Asus BW-16D1HT for quality scanning QL BD-Rs

[mreru]

Hello,
perhaps slightly off-topic but...
Has anyone here flashed Asus BW-16D1HT (original firmware 3.11) to the WH16NS58-1.V5 quality scanner firmware (via the 3.10MK FW I guess), and then successfully used it to quality scan 128GB (quad layer) BD-Rs?

I know it's technically possible but I'm interested if someone can confirm that the crossflashed drive still reads QL BD as well as before. I read that apparently some Asus-vs-LG-crossflashed drives may have trouble writing discs, but I don't need that capability.

[Coopervid]

Hello,
perhaps slightly off-topic but...
Has anyone here flashed Asus BW-16D1HT (original firmware 3.11) to the WH16NS58-1.V5 quality scanner firmware (via the 3.10MK FW I guess), and then successfully used it to quality scan 128GB (quad layer) BD-Rs?

I know it's technically possible but I'm interested if someone can confirm that the crossflashed drive still reads QL BD as well as before. I read that apparently some Asus-vs-LG-crossflashed drives may have trouble writing discs, but I don't need that capability.

Sure. It works. The patched LG BH16NS58 MK firmware has issues regarding burning but there is also an original version. It doesn't matter anyway if you don't want to burn with it and you should always use a Pioneer to burn. I have everything necessary but first you need to flash your drive to 3.10 MK or WH16NS60. Then flash in a second step to this firmware. Let me know.

[mreru]

Sure. It works. The patched LG BH16NS58 MK firmware has issues regarding burning but there is also an original version. It doesn't matter anyway if you don't want to burn with it and you should always use a Pioneer to burn. I have everything necessary but first you need to flash your drive to 3.10 MK or WH16NS60. Then flash in a second step to this firmware. Let me know.

Thanks. I guess I'll go with this path if it's correct:
original 3.11 (enc) -> ASUS-BW-16D1HT-3.10-WM01601-211901041014.bin (from The all you need firmware pack) -> HL-DT-ST-BD-RE_WH16NS58-1.V5-NM00900-211802070957.bin (from the mk-firmware-pack) and then it should work in qpxtool?

Have you tried reading quad layer blurays (SONY-NQ1) with that setup, or do you just know that they will still work perfectly, regardless of current alignments of lasers and planets and whatnot? Just want to be sure the perhaps older LG/Vinpower firmware plays nicely with the newer Asus drive's calibration data etc.

What did you mean by original version? Flashing the official non-MK firmware? Does it allow burning then or does it have some other benefits?
And is it possible/bad idea to flash some newer official firmware update, if available from somewhere, on top of a MK firmware (WH16NS58-1.V5-NM00900)?

[Coopervid]

Sure. It works. The patched LG BH16NS58 MK firmware has issues regarding burning but there is also an original version. It doesn't matter anyway if you don't want to burn with it and you should always use a Pioneer to burn. I have everything necessary but first you need to flash your drive to 3.10 MK or WH16NS60. Then flash in a second step to this firmware. Let me know.

Thanks. I guess I'll go with this path if it's correct:
original 3.11 (enc) -> ASUS-BW-16D1HT-3.10-WM01601-211901041014.bin (from The all you need firmware pack) -> HL-DT-ST-BD-RE_WH16NS58-1.V5-NM00900-211802070957.bin (from the mk-firmware-pack) and then it should work in qpxtool?

Have you tried reading quad layer blurays (SONY-NQ1) with that setup, or do you just know that they will still work perfectly, regardless of current alignments of lasers and planets and whatnot? Just want to be sure the perhaps older LG/Vinpower firmware plays nicely with the newer Asus drive's calibration data etc.

What did you mean by original version? Flashing the official non-MK firmware? Does it allow burning then or does it have some other benefits?
And is it possible/bad idea to flash some newer official firmware update, if available from somewhere, on top of a MK firmware (WH16NS58-1.V5-NM00900)?

The unmodified firmware was extracted from the flasher and can't read UHDs. The MK firmware has issues with burning discs. Otherwise stick just with the MK.

And check this posted by kitahoshi:

https://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=185539&page=19

[mreru]

The unmodified firmware was extracted from the flasher and can't read UHDs. The MK firmware has issues with burning discs. Otherwise stick just with the MK.

So for reference, this would be the "original" 1.V5 non-MK firmware you were talking about, right?
[1] / [2](same file)
Looking with hex editor, I see it has the downgrade enable byte set (0xDE at 0x1ec056).
It could be flashed using the normal SDFtool Flasher over 3.10MK, right?

I also spotted WH16NS58_1.V7.exe installer on ixbt forum. As well as some 1.V9 installer but whether that one works with quality scan or at all seems a bit questionable.
I guess I'll go with the MK version, however.

[Coopervid]

The unmodified firmware was extracted from the flasher and can't read UHDs. The MK firmware has issues with burning discs. Otherwise stick just with the MK.

So for reference, this would be the "original" 1.V5 non-MK firmware you were talking about, right?
[1] / [2](same file)
Looking with hex editor, I see it has the downgrade enable byte set (0xDE at 0x1ec056).
It could be flashed using the normal SDFtool Flasher over 3.10MK, right?

I also spotted WH16NS58_1.V7.exe installer on ixbt forum. As well as some 1.V9 installer but whether that one works with quality scan or at all seems a bit questionable.
I guess I'll go with the MK version, however.

Correct regarding 1.V5.

As far as I know - but I could be wrong - the newer firmwares don't work for quality scanning. I use 1.V5.

[Stingray]

1.v7 & 1.v9 also can perform quality scans

[mreru]

Noticed goughlui.com blog [1] [2] seems to use a LG BH16NS55 flashed to WH16NS58 1.V9 firmware for BDXL quality scans, there are pictures of 1.V9 working in qpxtool.

(For future reference) should it work okay to just upgrade a BW-16D1HT from 1.V5-MK to official 1.V9? Would that kind of update from MK to official FW then presumably give back the ability to burn discs at good quality, if that is a problem with the MK firmware?

Should eg. the 1.V5-MK firmware then also allow one to go back from the official 1.V9 to the MK firmware, or could there be some additional downgrade guards?

[Coopervid]

Noticed goughlui.com blog [1] [2] seems to use a LG BH16NS55 flashed to WH16NS58 1.V9 firmware for BDXL quality scans, there are pictures of 1.V9 working in qpxtool.

(For future reference) should it work okay to just upgrade a BW-16D1HT from 1.V5-MK to official 1.V9? Would that kind of update from MK to official FW then presumably give back the ability to burn discs at good quality, if that is a problem with the MK firmware?

Should eg. the 1.V5-MK firmware then also allow one to go back from the official 1.V9 to the MK firmware, or could there be some additional downgrade guards?

You can flash up and down - no problem. 1.V5 original works better for burning compared to MK. It's available on cdrinfo.pl or from me upon request. Nevertheless you should not burn multi-layer disc with an LG anyway. Just use it for quality scanning.