I successfully updated my brick with the downloaded firmware... x.x.1371 is what i have now.

However earlier in the thread some people updated over the air to x.x.1386? So the downloaded firmware may not be the newest.

And trying to do a 'network' firmware upgrade I still end up with .1371 after it does the upgrade. I'm concerned I'm not pulling the newest one. (my netflix performance sucks, that's why I'm trying to get the newer firmware).

I haven't got mine yet. I wonder if Woot has 2 or more order fulfillment warehouses and one is shipping new correct units and one is shipping f'd up refurbs. Mine is coming from Dallas TX and is due tomorrow (to Oregon). I will cross my fingers and hope that it doesn't come with the crappy firmware.

(edit)
I got mine today after all. I turned it on and got the tour. It seems to be working ok, searching for wireless network and all. I won't let it connect to my work network. It seems to have firmware version 1.7.1186 from going to the firmware load screen. The sticker at the bottom says the mfg date is July 2010. It looks new, all virginal shrinkwapped and all.

I'll check it out more when I get home.

Guys... In my experience to me, the one i got was NEW but box came with the external plastic but the inside looks fine... BUT the device doen't have the plastics and also the unit looks used or REFURBRISHED... i have the same issue about the black screen UPDATE IS NOT AVAILABLE i called SONY and the tech told me " SONY knows about some units had a DEFECT and you unit needs to be exchanged... they transferme to customer service they proceed to create the RMA and PREPAID LABEL to sen t it back... after that i was very sad and doing a research i find here the solution and now my unit is working.

Resuming... Only problem with easy fix is do the UPDATE via USB but the other aspect TO ME the unit i got NEW to me again is a REFURBRISHED UNIT.

WOOT may be is getting this things as new but they are not... pls check WOOT GUYS with the supplier of this NEW units.

After a few snarky comments from one woot employee they have conspicuously disappeared again. Woot as we knew it has ceased to exist. They are just another big corporate entity now.

Too bad, so sad.

Well, at least you guys have gotten your crappy product...I live in Texas, 8 hours away from the Woot offices, and have yet to receive my brick......Fedex tracking has my package in Houston on the 15th, and then nothing.....Damn, Fedex Smartpost sucks! It'd be easier for me to drive and pick up the damn thing at Woot's distribution center; between this and the Big o' Cosmos fiasco not too long ago, my faith in WOOT has been greatly diminished

This looks like a fun toy but I'm terrified of getting one that doesn't work.

Is there any other device comparable in price and functionality to the Sony Dash?

I also have not gotten mine yet =(

got 1 of 2 units in. Not sure why I would only receive half my order. Seems like Woot dropped the ball and this was my first time I ever placed an order with them before.

Thanks to everyone who posted the fix, worked like a charm for me. Was ready to send the unit to Sony . . . and wait . . . .

Of course, their website is down now, so I can't register the thing in order to get the apps I want. Sigh. I was told they "hope it will be up in an hour." Hmmm.

atgard wrote:Well, to be fair, it takes WAY longer than 10 minutes for me to write a book, so I'd assume even the Dash would take a few months or so. ;-)

That doesn't help me.

But it turns out that the router crapped out, rebooted it and is working again. However, The touch screen and radio station issues persist.

I wanted to check out the Sony dash forum, but can't connect to it. They seem to be under siege of hackers. Sony should know better than to mess with hackers.

Please, any one having problems with the radio features, could you post your experiences? I want to see if is only my dash, a few of them, or the whole collective has problems with the Shoutcast radio. If all dashes have this problem, the it could be the service.

I want this feature to work so bad. You just type a music genre and you get a list of stations to choose from. Pick one hit play, and leave Shout cast to mess with the dash other widgets with background music.

My problem: once I start the music i can't stop it, there is a stop button, won't work though. I can choose another station and hit play again, maybe it will (eventually) play, but most of the time it doesn't. The dash needs a "force quit" or "end now" option to deal with runaway widgets.

Purchased it on Tuesday, go it today, its bad out of the box. Tech said they had a bunch that were defective. Needs a firmware update and it cant get it. I wanted to just download it and update via usb, guess sony doesnt think we are capable. Now I have to send it back and wait 2 more weeks. Not looking good. Glad it was cheap.

