Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown

[yogort1]

I might have screwed something up
I have succesfully set up camera to RNDIS mode, but by the 'Set_RNDIS_permament.fif' file. That was before I found out a way to enter a hidden menu through settings, directly on camera (well, that's because I'm an idiot  ). Now I've lost connection though USB, thus I cannot upload the 'Remove_RNDIS_Permament.fif' via FLIRInstallNet.exe
How do I have to upload the 'Remove_RNDIS_Permament.fif' without USB connection? 
Another thing is that while in RNDIS mode and the camera is on, I don't see any extra IP adresses listed. What am I doing wrong?

EDIT:
I've managed to establish ftp connection on XP, but still, please tell me how to send the fif file disabling the RNDIS?

[Bud]

If you do not see a new IP address on your computer then it is not talking to ghe camera. Did you install Flir device Drivers ? Not FLIR Tools, the drivers is a separate package

[yogort1]

Everything worked fine after moving from Win7 to XP 
You guys are the best. Thank you!

[JerryTN]

Well, thought I would try my luck and did the 25% coupon at Zoro for the Flir E4 hoping to get a 1.22.  UPS ground and it arrived in only two days. I'm sorry to say its the 2.3.0 version.  It was shipped out of their South Carolina warehouse so guess it all depends on which warehouse it gets shipped from as to which software version one gets.  I already have the E4b that was also at SW version 2.3.0, so guess will put the E4b on the auction block and keep the E4 since its temp readings is not limited. So for anyone trying to get the 1.22 version, you may need to find out which warehouse they are being shipped from and try to request that warehouse when ordering if possible.  Maybe the ones getting 1.22 can comment on which warehouse theirs came from as that may help others in getting the older version.  Hopefully soon SW version 2.3 will be able to have all the same features as the 1.22 but then I understand there may be some hardware differences that may limit it.  Just thought I would pass this information along for anyone trying to get the 1.22  Oh the battery was also flat dead as others have mention which was a fooler when first trying to check the version.  Oh Well, anyone want a good deal on an E4b only a few weeks old.

[quattro]

I got a 1.22 E4 using the Zoro 25% off coupon. A friend of mine ordered one from Zoro a day later using the 25% off coupon, he received a 2.3 E4. Both shipped from Hodgkins, IL; mine shipped on Saturday, his on Monday.

[yogort1]

I've downloaded janekivi's 2.3.0_Menu_5.zip file and installed it on my E4. Thanks for the extra palettes  I wonder if there is a possibility to unlock the zoom option. Janekivi said that there is a telnet command 'zoom - rls .caps.config.image.zoom'. This will add zoom option in menu?

[Galaxyrise]

3rd Photo: No Lens approx. 6" away from Arduino Mega
4th Photo: Lens attached approx. 3" away from Arduino Mega

I just went through a similar process and thought I'd post some comparison photos for the next person trying to choose a lens.  I used the stl that Georges80 posted on Shapeways (it complained about thin walls, but it printed fine.)  I bought both a 2" and a 4" from bingo929.  The lens is a bit loose in the holder, so after making my choice, I used Elmer's to glue the lens in place.

The subject for these is a BK 9130 power supply:


You can see a number of warm areas.  For the purposes of these comparisons, I'm going to be looking at that bright spot in the upper left, and the regulators in the center.  With the macro lenses, I also captured an area with some SMD parts on it, however the parts didn't have much temperature variation, so you'll just have to get an idea what's going on from the pads.

It was really hard for me to pull the trigger without making things blurry on the macro shots, so these samples are often blurrier than the best you can get.  In all of the macro pictures, I was able to get some part of the image in decent focus.  The point of these samples is to show off the kind of feature size you can make out with the different focal lengths.

Lens	Regulators	Diode	SMD
default
4"
2"

Sorry I had the camera rotated for the regulators with the default lens.   It should be rotated ccw to match the others, but it still easily shows how blurry it is.

