Boot problem on 3524

[scarr]

I have a 3524 that is stuck and am wondering if it is fixable. The error I see is

Initializing Flash...

flashfs[0]: sector 99, block 1 checksum (0xfb42 != 0xe2f0)

flashfs[0]: writing to flash handle 0x75d588, device 0, offset 0x20000, length 0

x208: Illegal Operation -- setting bit(s) with write operation

flashfs[0]: sector ptr: {0x1, 0x63}

...done Initializing Flash.

Boot Sector Filesystem (bs:) installed, fsid: 3

Parameter Block Filesystem (pb:) installed, fsid: 4

It then dumps me into

switch:

then if I do a "dir flash:" I get

unable to stat flash/: permission denied

The only resources I found that mentioned this pointed to putting a new IOS file in flash with XModem. When I try to do that it bails quickly with an "invalid argument" error *I know the image is good because I've used it many times"

Any ideas or is my flash toast?

[b.hsu]

Which IOS version you are using?.Can you send me the image name?. Also, send me your details about the flash memory in your switch. These details will help me to track the root cause of the problem.

[Georg Pauwen]

Hello,

you might want to try the following commands (in the same order):

1. --> flash_init

2. --> load_helper

3. --> boot

What happens when you issue those commands ?

Regards,

GP

[scarr]

thanks for the replies. the flash_init, load_helper and boot commands didn't help too much since it would say flash already initialized and then refuse too boot anyway. After trying a bunch of different things I finally try to method of resetting a forgotten password (not because it had any relation to my problem but in hopes that it put the switch in a better "place". So, it turns out that when I held the Mode button down on reboot it still gave me the same error but I was finally able to view the flash: directory and, in turn, use Xmodem to upload a good flash image (the image listed in the flash: dir showed zero kb so it must've really gotten corrupted. After that it still took me some time to get it to change the environmental variable to point to this new image (even though named the same) by setting that after manually loading it instead of at "switch:" but that finally did it and so far no worries.

Thanks again for the help though