The Sercomm Update Utility can be used on a Windows machine to upgrade the firmware on an NSLU2 using upgrade mode, similar to the basic usage of UpSlug2. It has been tested with Windows XP SP2 and with Windows 2000 SP4.

Note: in Windows Vista, please set it to run in administrator mode and also into Windows XP (Service Pack 2) Compatibility mode. Right click on exe, go to Properties, select Compatibility tab, check "Run this program in compatability mode for", and then select Windows XP (Service Pack 2). Then select run this as an administrator from the bottom.

This utility used to be available from Sercomm web site (http://www.sercomm.com), but the old download link does not work since January, 2007 (http://www.sercomm.com/web/download.nsf/cd9678c311095856482566a5000aac9e/7f17bf7344cfc12f482566aa00389845/$FILE/Upgrade_207_XP.exe)

Other copies of the same utility were found at the web sites from other router manufacturers, since the same utility is able to upload firmware images to other embedded devices. The current know links are:

• http://saytec.com/board/download_download.php?n=319&c=1
• http://www.everbesthk.com/8-download/sercomm/firmware/NU54/Upgrade_207_XP.zip
• http://www.everbesthk.com/8-download/sercomm/firmware/all_router_utility.zip

The MD5 checksum of the original Sercomm_Upgrade_207_XP.exe file (yes this one was downloaded from sercomm using the link that no longer works):

 534270510c7be84e5784646e8e5385a0 *Sercomm_Upgrade_207_XP.exe

There may be some old references to another utility, distributed ion a file name ugtool.zip or something like it. This utility does not work, it usually crashes immediately on starting.

1. Fire up the SerComm utility. It will go looking for a slug on the local subnet;
2. Select your slug in the SerComm utility
3. Select the firmware to be loaded and press the upgrade button.

The SerComm utility will then upload the firmware image to the slug and verify it once written. Once done, you can reboot your slug. - Romix12000

Additional SerComm notes: When starting Upgrade.exe I kept getting an error message telling me to run RmDrv.exe, and then rerun Upgrade.exe - unfotunately doing so had no effect, I still kept getting the error. Then by sheer luck I discovered that the "Adapter Cards Lists:" was actually listing each of my network cards 3 or 4 times. By using the up & down keys and trial & error I eventually managed to select the correct network card, at which point it all worked flawlessly. - Lurch. I had a card disabled (a 1394 card) and got the same behavior until I enabled it. - Gunnar

More additional SerComm notes: The behaviour mentioned above happened to me too. For me the solution was to run the Sercomm utility with Administrators' rights - ABE

More additional SerComm notes: Under Windows Vista i got repeatingly blue screens (page fault in non paged area), The solution: Set the properties to compatibilitymode "XP sp2" and run the Sercomm utility with Administrators' rights - Wouter

More additional SerComm notes: In windows vista I couldn't discover the device for a long time, everything worked when I disabled Norton's firewall and windows defender - Ari

The SerComm-Utility sees the slug with firmware 4.x and higher after putting him into upgrade mode. The SerComm-Utility left the ethernet devices on two of my machines disfunctional after browsing for slugs and another time after starting with "erasing flash" and stopped updating. seems unstable. suggestion: switch to upslug on linux/knoppix. worked reliable.

Another alternative is to have a direct connection to the slug. Down grade the link speed to 10mbps half duplex. After that, the updating goes on smoothly after "erasing flash" - Cozi

You can also put your slug manually into Upgrade mode by giving it the upgrade command in Redboot.

More additional SerComm notes: I added the URL reference to all_router_utility.zip and the first two don't work for me at all. Once the file was unzipped, i had to down-length the directory name to < 8 chars as the installer seems to be of the 16bit kind! - hjw

Unslung 6.10: I successfully used Sercomm to upgrade my slug to Unslung 6.10. Sercomm runs on XP SP3 (!). No sweat - BenMcDui