Mine just came, SF Bay Area, and the label on the bottom says "Manufactured February 2011".

Nobody had posted any dates other than June and July 2010, so this is weird.

I'll plug it in and see what happens. See ya after I try it out...

UPDATE: I said OK to a software update, went from 1.7.1186 to 1.7.1371. It's running, for now...

Got one of the new dashses sold on 4/11/11. Fortunately I had one with newer fw on it and the unit goes through the processes of installing the update however once it reboots I cannot get past installing the control panel. It says something about not finding it.

This the second dash I purchased. I bought the first one through Amazon in January during one of their Deal of Day sales. After a little frusttration I finally got the thing updated and it's been working great so I decided to get a 2nd one. And now I'm wondering if it was worth the frusttation.

Mine is dated October 2010.

Anyhoo, any direction on how to get past this one screen would be greatly appreciated. I cannot get on Sony's Community Forum website for help. Did they take Good Friday off?

Please help.

Got mine today and like others, mine is a bad one too. Doing USB updating now. I hope it works. Keep my fingers crossed.

Updated: It works. Thanks for all helpful posts for software update and how to do it.

I must be doing something wrong as I cannot get the usb fix to work for me. Something is either wrong with my files or I'm not putting them on the usb stick correctly or maybe naming them correctly. I feel like a dope!

I got a functioning unit- hooray! I have a problem though where even after the OTA update, my recurring alarms pay no attention to what day they are set for. My alarm setup for Mon-Fri went off this morning, and I'm pretty certain that today is in fact Saturday.

Penny for your thoughts?

Have you actually checked the schedule or are you just going by the alarm name? If you change the alarm schedule after it was created, it does not automatically change the name. You either have it set to daily or have multiple alarms set. Tap on the Advanced buttom on the bottom of the alarm screen to check.

BTW: The Sony support forum is back up now. The must've been affected by the whole Amazon Cloud fiasco.

KuoH

macsobel wrote:My alarm setup for Mon-Fri went off this morning, and I'm pretty certain that today is in fact Saturday.

Reporting another bricked, new Dash unit. I read the forum chain and probably will try the file and USB update but have not as yet.

Did an interactive session last nite with Sony support (very frustratingly s l o w) and they said "Dash Support is aware and has a solution for this problem" or words to that effect. I could call them...
I figure my unit is new, if I RMA it the one I will get will be "refurb", I think I'll try the zip file 1st.

BTW this was purchased as "new" from Woot on 4/11/11 and all the package and unit appearance bear that out as new BUT, the label says May 2010.

Greetings,

Got my new Dash from Woot, found it had FW version 1.0.1111 (Mfg June 2010). Got the "update required but not available" screen, came to the forums here and saw I was not alone.
I grabbed the update files from http://www.bestoccardeal.info/sonydash.zip as the easyshare links were terribly slow and all the rapidshare links were past their limits. I put the files on the root of a FAT32 2GB usb stick, rebooted while holding the snooze bar, the 'update via USB' option was selectable, and a few minutes later all is well--Netflix streaming as I type. Thank you to the community (and mostly the owner of bestoccardeal.info) for saving me a huge RMA headache--it really sucks RMA'ing a gift you gave to a loved one.


A lot of people have been asking why Sony won't provide these files on their website. The short answer is that the Dash is a closed system and these files provide the keys to the kingdom so to speak. I bought my first Dash a while back, excited that it was a Chumby product and Chumby is a synonym for hackable. I tore the unit down, soldered some leads onto the UART pins, and got next to nothing. I found a few tricks like putting an empty text file onto a jump drive named 'fi_inspection' and got it into test mode, but nothing in terms of modification. A quick examination of the sonydash.zip files shows a HUGE wealth of info--hacked ROMs anyone?

Happy Chocolate Egg Day everybody!

OK - Finally!! For whatever reason I had to format my USB stick to FAT. Put the zip file AND the unzipped files on it and used the power on hold menu button and this time it DID have a usable update via USB choice.

