Furuno MFD8/12 - Replace HDD with SSD

[MYTraveler]

Originally Posted by CarinaPDX

Pretty steep price, but it is what it is.

Did you get the other GPU working? Are these GPU boards made by Furuno or could you possibly source them elsewhere (perhaps used on flea-bay)?

Greg

On principle alone, I object to the price and will work hard to find an alternative. I have ordered a couple replacement drives, one identical to the OEM, the other and IDE SSD. The more I think about it, the more confident I am that I will be able to clone one of my other drives. (The fact that Furuno will sell the replacement drive without knowing my unit's serial number is strong evidence that the encryption is not machine specific.) I suspect the HDD failed before the video did (I kept using the unit, I just couldn't display from it).

Yes, I repaired one of the video (GPU) cards and expect to be able to repair the other. It was not made by Furuno but is no longer manufactured and none available on the internet, as far as I can find. Even so, I don't expect to need one, but if I do, I think I figured out how to replace without having a driver problem. .

[CarinaPDX]

I'm impressed with your efforts.

As for the price, it seems it is part of the direction high tech has taken. Spend $800 for a smart phone and find the network never updates the OS, the manufacturer updates the OS at most for 2 years (but it won't be available for phones bought from the network operator), and you risk destroying it to change the battery. They will happily sell you a new one every two years - if they can get away with it. When I spend $4,000 for a navigation system I don't expect to replace it every 5 years either. Or get hosed on repair costs. I feel your pain

I suppose you have already worked it out, but you should clone the new HDD to the SSD before you do anything else. That way if the fresh drive is tied to specific hardware during the initial run you will still have the ability to create new SSDs for the other machines. Come to think of it you would be doing some folks a favor if you made available the image of the fresh drive - then others could repair their boxes with SSDs and avoid the $835 extortion payment. How large a drive are you getting? If it is 80GB or 120GB I would be interested in the image file - my cloned SSD has the capacity but there is no way to expand the encrypted 40GB content. (I inferred from your comments that Furuno is selling you the drive for your installation - is that correct?)

If you do need to chase down a new GPU card I think one approach is to find models of computers that shipped with it originally, then look for those on flea-bay. Otherwise I suspect that the card would be considered to be so obsolete as to not have a market. I wouldn't be optimistic about installing a newer design as I think it would be beyond our abilities to put a newer driver into the WinCE firmware image.

Greg

[MYTraveler]

Originally Posted by CarinaPDX

I'm impressed with your efforts.


I suppose you have already worked it out, but you should clone the new HDD to the SSD before you do anything else. That way if the fresh drive is tied to specific hardware during the initial run you will still have the ability to create new SSDs for the other machines. Come to think of it you would be doing some folks a favor if you made available the image of the fresh drive - then others could repair their boxes with SSDs and avoid the $835 extortion payment. How large a drive are you getting? If it is 80GB or 120GB I would be interested in the image file - my cloned SSD has the capacity but there is no way to expand the encrypted 40GB content. (I inferred from your comments that Furuno is selling you the drive for your installation - is that correct?)

If you do need to chase down a new GPU card I think one approach is to find models of computers that shipped with it originally, then look for those on flea-bay. Otherwise I suspect that the card would be considered to be so obsolete as to not have a market. I wouldn't be optimistic about installing a newer design as I think it would be beyond our abilities to put a newer driver into the WinCE firmware image.

Greg

I am not sure I understand your suggestion, or reference to fresh drive. I took a brand new blank drive and cloned one of my two good NN3D black box drives to it. I then installed that newly cloned drive into the bad NN3D black box. Everything works, problem solved.

Also, I was able to replace my second video card with a similar (PCI with DVI out) graphics card and that works fine. So, all problems solved.

Thanks for your insights and inspiration.

[CarinaPDX]

I'm glad to hear you solved your problem. I'm particularly impressed with your GPU efforts - not something I think the MFD8/12 would benefit from.

