Adalm Pluto

Rebuilding a Pluto

If your Pluto is not recognised over USB (not bing bong windows noise) and just LED1 glows dimly or if it is not working on some frequencies but OK on others or has any other obscure problem then this may cure your problem...

Below is the short sequence to follow - follow each step carefully right to the end and your Pluto should live again.

DFU mode

First you need to put the Pluto in to DFU mode.

Press the reset button (pin hole next to the USB port) and whilst holding it in, plug the pluto in to the USB port of your PC.

Let go of the reset button, the active LED should glow brightly and it should now be recognised by the PC (goes bing bong) but not open any file explorer window - it is now in DFU mode.

Firmware

Download the latest AD firmware https://github.com/analogdevicesinc/plutosdr-fw/releases/download/v0.33/plutosdr-fw-v0.33.zip

Unzip the file and save it into a local directory on the PC.

Download "update.bat" https://raw.githubusercontent.com/analogdevicesinc/plutosdr_scripts/master/UPDATE.BAT and save it to the same directory.

Open up a command line (type cmd on the windows search bar) and navigate into the directory where you saved the files.

Type

update.bat pluto.dfu

and things will happen on the screen for about 30 seconds

When finished type

update.bat uboot-env.dfu

and more things will happen on the screen for about 2 seconds.

Unplug the Pluto from the USB port, wait 5 secs and replug - it should be alive again and open up the root folder of the Pluto!

Frequency extension - the easy way

Now you need to do the frequency extension - the easy way is to run the marvelous spectrum analyser / tracking generator SATSAGEN program. This will do the frequency extension and dual-core mod for you when first started with your "new Pluto".

Download it from here - you'll be glad you did! https://www.albfer.com/satsagen-download-page/#content

Plus you may need to run an additional command - see below.

Frequency extension - the hard way

If you want to do it manually - log in to 192.168.2.1 via SSH (user root, p/w analog)

Type the following to check your unit is not extended - note type the lines not starting with the # (lines with # are what the Pluto returns).

fw_printenv attr_name
## Error: "attr_name" not defined
fw_printenv attr_val
## Error: "attr_val" not defined

fw_setenv attr_name compatible
# fw_setenv attr_val ad9364

If you have a REV D PCB and / or firmware revision v0.32 YOU MUST ADD AN ADDITIONAL COMMAND

Update April 2022 - Recently I have found I need to log in and do this even after using SATSAGEN

fw_setenv compatible ad9364
reboot

DATV firmware

Finally, if you want to use it with Portsdown, you need to change the Firmware to F5OEO "only for the Brave" - (no other version works, so don't even try it!).

Download the firmware from the BATC wiki https://wiki.batc.org.uk/File:FIRM2101RC.zip -

Unzip and save the Pluto.frm (note you can not tell the difference between file versions) so save it somewhere special!

Plug the Pluto into your PC which will open a window listing the files on the Pluto drive. Copy the F5OEO version of Pluto.frm file into the Pluto drive window.

Right-click on the Pluto USB drive letter in the Windows listing on the lefthand side of the screen and select eject - DO NOT unplug the Pluto. The Pluto LED will flash quickly for about 2 minutes, after which it will reboot and open the window listing files on the Pluto drive.

Double click on info.html and it will show the F5OEO dashboard - and that's it done, until the next time!!