It proceeded to update and seemed to complete but then update again! I guess OTA this time. It then proceeded to reboot and it was as if it had never been powered, needed to go through settings (a location setting) time zone and network. Now I am at the HOME screen!! Ya!

Thanks Wooters!!

I had to find an old USB 1.1 jumo drive to get it to work. Thanks to everyone for posting the files.

I got the same ""update required but not available" problem, I went the RMA new unit exchange. This is a real bummer, hopefully they have their Battlefield Earth (2000) together.
I wonder what percent have the update problem?

I just recieved mine on thursday the 21st and I was pretty nervous because of all the comments I had read about this before and I had even gotten mine yet. I dont want to jinx it but so far it is a great device. Maybe others expected more from it so they were dissapointed but I got the nookcolor for myself and my husband showed me this one on woot. I figured I would take my nook back and just keep this one but my husband has grown attached to it and it hasn't given him any trouble at all. Even the set up was easy. So we don't count it a loss. Great picture for movies or he can listen to music....the speakers weren't the greatest but we use head phones most of the time anyway. It gets a thumbs up for me :-)

Well, add me to the short list of purchasers who received a model manufactured Feb 2011 and had no problem updating over the network (even with closed WPA2 wifi).

I do, however, regret that I failed to research this product before purchasing and only now find this: http://forum.chumby.com/viewtopic.php?id=5021

I'm very surprised to read about all these problems. I got mine today, updated it fine and registered it and have managed it online without a hitch.

I came back here to ask if anybody knew how to get Clear Channel Internet radio station streams. Way back, somebody said it was possible which is why I pulled the trigger on this. But, the stations I want seem to play WPA which I guess the Chumby software won't support? Was the guy who talked me into it making a mistake?

In lieu of an I Heart Radio app, I'd love to be able to get a radio stream URL for the stations I want - KSTE in Sacramento and KFI in L.A. KTKZ in Sacramento also a plus.

Thanks, and so sorry many of you are having problems.

Also got a bricked one. Big Thanks to the Woot community for providing the contact information to get Sony to resolve it. Looks like I have to mail mine in and then wait 7 to 10 days for the replacement. I'm really disappointed in Sony. Shame on them.

Follow Up:
I used the directions provided by others and it fixed the problem. A big thanks to all in in the Woot Community for the resolution!

Mine is still not here. Tracking shows it has been sitting at a regional post office less than 10 miles away for 4 days now. Woot should call it slow post instead of smart post. I could have walked from Dallas to my house in 13 days.

Bummer to know when I finally do get it it probably won't work anyway. This is my first Woot and probably my last as well. Lesson learned loud and clear.

Considering it took you nearly 4 years to get up the gumption to buy something, I think that is probably the best outcome.

KuoH

rjdomos wrote:This is my first Woot and probably my last as well. Lesson learned loud and clear.

justapixel wrote:In lieu of an I Heart Radio app, I'd love to be able to get a radio stream URL for the stations I want - KSTE in Sacramento and KFI in L.A. KTKZ in Sacramento also a plus.

Check your PMs here; I'm sending you the URLs for all three of these.

For that matter, anybody else trying to find specific stations, PM me.

[Edited to note, as it's not very obvious on this forum... you can get to your PMs by scrolling to the top of this page. In the green bar, to the right of "Everything But Woot", you'll see an envelope, probably with a number beside it. Click the envelope.]

Shmuel510 wrote:Check your PMs here; I'm sending you the URLs for all three of these.

Thank you, that was very helpful. Now that it does what I wanted it for, I love my little dash.

For those of you who are sure you are going to get a bricked one, keep in mind that I didn't, other people here didn't, and most people only come back to these threads after to report a problem. I'm not saying there isn't a problem, but it may not be as pervasive as it would seem.

Good luck to those of you who haven't gotten one yet, I hope you get a working one.

justapixel wrote:Thank you, that was very helpful. Now that it does what I wanted it for, I love my little dash.

Very welcome!

Also, for others with similar questions... the station database at http://www.radiosure.com/stations/ may be of use. (Not everything listed there is Dash-compatible as given, but it's an excellent first line of attack.)

I finally got mine last week. It has the old software and i cant update it. i have read about the zip file downloads. can someone give me a link.

