https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=18874
Apparently someone got his hands on OS 4.3 for the TI-Nspire in China and apparently, it features more powerful TI-BASIC linking commands to interact with other devices connected to the TI-Nspire. They were tested with the TI-Innovator and apparently worked.
Now the next question, though, is did they patch the exploits used by nBoot and Ndless?
UPDATE (08/02/16): Although this OS blocks Ndless, it seems like it doesn't block nBoot+ControlX. Critor had no issue launching them from the new Boot2 4.3, as demonstrated at https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=18877&p=206173#p206172
He also demonstrated how installing OS 4.3 on a calculator that already had nBoot+ControlX installed will not prevent you from downgrading back to OS 4.2. The Ndless installer currently doesn't work on OS 4.3, so downgrading will be necessary for the time being. Also note that the exploit used by nBoot was patched in hardware revision W.
Quote from: DJ Omnimaga on August 02, 2016, 06:02:56 PM
Now the next question, though, is did they patch the exploits used by nBoot and Ndless?
The exploit used by nBoot can't be patched, it's in the hardware (boot1). It is fixed in HW-W though.
Ah I didn't know W didn't support nBoot. But thanks for the info.
Important:
I updated the first post with more information from
@critor : https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=18877&p=206173#p206172
Basically, although this OS blocks Ndless and downgrades, it doesn't block nBoot+ControlX, so if you installed the latter two prior upgrading, then you can downgrade at will (which will be needed to install Ndless for the time being).
OS 4.3.0.702 is now out:
TI-Nspire CX CAS https://education.ti.com/en/us/software/details/en/0607F21D07B14ACB9EE85E57A9C30EDA/ti-nspirecxcas_os
TI-Nspire CX https://education.ti.com/en/us/software/details/en/0607F21D07B14ACB9EE85E57A9C30EDA/ti-nspirecxcas_os
No official changelog so far (but it blocks Ndless and downgrades, as usual, so don't upgrade if you still want to use Ndless. I assume that older hardware with nBoot and ControlX can downgrade, though, right?). The main additions are an exam mode for the Netherlands and TI-Innovator commands for TI-BASIC
Source https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=18919
Yes. If you install nBoot + ControlX before updating to 4.3, then you can still downgrade whenever you want and much more... ;)
A clean english nBoot + ControlX installation tutorial with download links is now available :
https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=18920&p=206415#p206415
I assume that nBoot + ControlX still requires hardware V or lower, though? Hopefully enough students managed to get an old enough hardware revision for this school year.
Thanks for the tutorial by the way. :)
Yes, hardware A to V.
I did test with an emulated hardware W calculator - it just doesn't work (normal boot).
I didn't test with a real hardware W calculator (we don't know... it might brick things... the emulator is not perfectly reliable).
I've translated the tutorial in French ; just change the language of the website in the upper-right corner.
https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=18920&p=206423#p206423
Also, there has since been seen a revision X :P
But my guess is that it's a minor update of W.
We won't know for sure (well, even then...) until we get our hand on one, take a photo, and compare with W :P
I wonder if the revision that comes after Z will be AA or greek letters? Also I wonder if any previous calc ever saw that many hardware revisions before?
Well the 84+ uses AA, AB, AC... but the 83+ have restarted to A, for instance (also, different factories over time), so, we'll see.
I lean towards AA, AB, AC...
I didn't know the 84+ went this high. I thought they were around revision R or S at most. As for the 83+ I was sure revisions stopped years ago. (at least on North American models)
Rev. R was made by factory P between around April 2011 and December 2013 (yep, it lasted quite a while, at least from information I have - we'd need people to share their datecodes to get better accuracy :P).
However, in the same time, there have been other factories and revs, from S (Jan 2011 factory K and Mar. 2012 factory P) to Z (factory K)
Darn, that's a lot. Even by 2011 I thought they were around M or so. I guess I forgot how long ago the missing RAM pages were discovered (2009 when people noticed TI-Boy SE and some Omnicalc functions stopped working on newer models)
TA1 ASICs were seen with revisions H (and I believe that it was initially the ones by factory S in April 2007. The other possibility being the rev. H by factory K starting Jan 2008).
Once again, any hardware photos from anyone would help having more accurate data for history/knowledge-keeping purposes ; datamath has many things, but not in such details :(
Major ControlX 4.4 update has been released with lots of new features and possibilities :
- you can now store your default choices in the ControlX menu
- new ability to run CX/CM Boot2 images older than 4.0.1
- new ability to run CX/CM OS images older than 4.0.1
- new ability to run light OS images (see nTNOC)
- added the 3.1CX, 3.1CM, 3.6CX and 3.9.1CX Ndless installers
- added the 4.4CX Ndless installers
- now also auto-installs Ndless when directly hot-running decrypted OS images
About
default choices :
To store a choice as a default boot choice, just hold [ctrl] while pressing it.