The camera wasn't able to resolve the high temperature diode without a lens: not only was it a blurry blob, but it was showing as 33C instead of 50C.  The regulators were big enough that they measured as roughly 50C both with and without the lens (although the sample here has the 3 lenses looking at different parts of the regulator, oops.)  As I said above, the SMD parts themselves are too uniform a temperature to really make out.  You can see some... I think they were 0805 parts that are just barely warm. 

I went with the 4".  0603 is still discernable, and the depth of field on the 4" focal length was enough to have the entire TO220 parts basically in focus (where the 2" lens could only focus on the top or the bottom.)  There were also areas of the board I couldn't get into focus with the 2" lens because taller parts got in the way.

The holder + lens cost about $25, and makes my $1k camera so much more useful for PCBs!

[-jeffB]

Well, that was a surprise.

I ordered my E4 around 22:00 CST Monday night.

All day Tuesday, the order showed as Pending.

Wednesday afternoon, I got email that it had been "fulfilled", with a tracking number. When I went to bed last night, UPS still wasn't displaying any tracking information.

This morning, UPS said that it had been origin-scanned in Greensboro -- a city in North Carolina, not South Carolina where Zoro claims to have a warehouse -- it arrived in Chapel Hill, midway between here and Greensboro, in the middle of the night, and it was out for delivery on the truck.

Around dinnertime, I got email that it had been left on our front porch. We were here at the time; I guess this close to Christmas, the UPS folks don't even have time to ring the doorbell. Looked out the front door, and there it was.

Calibration certificate was dated May 13, 2014; a good sign...

...software version: 1.22.   

I'm going to try to be disciplined enough to do some good before-and-after images, but given the amount of knowledge that's already on this thread, I'm hoping I won't run into any surprises. I probably won't attempt the hack until this weekend, but we'll see.

[-jeffB]

I'm off to my usual software-installation start. For somebody who actually got a Ph.D. in computer science, I have a real talent for screwing up installs.

The instructions that I've found have me install RNDIS drivers, set the camera to RNDIS mode, plug it into the computer, and connect with Filezilla. The RNDIS drivers installed without difficulty, and when I plug the camera in, it shows up as a FLIR Camera Device with RNDIS drivers -- but it doesn't respond to the 192.168.0.2 address that everyone specifies. I found a slot under the Device Properties where I could assign an IP address for the device, but that didn't seem to make any difference. This is on a borrowed Win 8 machine; mine's a Mac, and while I found an RNDIS driver for OS X, I thought it would be quicker to use the canned PC tools.

I'll trawl through Google and the depths of this thread, and see if I can diagnose "nobody home at 192.168.0.2". But not tonight. Sigh...

[JerryTN]

Congrats on getting SW version 1.22. Mine was ordered on Tuesday evening. Almost sounds like it just luck of the draw on which E4 one gets.  Mine had a calibration date of June 2014.  It would be great if you could request which version to be shipped, ha ha.  The box mine came in was torn apart and at first thought it might had damage the case and unit, but appears only the box got damage. Only thing is did the box get damage from a major drop to the floor and there may be an issue lurking within my unit to only show up at a later date. Maybe I should contact Zoro to let them know in case they would like to swap it out for another unit, maybe an older one with version 1.22....ha ha.  Oh well, guess I'll wait a little while before doing any upgrade to the unit to make sure nothing is broken from the damage seen on the box.  Who knows maybe soon 2.03 will have all the nice features of 1.22.  One can hope.... Will be interesting to see what some of the others receive in that recently ordered one.  I believe its just pot luck on which version software one gets as their inventory may be mixed between the different versions.   Thanks to ones that are providing the much needed support for the E4.

[edavid]

I'm off to my usual software-installation start. For somebody who actually got a Ph.D. in computer science, I have a real talent for screwing up installs.

The instructions that I've found have me install RNDIS drivers, set the camera to RNDIS mode, plug it into the computer, and connect with Filezilla. The RNDIS drivers installed without difficulty, and when I plug the camera in, it shows up as a FLIR Camera Device with RNDIS drivers -- but it doesn't respond to the 192.168.0.2 address that everyone specifies. I found a slot under the Device Properties where I could assign an IP address for the device, but that didn't seem to make any difference. This is on a borrowed Win 8 machine; mine's a Mac, and while I found an RNDIS driver for OS X, I thought it would be quicker to use the canned PC tools.

