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Help...E4440A Problem

Question asked by fly on Jun 17, 2010
Latest reply on Jan 8, 2013 by tabbott

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Hello all,
I recently began getting the following message at the bottom of the screen when I power on the instrument:

/users/e4440a/.xinitrc 80 Floating exception
Firmware Exited, cycle power

Begin all over again,have no improvement.

Would you please help to give a solution?Thanks very much.

Best Regards,

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mukta2008 Jun 22, 2010 10:54 AM
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I would suggest reinstalling the firmware in the unit. Here is the link to the PSA firmware update: http://www.home.agilent.com/agilent/edi ... 8:epsg:sud

Please follow the procedure delineated for "Non functional instrument" in the Help file which gets installed when you install the PSA update program on your PC.
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- bardo0003 @ mukta2008 on Jan 8, 2013 2:52 PM
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  Sorry to dig up an old thread but....
  When Firmware has been re-installed does it keep the stored calibration numbers?
  
  Thanks for the help!
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  - tabbott @ bardo0003 on Jan 8, 2013 3:59 PM
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    Hi -
    
    Sometimes when the PSA’s CPU battery runs low, the clock inside the instrument can run fast and go past the largest integer representing Unix time. Once the clock rolls from Jan 19, 2038 to a negative integer representing December 13, 1901, this can cause the instrument firmware to crash upon boot up if analyzer is set to boot up in a mode other than SA mode. The year 2038 problem is documented in this Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_2038_problem
    
    The fix for PSA is to either replace or remove the CPU battery. Removing the CPU battery causes the clock to reset to zero time (December 31, 1969) upon boot up, which resolves the crash upon boot up. Replacing the battery allows the instrument to retain clock time and retain settings such as GPIB address, power on preset settings and allows the boot up to be faster, since the instrument doesn’t have to read the calibration data from EEPROM and can instead use the copy of calibration data in NVRAM that is restored whenever the data is missing from NVRAM upon boot up. Please refer to the PSA battery service note for information concerning what battery to use: http://cp.literature.agilent.com/litweb/pdf/E4440A-18A.pdf You can purchase the CPU battery from Agilent, or you can buy it at your local Radio Shack or equivalent electronics store that sells lithium batteries. The Agilent part number battery 1420-0314 used in serial prefix instruments US/MY/SG4825 and prior is equivalent to Panasonic battery part number is BR-2325. The Agilent part number battery 1420-0905 used in serial prefix instruments US/MY/SG4924 and later is equivalent to Panasonic battery part number is BR-2330. For instruction how to replace the PSA CPU battery, refer to the PSA service guide, which is orderable as E4440AU-0BW. Alternatively, you can follow the install note for option ANE, except, instead of replacing the flash memory, replace the battery instead. The option ANE install note is located here: http://www.home.agilent.com/upload/cmc_upload/All/E4440-90072.pdf
    
    To answer the separate question about whether reinstalling firmware affects calibration files, it does not. The calibration files are stored in EEPROM and are not stored on the instrument flash. Reinstalling firmware does not affect calibration files.
    
    Regards -
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