You can choose up to 2 things :
- a default boot action in the main ControlX menu (clearing minOS for example)
- a default boot image in one of the Boot2/Diags/ExtnD partitions
Although it's possible, you shouldn't make minOS=0 a default boot action, and select it manually only when needed.
Choosing it as a default boot action means a NAND block always in the same 2-3 NAND blocks is going to be erased+rewritten each time the calculator does reboot.
And NAND chips are supporting a huge but still limited number of erase+rewrite cycles for each block. It's very unlikely you'll run into problems before taking your exams, but it's still not a good choice.
It's not very useful to make something else than Boot2 4.0.3 as the default boot image.
But by manually specifying your Boot2 4.0.3 image as the default boot image, ControlX is going to store its location,
and thus will boot your calculator a little faster as it won't have to search for this image anymore.
About
OS launching :
This is important to understand things below.
Let me remind you you have 2 interesting ways of launching TI-Nspire OSes :
- through the Boot2 in which ControlX is going to inject its payload with several OS patches (only Boot2 4.0.3 is fully supported)
- by directly flashing and hot-running a decrypted OS image (raw or compressed) in the ExtendeD partition, *if* you are able to decrypt OS images
About
hot-running decrypted OS images :
You're completely skipping the Boot2 and all its checks.
Thus you are able to :
- run a CAS OS on a non-CAS calculator (up to version 3.6)
- run a non-CAS OS on a CAS calculator (up to version 3.6)
- run a CM OS on a CX calculator
- run a development OS on a production calculator
The incomplete source code
(keys missing) of an OS decrypting tool is available : https://tiplanet.org/forum/archives_voir.php?id=4281
But you should also be able to get the decrypted OS image by dumping the SDRAM in th Firebird emulator with a breakpoint on execution at 0x10000000.
As hot-launching is skipping the OS installation, the resources files aren't updated. Thus you should keep versions of your hot-launched decrypted OS image and of your installed OS image as near as possible
(for example, if you have a CX non-CAS with OS 4.3 and want CAS, decrypt, flash and hot-launch the 4.3 CX CAS OS image).
The only way to really install such "forbidden" OS images and thus not having to decrypt them is to also install Nlaunchy, if compatible with your hardware.
About
Boot2 4.0.3 OS patches :
When running OSes normally through the Boot2, you'll still need Boot2 4.0.3 for patches to be applied to the OS
(nBoot fix for versions older than 4.0.1, Ndless auto-installers, discrepency fix, disable Boot2 updater...).
The discrepency is a set of auto-checks performed by the OS itself, and triggering an OS self-destruct process if the OS considers itself as unsafeThe Ndless auto-installer only works if you have the right ndless_resources.tns file in your /ndless folder.
Thanks to the new discrepency fixing patch, you can use nTNOC (https://codewalr.us/forum/archives_voir.php?id=6566) to gain some space by removing useless things
(Boot2 image + sample files) from your installed OS image.
The size of the payload injected in Boot2 4.0.3 is limited. So not all patches are available when launching the OS through a Boot2.
Patches enabled by default in the Makefile are :
- OS 3.1 (nBoot fix + Ndless auto-installer + discrepency disabled)
- OS 3.6 (nBoot fix + Ndless auto-installer + discrepency disabled)
- OS 4.2 (Ndless auto-installer + discrepency disabled)
- OS 4.4 (Ndless auto-installer + discrepency disabled)
For other OS versions, you'll either need to rebuild ControlX by disabling support for some of the above versions, to flash and use a decrypted OS image in your ExtendeD partition, or to also install Nlaunchy if compatible.
About
downgrading.
Boot2/OS 3.6+ won't let you install OSes older than 3.6
(although they'll still be able to boot them).
To install older images, you'll have to :
- temporary install a Boot2 image older than 3.9.1 somewhere in your partitions
- trigger the maintenance menu and remove the current OS
- ask ControlX to reset the minOS version
- ask ControlX to launch the older Boot2
- then send your OS older than 3.6
Of course, the Boot2 image will have to be compatible with your hardware.
Boot2 3.1 for example won't work on harware revisions J-V, but you can use Boot2 3.2.4 in its place.
The OS will also have to be compatible with your hardware - see the table over there : https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=57&t=17770
To sum up things :
- no OS older than 3.2.3 on hardware revisions J-R
- no OS older than 3.9.1 on hardware revisions S-V
Download : https://tiplanet.org/forum/archives_voir.php?id=652778
Tutorial : https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=57&t=18920&lang=en
I'm really glad to see all hardware revisions being supported once again by Ndless and ControlX. Thanks for the update :)