UMC-200 Firmware Update to 52 Made Things Worse

[keephowlin]

I had an issue when plugging in a new FireStick 4K.  The video showed fine , but no audio.  I tried 3 different 4K FireSticks on different HDMI inputs and got the same result.  I tried two different FireSticks that weren't 4K and both worked fine.  So I thought I'd upgrade the firmware (I was running 39).  The upgrade process was definitely a challenge to find the combination of cable and laptop that would finally work, but eventually I got the upgrade to take and uploaded all four files.

The issue is that now my regular HD input (DuneHD) has a strong green tint.  Additionally, the FireStick 4K now has audio, but only stereo, regardless of the source movie.  In other words, on a different non-4K FireStick connected to the UMC-200 the same movie on Netflix would have surround.   In comparison to the DuneHD, the video for the various versions of FireStick looks fine.

I need help because we actually watch mostly the DuneHD player with our library of movies, and where I stand right now has essentially bricked my system.

Thanks in advance,

Rob

[mgbpuff]

you do realize, don't you, that the MC-200 is HDMI 1.4 and is unsuitable for 4K?

[KeithL]

As mgbpuff said.... the UMC-200 is NOT a 4k pre/pro.... so it will never support anything beyond HD.

In theory, when you plug a 4k device (like the 4k Fire Stick), into a non-4k device (the UMC-200), the 4k device recognizes what's going on, "falls back" to sending out regular HD video, and everything should work.

Unfortunately, in practice, 4k devices frequently don't handle this quite properly, and don't work properly with older non-4k devices.

That's probably why you're having issues with the 4k Fire Sticks.

However, upgrading the UMC-200 to FW v.52 shouldn't really cause any problems with its working properly in HD.

The most likely causes of your current problems are that either the update somehow became corrupted... or that there's some sort of hardware problem with your UMC-200 that only shows up with the .52 firmware.

Unfortunately, because the UMC-200 is old, and some parts for it are no longer available, we aren't servicing them any more.

However, here are a few things you could try:

1) Check your cables and the settings on your DuneHD (odd color tints may be caused by cable issues or by bad color space settings on the source device - so those are worth checking)

2) If you haven't already - do a Reset To Factory Defaults on the UMC-200 (if the configuration has gotten corrupted this might help)

3) Re-load the v.52 firmware (if the update itself has gotten corrupted then THAT might help)

4) Roll the firmware back to v.39 (if you're lucky, you will be able to reinstall v.39 successfully, and it may work just as before)

If you want to try #4, you can get a copy of the v.39 firmware here: we.tl/t-OasjPtZibF

This is just the firmware file itself... the same updater program you used before with v.52 will work with it.

(The link will be good for one week).

Feb 4, 2020 9:55:03 GMT -5 keephowlin said:

I had an issue when plugging in a new FireStick 4K.  The video showed fine , but no audio.  I tried 3 different 4K FireSticks on different HDMI inputs and got the same result.  I tried two different FireSticks that weren't 4K and both worked fine.  So I thought I'd upgrade the firmware (I was running 39).  The upgrade process was definitely a challenge to find the combination of cable and laptop that would finally work, but eventually I got the upgrade to take and uploaded all four files.

The issue is that now my regular HD input (DuneHD) has a strong green tint.  Additionally, the FireStick 4K now has audio, but only stereo, regardless of the source movie.  In other words, on a different non-4K FireStick connected to the UMC-200 the same movie on Netflix would have surround.   In comparison to the DuneHD, the video for the various versions of FireStick looks fine.

I need help because we actually watch mostly the DuneHD player with our library of movies, and where I stand right now has essentially bricked my system.

Thanks in advance,

Rob

[keephowlin]

Thank you for the replies.  I should have stated up-front, but I was never expecting the UMC-200 to route 4K video, but I guess it won't really support a 4K device plugged into it and route HD.  In the meantime, I'll try to roll back to 39 tonight.

Thanks again for the fast replies.

[keephowlin]

OK, we successfully rolled back to .39.  Although the colors on the DuneHD went back to normal, now the UMC-200 doesn't decode DTS anymore.  I tried a bunch of movies on both my DuneHD and my Blu-Ray.  If I switch to Dolby Digital, it plays fine, but no TrueHD or DTS.  Does this shed any more light on the situation?  Let me clarify, if I switch using the BluRay audio options on the disk to an alternate audio format using Dolby Digital, then the audio plays fine.  But that is usually a different language or an audio commentary track.

Thanks again for all your help!

Rob