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machdyne / blaustahl

Blaustahl Storage Device
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Firmware needed fro operation #6

Open jasen-b opened 1 month ago

jasen-b commented 1 month ago

You need to also store the firmware in durable storage, else when the flash holding the firmware forgets it the device is bricked.

akrabu commented 1 month ago

Did you catch the "Future data recovery" section at the bottom of the main page? It is possible to recover directly from the FRAM chip.

machdyne commented 1 month ago

This is a common criticism that I saw after Blaustahl was released. One of the main ways I imagined Blaustahl being used, was that a user would make regular edits over several years, and then at some point stop. After that, it would become a matter of data recovery in the distant future.

However, if the flash became corrupt after 20+ years it may still be possible to reflash the firmware. The MCU has a USB bootloader in ROM that's essentially unbrickable. We have plans to make all of our firmware/source, documentation and schematics available for 100+ years.

And then as @akrabu mentioned, it is possible to recover the data directly from the FRAM chip if the MCU, flash or PCB don't work.

It's not clear how common USB-A connectors will be decades from now, so specialized equipment for data recovery may be necessary regardless.

Luckily Blaustahl has received a decent amount of press coverage that may be discoverable in the future so if someone finds a Blaustahl they should be able to determine what it is and that it might be worth trying to recover data from it.