Firmware for nextGeneration-II chargers; nextGen2_neu-e.txt; issue 11 NOV 2011 Expanded in V 1.01 - 27 MAI 2010: Displays an error message on the screen if a totally unsuited power supply (AC/DC) is used. Removed and expanded in V 1.02 - 01 JUN 2010: a) When rather full Lithium batteries are connected to chanrge them to its maximum then the full message appears when they are not really fully charged. This happened after a change of the measuring interrupt from 1 to 3 minutes after connecting the battery. This measuring interrupt is set back to the old time of 1 minute after start of charge (as it is usual on the nextGeneration-I). b) Small Lithium batteries which are charged with a very low charge current (about 100 mA) will be charged in the last minutes until the charger displays FULL using currents of less than 100 mA. This prevents against an early FULL message and an erroneous cut off. c) The change over of the cell voltage displays for battery 1 and battery 2 or from cell 1...7 to cell 8...14 (and back), is now NOT ONLY possible with the buttons and BUT ALSO with <-> and <+>. d) The change over of the graphical screens of battery 1 and battery 2 (and back) is now NOT ONLY possible with the buttons <1> and <2> BUT ALSO and . Removed in V 1.03 - 03 JUN 2010: The state message of the battery 2 graphical screen is now - when the voltage converters are coupled in the next-14 chargers - more correctly "b2=b1!" and not "ready". Removed and expanded in V 1.04 - 07 JUN 2010: a) The nominal capacity was not written into the AMS chips, if LiPo batteries are used. b) If an AMS chip was connected, the maximum charge time was not changed in the charger. Now the maximum charge time is set to 3 h for NiCd, 4 h for NiMH, 12 h for lead and for LiXx batteries the maximum charge time is set to 1 h/C-Rate + 1 h. c) If a battery was charged at b1 with "b1+b2 coupling" and the battery type of b2 was changed in the parameter menu the "b1+b2 coupling" was switched off. d) If the right balancer connector of a battery pack with two balancer connectors was connected before the left balancer connector was connected, then the single cell (balancing) display in the graphical screen of the b2 output was not removed after the left balancer connector was connected and the cells were re-arranged / assigned to the battery 1 output. Removed in V 1.05 - 17 JUN 2010: a) The charger switched by error into LiPo mode if a NiXX battery was connected to the balancer port to monitor the single cell voltages of the Nickel battery. b) The real charge current was a little lower than shown on the display. Removed in V 1.06 - 18 JUN 2010: A connected AMS chip was not written with the new nominal capacity of the pack when the C-rate was changed as the sole parameter. Expanded in V 1.07 - 21 JUN 2010: To avoid problems at connecting the USB connection to a PC which is booting or which has not the USB driver installed, the USB connection will be ignored if the connection will be done at charging or discharging batteries. Then the charger will show the warning #80 "remove USB cable". Removed in V 1.08 - 22 JUN 2010: a) If the "Buzzer mode" was set to "OFF", the charger still made the full and empty beeps. b) If the external temperatur sensor was removed and no temperature function was activated, the right parentheses was still left in the graphic screen. Removed in V 1.09 - 23 JUN 2010: If the USB connection will be done while charging or discharging batteries the charger shows the warning #80 "remove USB cable". If a b a t t e r y or both batteries had been removed, the warning text disappeared in the past without solving the problem. Now the warning disappears only when the USB cable is removed as requested in the warning text. The reason is that Windows ignores the USB port when the charger does not answer in a defined time limit. This state can be resetted only by removing the USB cable. Improved and expanded in V 1.10 - 09 JUL 2010: a) Transfer speed of the transmittion of the data in the internal memory to the connected USB port improved. b) New error message Error #165 "b1-ChargeStage def. " c) New error message Error #265 "b2-ChargeStage def. " Removed and expanded in V 1.11 - 12 JUL 2010: a) At Error #262 the charger showed "b1-disChargeCurr>Max" instead of "b2-disChargeCurr>Max". b) If a 4s LiPo was discharged and an AMS chip was connected to the AMS port 2, sometimes the charger detected a BalCab configuration after the connection of the EH balancer connector. c) If an AMS chip is connected to its connector then the AMS statistics will be sent to the USB port to improve the documentation about the connected the battery pack. Removed in V 1.12 - 14 JUL 2010: If the charge current was low and the internal resistance of the single cells is low a underflow could occur. In this case the single cell voltages could be misplaced on the display of the charger. Removed in V 1.13 - 19 JUL 2010: If the charger was disconnected and reconnected in a short time after the batteries were removed, in very few cases the charger showed then the following unfounded error message: "SERIOUS WARNING" "Only charging is pos-", "sible. Press a key" Removed in V 1.14 - 17 AUG 2010: Sometimes the type configuration of a LiFe battery with BalCab connector was not detected correctly. Improved in V 1.15 - 18 AUG 2010: When an AMS-Chip was connected and you started from the battery 1 graphical screen via the button to have a look on the statistics of the battery 1, then the statistics of battery 2 was displayed always first instead the statistics of battery 1. Improved in V 1.16 - 3 SEP 2010: a) The current regulation for the LiFe batteries has been improved, some new LiFe batteries have a different charge behavior, so a modification of the regulation has been done. b) The balancing regulation has been improved to avoid back and forth balancing. c) If an AMS chip has inadmissible values the complete values of the AMS chip will be ignored when reading it. If you make changes to the current charger settings (battery settings) when this corropted chip is connected, then the new battery settings will be written