I think that Sony/woot owes the buyers of this obviously defective product some sort of adjustment. Sony had to know that all the old units could not be upgraded, and Customer Service had no clue (or acted like they had no clue and should have, the error message is very specific).
Any one have any thoughts about this?

dbrahm11 wrote:I think that Sony/woot owes the buyers of this obviously defective product some sort of adjustment. Sony had to know that all the old units could not be upgraded, and Customer Service had no clue (or acted like they had no clue and should have, the error message is very specific).
Any one have any thoughts about this?

The update method detailed in this thread works. It's a pretty big goof on Sony's part, but there really is no need to RMA. Woot is not at fault here at all--they sold you a piece of electronics at half price; they didn't put the wrong firmware on it, and they have no obligation to provide support on the items they sell. Thankfully, the community did some digging for you and figured out the solution:

Unpack the zip located here: http://www.bestoccardeal.info/sonydash.zip onto the root of a flash drive, plug it into the Dash, reboot while holding the snooze bar, and use the 'update via USB' option. It works.

Just wanted to say I was one of the lucky ones, I haven't had a single problem with my Dash. I really like it, more than I thought I would.

dbrahm11 wrote:I think that Sony/woot owes the buyers of this obviously defective product some sort of adjustment. Sony had to know that all the old units could not be upgraded, and Customer Service had no clue (or acted like they had no clue and should have, the error message is very specific).
Any one have any thoughts about this?

Regarding Sony, I think they should've done a better job recovering their bricked merchandise.

Regarding Woot, I've heard from two of their reps. (One via email and one in this thread.) Based on their comments it appears Woot doesn't much care about inconveniencing customers - or professionalism.

Agree with the last post. Woot only showed up here to insult their customers,not to help. Pathetic.

Mine still says via fedex smartpost that the information was just sent to fed ex, but it has yet to be picked up or shipped at all.. It's been what, two weeks now?

hrmm...

Bricked unit here, wanted to thank you guys for being on top of things regarding the firmware update. Mine was dated June 2010. To me, the unit was not packaged as I'm used Sony products to being (mine was simply in a staticproof mesh bag - usually i expect to be peeling plastic) if that adds to the conspiracy theories. In Woot's defense, when they have listed a product incorrectly, they have credited customers (it happened to me before, though this was pre-Amazon). I do think Woot should at least stand by a product and accept returns when a product is not working as advertised. Plain and simple, if Woot starts to become a buyer-beware type of purchasing adventure, I'll stick to other vendors that I know will take my returns.

I am being told that I have to send the dang thing in to Sony and wait for another unit after they receive it (probably a refurb). I am tempted to just RMA it back to Woot. Sony blames woot for "keeping it in inventory so long" but as a computer professional I know this is a crock. Why the hell can't they design the unit so the firmware can be updated more than one rev at a time? I figure I may be out of the country like I am frequently on business and unless I have thing thing plugged in, powered on with WiFi access, I may miss a firmware rev and get screwed while it is no longer under warranty. Bogus deal.

Mike

agingdragqueen wrote:Please bear with us Woot CS peeps, we're kinda running low on ability to do everything we need to right now. I've been briefed on the issues here and think I understand but I'm open to correction.

From what we've seen, everyone who's bought a Dash from us is posting in this thread. This is the thread for the NEW Dashes, whereas the others we sold were refurbs. We need to clarify that firmware issues should only ever possibly be an issue with the refurbed units and it can be fixed by going through the steps outlined here. I've been told to really accentuate that using those steps and not the shortcuts or other advice you're getting from this forum SHOULD fix your issues. If you continue to have problems, you can also post or browse within these forums here (though they've randomly been down today).

If nothing's helping, calling Sony will get you in touch with their CS that will assist you in getting yours replaced/repaired or correctly troubleshooted (troubleshot?). Their number is 866-918-2485. Anyone with a new Dash that's having issues with their firmware should go straight to Sony's help line to get assistance.

You are welcome to email into us and we will try our best to help you: service@woot.com. I'll try to keep watching this post and will be happy to answer any questions you all have but I warn you that I've never touched one of these things and have only a theoretical knowledge of what they do.