I perhaps misunderstood. I thought you had ordered a hard drive from Furuno. In that case I would be interested in the image from it (no charts, or basic charts) in an 80GB or 120GB size so I could enlarge the usable space in my 120GB SSD (now formatted to 40GB). Anyway, if you have a drive that doesn't have purchased charts on it I would be interested if you could provide an image. Also, if anyone needs an image I could make one but it would only be in a 40GB size. At least that would allow owners to get an MFD back in use without the $835 cost.

Greg

[MYTraveler]

Originally Posted by CarinaPDX

I'm glad to hear you solved your problem. I'm particularly impressed with your GPU efforts - not something I think the MFD8/12 would benefit from.

I perhaps misunderstood. I thought you had ordered a hard drive from Furuno. In that case I would be interested in the image from it (no charts, or basic charts) in an 80GB or 120GB size so I could enlarge the usable space in my 120GB SSD (now formatted to 40GB). Anyway, if you have a drive that doesn't have purchased charts on it I would be interested if you could provide an image. Also, if anyone needs an image I could make one but it would only be in a 40GB size. At least that would allow owners to get an MFD back in use without the $835 cost.

Greg

I was put off (putting it mildly) by what I regarded as extortionistic pricing and refused to buy a replacement drive. (The truth is, I never needed 3 NN3D drives to achieve my objective, as each machine is capable of driving two separate displays, but that is not the way it was explained to me at the time, so I purchased 3 units to have 4 separate displays).

Rather than paying $835 for a <$100 drive, which contains no software that I haven't already paid for, I cloned one of my others, as it appears to be identical to the "bad" drive -- any encryption is common at least to my NN3D network. I haven't thought to check whether purchased charts are still accessible, although as I understand it, the license should be good for all NN3D boxes on the same network. In any event, since my "new" drive, being a clone of a 40GB drive, is a logical 40GB drive, even though it is an 80GB physical drive, I don't think it is of any use to you, right?

[CarinaPDX]

Sadly you're right - it is of no use. But it does give me an idea: a friend has a newer MFD12 with an 80GB HDD, so the next time I see him (in a few months - he's overseas now) I will propose installing an SSD in his system. He can buy the SSD, I'll do the labor and make a clone of his HDD for myself. He has no purchased charts yet so that is not an issue. Then I can post a link to the image for those who need to repair their MFDs. Everyone wins (except Furuno, but the price for the antique HDD pretty much eliminates any sympathy in that direction).

Greg

[northcaptain]

Very interesting post as i have one MFD12 and MFD8 that i would like to keep running for the next 10 years or so. Did someone succeded at obtaining a workable 80 Gb formatted SSD with new image ?

I'm puzzled that Furuno would have used the same encryption key for all the hardrive they have installed, i understand cryptography for hard disk they had to impletement a symmetric key and store it somewhere on the MFD.

Not sure your plan of taking anybody's 80 Gb image would work. But maybe hope can prevail, if they used the same key for all MFDs sold then it will work.

Is there any update on your work ?

[CarinaPDX]

I have not got an 80MB image yet, although I might have one in a month or so to try out. I am pretty sure that it will work on 40MB units, but still need to confirm.


As to why they encrypted the disk, suffice it to say that they are trying to protect their intellectual property, and beyond that I will not speculate, and ask that others refrain as well. I doubt they did it to secure a repair monopoly.


Greg

[wkearney99]

Is there any way to tell from the MFD12 screens what size drive is in there?

And has anyone used a PATA/IDE to mSATA adapter board instead of just a PATA/IDE drive? Might open up some other upgrade options as PATA drives become less and less popular.

[CarinaPDX]

I'm pretty sure there is a way but I don't remember it - will take a look.