to the corrupted AMS chip when you leave the parameter setting menu of the charger. Improved in V 1.16 - 17 SEP 2010: Balancing and current regulation was optimized. The charger will detect "full" earlier and with a higher probability when battery packs are charged which inludes one/some cells with higher self- discharging than normal. Improved and removed in V 1.18 - 9 OCT 2010: a) From now so called "Shortkeys" are available to come to the "read"ing menu of the internally stored user defined configurations of battery 1 and 2. a1) When you will read a configuration of battery 1 then you must be in the graphical screen of battery 1. The configuration menu appears when you press the buttons <1> and <+> at the same time. It is no longer necessary to call this menu via "bType" and "read". a2) When you will read a configuration of battery 2 then you must be in the graphical screen of battery 2. The configuration menu appears when you press the buttons <+> and <2> at the same time. It is no longer necessary to call this menu via "bType" and "read". b) When the AMS Chip is connected and the tempereture-cut-of is changed then you will also be asked when you quit the parameter screen if you want to store them into the AMS chip. c) When a Battery with a high capacity was charged then it could be happen that the displayed inner resistance was displayed too high. d) When two battery packs had been connected to one pack in series or one battery pack with two balancing connectors had been connected to the charger then it could be happen that the measured voltage of cell No.8 was wrong in the case when no BalCab20 connectors had been used. Improved in V 1.19 - 22 OCT 2010: The "Shortkeys" to read a configuration of battery 1 or battery 2 will now work in both graphical screens. Removed in V1.20 - 09 NOV 2010: When a lithium battery shall be charged AND if the Schulze balancing cable system is used (BalCab10, BalCab20) AND when the value of the current setting resistor in the cable(s) is higher than the maximum charge current the charger is able to deliver, the charger calculates a maximum charge time which is too low to charge batteries full. Now it is no longer calculated in dependency of the C-rate but by the charge current the charger can deliver. Improved and removed in V 1.21 - 23 DEC 2010: If the battery minus is not connected to the charger minus, it could happen that the charger showed not the correct single cell voltages at higher cell counts. Now the charger tells you that you have to connect the battery minus in the single cell screen, if a deviation is detected. In the Czech version there were some errors removed which occured in the "wide" menue text. *********************************************************************** Developed for the next-14-500 - now available in all nextGeneration-II: *********************************************************************** Changes in V 1.22 and 1.23 - 20 MAR 2011: a) There is an additional error message when a balancing leads are connected but cell #1 of the pack is not connected or wrongly wired. b) The fan speed varies now in a wider range nearly infinitely variable. c) The storage voltage is now no longer calculated by the full/empty voltage but can be selected now directly in the storage menu: With LiPo batteries following values can be selected: 3.6V, 3.7V, 3.8V, 3.9V With LiIo batteries following values can be selected: 3.5V, 3.6V, 3.7V, 3.8V With LiFe batteries following values can be selected: 3.1V, 3.2V, 3.3V d) Beim Lagerprogramm reduziert sich der Entladestrom stufenweise, damit Akkuspannung nach dem Abschalten des Entladestroms nicht mehr ansteigt. e) With the auto_E function the step width of the current reduction is now reduced. f) The function "Diode" makes only sense in the charge program fix_C. For this reason the Diode menu is blocked in discharge or automatic current calculation programs. g) In the statistical screens for battery 1 and 2 it is now possible to change between them not only by pressing and but also by pressing <+> und <->. h) In the screen of the Lithium single cell voltages is now displayed which cell is presently balancing. When a cell is balancing the the cell number appears in reverse mode. Improved and removed in V 1.24 - 12 APRIL 2011: a) When a 14s pack was charged on the battery output 2 then it could happen that after about 60 seconds (after measuring the inner resistance of the cells) the charger showed VMAX in error. b) When a 14s pack was charged on the battery output 2 and this pack was disconnected and re-connected within some seconds then it could happen that the charger showed VMAX in error. (Reason: The big electrolytic capacitors of the output were still charged so that the charger measured that the battery was still connected. The waiting time for a re-connection was now reduced to less than 1 second. Improved and removed in V 1.25 ... V 1.28 - 28 SEPTEMBER 2011: a) A lot of changes in the firmware had been done to protect the charger when it is operated in a wrong way (which could cause damages on the device). (e.g. on the next-14-500: best available protection for the anti-spark circuit when the charging cables are producing intermittant contacts when they are plugged into their sockets on the charger and/or the battery). b) Beyond it our attention was directed to some errors messages which appear in error. We tried do avoid the following error messages when the charger is fully ok: Error no. 165 / 265: b1- or b2- ChargeCircuit defective. and error 162 / 262: b1- or b2- disChargeCurr > Max. Improved and removed in V 1.25 ... V 1.28 - 17 NOVEMBER 2011: a) Some more changes in the firmware had been done to protect the charger when it is operated in a wrong way (which could cause damages on the device). b) Some more changes in the firmware had been done to avoid unsuitable parameter settings which could be dangerous for Ni-Cd and Ni-MH batteries. c) The header information of the logging data is now expanded and informs about hardware- and firmware version of the charger. d) Client specific changes which are coupled to the serial number of the device.