Sunday, January 6, 2013

Memory Resetting (EEPROM)


EEPROM

EEPROM is a short of electrically erasable programmable read only memory, which is actually a chip. In TVs, all service menu settings kept there. You can delete and reprogram this chips millions time. So they are fast and reliable...

Reseting (EEPROM)

For resetting TV, settings, you needed to remove EEPROM device from TV. But it's not required. In electronic world, if you disable communication of the chip, it counts as removed. So we just needed to kill communication of EEPROM. EEPROM on TV's communicating via common i2c protocol. That protocol carries data via SDA line and send clocks via SCL line. In our situation, both blocking SCL or SDA will works. But I decide SDA.
To do this, all you have to do that feeding (connecting) GND (ground) or VCC (3.3v) to SDA line with little wire... That's all. Since this lines are HIGH (v3.3) in IDLE, its better to hold it via VCC. You can also hold this lines via GND too. But don't try to connect both GND and VCC. It will be short circuit and probably will damage your board.
Join VCC and SDA, power on TV and hold about for 20 seconds with the TV powered. It just try to read (wrong) settings from EEPROM, since it cannot read anything (refer to the warning message bellow), just start with defaults. That is what we want. Than releasing SDA line and shutting TV off will update the settings on EEPROM with null values, that TV could boot with it. After all, you can enter service menu and change the required changes.

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