I'll trawl through Google and the depths of this thread, and see if I can diagnose "nobody home at 192.168.0.2". But not tonight. Sigh...

I don't think anyone has gotten it working on Windows 8.  Windows XP is recommended.  You could probably do it with a LiveXP DVD.

[Isaac-1]

I used 64 bit Windows 7 Professional with no problem

[yogort1]

This morning I had a strange activity on my camera. When I unplugged it from USB and turned the camera on I could see a dim contours of a battery symbol that is showing when the camera is charging. As I said, it was quite dim, but still visible. Nothing changed after several hard reboots. I changed the screen brightness from high to low, and then high again and the contours are almost gone. Is it possible to somehow disable this battery symbol?

[mrflibble]

I'll trawl through Google and the depths of this thread, and see if I can diagnose "nobody home at 192.168.0.2". But not tonight. Sigh...

Quick note on that: the Flir DHCP implementation doesn't play nicely at times. You can work around that by setting the IP on the PC side to a static IP.

See for example: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/flir-e4-thermal-imaging-camera-teardown/msg340074/#msg340074

[janekivi]

I've downloaded janekivi's 2.3.0_Menu_5.zip file and installed it on my E4. Thanks for the extra palettes  I wonder if there is a possibility to unlock the zoom option. Janekivi said that there is a telnet command 'zoom - rls .caps.config.image.zoom'. This will add zoom option in menu?

For zoom we need at least two things: in conf.cfc must be
.caps.config.image.zoom.maxFactor double (number other than 1) - this is easy, I know pattern and can edit it
.caps.config.image.zoom.enabled bool (false must be turned to _true) - not so easy
Hackers can edit conf but they is not cooperative and answer no letters but I can't stop and try this my own way-
with notepad and calculator.

[Isaac-1]

So what do we have left of the missing E4 to E8 features in 2.3, Zoom, Area Metering and PIP?  Anything else?

[janekivi]

Abot this E4 hacking - this is not for others to make money. Did you even read this
E4HACK-2 v0.4

            **** DISCLAIMER ****

- You do this on your own risk.
- By using this tool, you agree that you will
  remove the hack before selling the device.
- TO REPEAT: UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES you are allowed
  to sell a device that has this hack installed.
but what we see here- guy bought 4 camera and can now leave one for himself.
I make here no money when I spend hours and play with it to find more holes to add some
features to it. And this stuff is too for only educational purposes for using commands and knowledge
to get from machine what you want.
(my english is not very good but hope you got the point)

[Paul10000]

And long may you continue - the vast majority appreciate your (and every one else's) efforts. 




Abot this E4 hacking - this is not for others to make money. Did you even read this
E4HACK-2 v0.4

            **** DISCLAIMER ****

- You do this on your own risk.
- By using this tool, you agree that you will
  remove the hack before selling the device.
- TO REPEAT: UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES you are allowed
  to sell a device that has this hack installed.
but what we see here- guy bought 4 camera and can now leave one for himself.
I make here no money when I spend hours and play with it to find more holes to add some
features to it. And this stuff is too for only educational purposes for using commands and knowledge
to get from machine what you want.
(my english is not very good but hope you got the point)

[Isaac-1]

Janekivi, I am not sure exactly who your last message was targeted to, I have not seen any recent messages by people talking about trying to make money off of upgrading and selling these modded E4's.  At most I have seen a few people without the skills to do the hacks themselves offering to pay others to perform the hacks.  If your reply was regarding my message about E8 features that have not yet been unlocked, that question was just meant as a way to determining how close the 2.3 hack is to the older full unlock hack, not any goal to make profit from applying this hack and reselling.  Now personally I feel the demand to remove the hack before selling is a bit excessive, but I have no plans to sell my  E4 at this time, however in 4 or 5 years once better / cheaper equipment comes along that may be a different matter.

p.s. I for one appreciate the effort you are making, and hope my feedback regarding 2.3.13 helps in the process

[gemrough]

All you need is ticonfig.exe and the config files. Go back to page 1 post 1 and follow the links for 1.22. A few pages after the initial instructions for 1.22 you will find the instructions for the hack with ticonfig (Very simple to do the hack with it)

I'm off to my usual software-installation start. For somebody who actually got a Ph.D. in computer science, I have a real talent for screwing up installs.