One reason to use the 2-1/2" format SSD is that they generally have controllers in them that do the wear leveling rather than using TRIM in the computer to do it; software for old IDE hardware often didn't provide the wear leveling. If the mSATA SSD has its own internal wear leveling then I see no reason to not use it. The quality of the controllers vary, and it can make a difference although given that this application does little writing it may not be an issue.

My friend with the 80GB unit is off traveling again but he has ordered an SSD so when he gets back in 3 months I should have a shot at getting an 80GB image. Good thing I'm not in a hurry...

Greg

[wkearney99]

Good points about the on-drive TRIM and controller.

I have four of the MFD12 and they're still cranking along. I don't love 'em but I don't hate 'em enough to have a $20k 'discussion' with the wife for an upgrade. So my thinking here is to pop 'em open, backup/replace the drives and keep them running for at least another season.

If there's a way to see the drive size without opening it that'd be great.

[CarinaPDX]

I couldn't find any direct indication of drive size, but I didn't check the setup wizard either. Indirectly you can work it out though: push the "MENU" button, move up the left scroll to "CHART", then across to the last tab "DATA CATALOG". Look down for the memory slot numbers; my 40GB format has 15 slots total, 11 used and 4 available. The 80GB should have roughly twice that number of slots.


Greg

[wkearney99]

Originally Posted by CarinaPDX

I couldn't find any direct indication of drive size, but I didn't check the setup wizard either. Indirectly you can work it out though: push the "MENU" button, move up the left scroll to "CHART", then across to the last tab "DATA CATALOG". Look down for the memory slot numbers; my 40GB format has 15 slots total, 11 used and 4 available. The 80GB should have roughly twice that number of slots.

My Furuno setup is 'new to us' and charts are the one area where I've done zero investigating. They 'have what we need' for now so I haven't dug into it further.

And each MFD has it's own charts, right?

If I have 40's is there a way to have the plotter expand to use 80?

When I first got the boat I took some pictures of various setup screens. One of them says 6 memory slots remaining, 9 occupied. So I'm guessing that means I've got a 40 in this unit.

[CarinaPDX]

Yes, it does sound like a 40GB drive. The only way to get an 80GB-formatted drive, HD or SSD, is to have an image of a working 80GB drive to copy to the new one. I have not tried to do this change in size but from everything I have found it seems likely it will work. My acquaintance with the 80GB is off traveling for a couple of months but once he returns I will push him to let me install the SSD he has now ordered, and I will get the 80GB image at that time and try putting it inside my 40GB unit on the SSD. Assuming that works I may consider writing them for others, but first things first.

About the charts: US sourced MFDs include NOAA charts, both vector and raster, which are updated every year and can be downloaded. They are currently due for a new release so keep an eye out over the next few months and download the latest. They also offer free satellite photos and in some places fishing charts (colored bottom contours) and currents, which don't change every year. These charts are in an NN3D proprietary format, converted from original by MapMedia.

They also offer C-Map and Navionics charts, converted to NN3D as well, for a price. If you have either of these they are cryptographically tied to your machine; the charts are downloaded in encrypted format and are unlocked with a file that is purchased and enables the chart to be unencrypted for use on your machine only, and for that version of chart only. If you are moving around a lot, and especially if you are using satellite photos, you will need to remove and replace charts/photos as you go because you won't be able to hold all of them for a very large area. This is not really a problem as they can be transferred from a computer to the MFD on (up to) 32GB full-size SDcards (with later versions of the firmware, otherwise a 2GB card is needed to first get the system updated). System firmware is now at v2.13 I believe (shown at startup before the required disclaimer is removed by pushing the rotokey). Of course a larger drive will hold more charts and photos so that is the value of the enlargement. The switch to SSD solves other problems so look back at the OP to understand about that.

I recommend downloading the current manual as well - this is not a device you can wing-it to get all of the value.

Greg

[Paul L]

One more item to Gregs comments. The locked charts are sharable with a registered Maxsea installed on a PC. You are allowed 2 copies of Maxsea and they can share their charts with one Navnet3D network.