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Basic Operations

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muzkr edited this page Nov 25, 2025 · 2 revisions

Install Ichi as regulat firmware onto the radio.

Ichi releases provide program files in different formats. Select the appropriate file format based on your radio's current bootloader and your flashing tool.

Connect the radio to your computer via USB, and you will see a ICHI drive.

Within the ICHI disk, two files (among others) are of particular interest:

  • BL.UF2 - This file contains the bootloader
  • DATA.UF2 - This file contains the complete contents of the SPI flash

You can copy these files to a safe place as backups.

To perform flashing, simply copy the bootloader or SPI flash data (in UF2 format) to the ICHI disk. Ideally, bootloader developers should provide files in UF2 format. If not, converting .bin format to UF2 is straightforward, for example:

python utils/uf2conv.py -c -b 0x08000000 -o bootloader.uf2 bootloader.bin

The uf2conv.py Python script from the UF2 project (a copy is also stored in this repository) was used to convert bootloader.bin to bootloader.uf2. 0x08000000 is the bootloader's address within the internal flash memory, which is fixed.

During the flashing process, the backlight will flash rapidly (so you know it's really FLASHING). After flashing completes, the backlight flashing stops. If the data just written is to SPI flash, Ichi goes to idle mode waiting for more UF2 files. Conversely, if bootloader is written, Ichi will reboot.

Generally, updating the bootloader takes just a blink of an eye, while updating the SPI flash is somewhat slower—you'll likely have time to enjoy the flashing light show.

Please note that only one file can be written at a time. Writing multiple files simultaneously will result in I/O errors.

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