 and these are the specifications of the FAT16 format.
You may check the properties of the file and will note that it is a 119.5K file. QDX firmware images
are always a 119.5K file. The creation date and modification date etc. have not been set, because
it was important to minimize the size and complexity of the QFU bootloader, in order to maximize
the space available to the application firmware.
You may copy the existing firmware file to another directory of your computer. Crucially, to do the
firmware update, all you need to do is copy the new firmware file to this QDX “Flash disk”.
Download the new firmware file from the QRP Labs website, unzip it, and simply drag it into the
folder where the existing firmware file version is shown. Or copy and paste it, however you wish.
The file on the QRP Labs website is a ZIPPED file, please be sure to unzip it to get the .QDX
file before copying it to QDX.
As soon as you copy the new file to the QDX QFU “flash drive”, the QDX QFU bootloader erases
the current program from its memory and installs the new one.
The QDX firmware is 256-bit AES encrypted and this means:
•
The encrypted QDX firmware file will only work on a QRP Labs QDX board, it cannot be
installed on any other board, even one containing the same processor.
•
No other firmware file will work on the QRP Labs QDX board except an official QRP Labs
encrypted QDX firmware file.
The procedure will vary slightly for different Operating systems but in all cases is just a simple
matter of copying the new firmware file to the emulated QDX QFU USB Flash drive.
The above firmware update procedure works on ANY modern OS because the QFU
bootloader emulates a USB Flash memory stick with the USB Mass Storage Device (MSD)
class, for which drivers are already present.
The QFU bootloader implements a USB device stack (Mass Storage Device class), emulated
FAT16 file system, Flash erase/write, and 256-AES encryption.
QDX operating manual; firmware 1_04
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