The instructions that I've found have me install RNDIS drivers, set the camera to RNDIS mode, plug it into the computer, and connect with Filezilla. The RNDIS drivers installed without difficulty, and when I plug the camera in, it shows up as a FLIR Camera Device with RNDIS drivers -- but it doesn't respond to the 192.168.0.2 address that everyone specifies. I found a slot under the Device Properties where I could assign an IP address for the device, but that didn't seem to make any difference. This is on a borrowed Win 8 machine; mine's a Mac, and while I found an RNDIS driver for OS X, I thought it would be quicker to use the canned PC tools.

I'll trawl through Google and the depths of this thread, and see if I can diagnose "nobody home at 192.168.0.2". But not tonight. Sigh...

[-jeffB]

All you need is ticonfig.exe and the config files. Go back to page 1 post 1 and follow the links for 1.22. A few pages after the initial instructions for 1.22 you will find the instructions for the hack with ticonfig (Very simple to do the hack with it)

I actually grabbed ticonfig.exe, and when I tried to run it, Norton yanked it out from under me. I don't much like Norton, but I was working on my wife's production machine, and I didn't want to override anything without giving her time to go over it first.

I was thinking about trying this on my work PC, which is running Win 7, but I don't want to abuse the local-admin privileges they gave me. (Especially since, as I said, I have a talent for breaking things.) My wife's PC can boot into 7; I'll probably do that this weekend and try again.

I'd really like to be able to do this from my Mac; I found what appears to be a RNDIS driver that might work. That would take some more homework, though. I'll confess that last night I was looking for the quick, easy answer.

[OrBy]

This morning I had a strange activity on my camera. When I unplugged it from USB and turned the camera on I could see a dim contours of a battery symbol that is showing when the camera is charging. As I said, it was quite dim, but still visible. Nothing changed after several hard reboots. I changed the screen brightness from high to low, and then high again and the contours are almost gone. Is it possible to somehow disable this battery symbol?

This was covered early on in the thread already. I managed to minimize this issue by replacing the black/white image with a black/grey image but simply leaving the unit on for a while seems to resolve the temp burn in.

[yogort1]

This morning I had a strange activity on my camera. When I unplugged it from USB and turned the camera on I could see a dim contours of a battery symbol that is showing when the camera is charging. As I said, it was quite dim, but still visible. Nothing changed after several hard reboots. I changed the screen brightness from high to low, and then high again and the contours are almost gone. Is it possible to somehow disable this battery symbol?

This was covered early on in the thread already. I managed to minimize this issue by replacing the black/white image with a black/grey image but simply leaving the unit on for a while seems to resolve the temp burn in.

Exactly. After some time the contours are gone. Strange thing to happen though

[djeans]

HI All,

can someone please point me to the right direction? I have a brandnew flir e4 with 2.3.0.
- How can I backup the E4
- Where to start to apply the res and menu hack?

I tried to find the information in this thread, but as it is now 414 pages long it is a bit hard and I'd be happy if someone can point me to the right starting point.

Thanks
DJ

[janekivi]

"I have not seen any recent messages by people talking..." - good point.
Why all other messages? All jump in and "I want!! I need!!" This is not personal.
No one can't feel touched by this. I don't point anyone with finger here.
There is only case  if this person thinking "I must have hacked E4, what you waiting!!!".
I only want to inspire all of - let's say - newbies like I am to search,
study and learn something. To try stuff, find something and give something.
Let's get smarter, let's think more.
Peace

Edit: message I started writing earlier landed not so good point...
        Page 1 message 1 is good point to start hacking, this is like bookmark to key points in thread