JP2000245681A - Version updating method for firmware for electronic endoscope device and electronic endoscope device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To omit the work of the manufacture, transportation and exchange of a new ROM and to easily update the version of firmware program data. SOLUTION: A processor device 10 provided with firmware in a control part is provided with a CPU 12, a flash ROM 16 for storing the firmware program data and a program Pa for data transfer for transferring the program data, a notebook personal computer or the like is connected through RS-232C 11 and the program data of a new version are transferred. Then, the program data are tentatively stored in a RAM 17 and then copied to the ROM 16 by a prescribed capacity each. The CPU 12 executes self reset after the transfer of the data is ended.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method for easily upgrading a firmware program of an electronic endoscope apparatus having a scope and connecting various peripheral devices, and a method of the electronic endoscope apparatus. Regarding the configuration.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art FIG. 3 shows a configuration of a conventional electronic endoscope apparatus. In FIG. 3, a scope 2 having a CCD 1 at a distal end is connected to a processor device 3, which includes a monitor 4, a video printer 5, a filing device 6, and other peripheral devices (such as a VTR). Connected. A digital video processor (DSP) for performing predetermined image processing on a video signal transmitted from the scope 2 in the processor device 3
7, a microcomputer 8, a ROM (UV-EPROM) 9 for storing firmware program data, and the like.

According to the above-mentioned electronic endoscope apparatus, the DSP 7 converts the video signal obtained by the CCD 1 at the tip of the scope 2 into a DSP signal.
, Necessary images are displayed on the monitor 4 on the basis of the video signal, and the images of the observed body are output to peripheral devices such as the video printer 5 and used. You. The control and management of the scope 2 and the peripheral devices (5, 6) are executed by firmware of the microcomputer 8 using program data and the like in the ROM 9.

[0004]

By the way, in the above-mentioned electronic endoscope apparatus, the functions of peripheral devices such as the above-mentioned video printer 5 and filing device 6 are frequently added and the performance thereof is improved. The performance has been improved and functions have been added, and the firmware needs to be upgraded accordingly. That is, if there is a function addition or performance improvement in the peripheral device or the scope 2, the command exchanged between these devices and the processor device 3 must be changed. Therefore, conventionally, the ROM 9 in the processor device 3 is replaced with a new upgraded ROM 9 in order to support the peripheral device and the scope 2 of the new command system.

[0005] However, in the replacement of the ROM 9 in the electronic endoscope apparatus, there are a work of manufacturing a new ROM that has been upgraded, a work of transporting the ROM, and a work of replacing the new ROM. There is a problem that it costs. For example, even in the above replacement work, after removing the power plug of the processor device 3 and removing the devices mounted on the processor device 3,
There is a task of removing the screws of the device housing, opening the lid, removing the ROM 9 attached to the socket, and replacing it with a new ROM 9. After that, there are operations to close the lid, attach screws, return other devices and so on, and plug in the power plug. Such an operation is complicated and causes a high cost.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and has as its object to omit the operation of manufacturing, transporting and replacing a new ROM, and to upgrade the firmware program data while the apparatus is powered on. An object of the present invention is to provide a method for easily upgrading the firmware for an electronic endoscope apparatus and an electronic endoscope apparatus which can be easily performed.

[0007]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided an electronic endoscope apparatus having a rewritable memory for storing firmware program data. To
An external device storing the upgrade program data is connected, the upgrade program data is downloaded from the external device to the electronic endoscope apparatus, and the control means of the electronic endoscope apparatus controls the data in the rewritable memory. The data is rewritten with the downloaded new program data. Here, the version upgrade means improvement and update of the program in a broad sense, including correction of a bug or the like. According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the electronic endoscope apparatus having a firmware in the control unit, a rewritable memory (read-only memory) for storing the program data of the firmware; And a control means for rewriting the data in the rewritable memory with downloaded version-up program data. In the invention according to claim 3, the control means includes:
The data transfer program existing in the rewritable memory is once copied to another memory, the upgrade program data is newly written in the rewritable memory, and a self-reset is performed after the writing is completed. And

According to the above configuration, for example, a notebook personal computer as an external device is connected to the processor through the RS-232C interface, and the upgrade program data stored in the notebook personal computer is downloaded to the processor. Then, the processor writes the downloaded program data into a rewritable memory (for example, a flash ROM) for each predetermined capacity according to the data transfer program. This facilitates the exchange of firmware program data without determining whether the power is turned on or off.

According to the third aspect of the present invention, the RO
The data transfer program in M is stored in another memory, for example, R
The data is temporarily saved in an AM (Random Access Memory), and the data downloaded by the data transfer program is written into the flash ROM. For example, the downloaded program data is temporarily stored in the RAM in a predetermined capacity unit, and then copied into the ROM, and this is repeated. After the download (transfer) is completed, a self-reset operation is performed, thereby erasing the data transfer program in the RAM and restoring the rest to the initial state. The program will be functional. It should be noted that the same data transfer program is included in the downloaded data, and it is not necessary to restore the original data.

[0010]

FIG. 1 shows the configuration of an electronic endoscope device (processor device) according to an embodiment. In this processor device 10, connection to peripheral devices or external devices is established. For this purpose, an RS-232C (or other communication format) interface 11 is provided.
A CPU (or microcomputer) 12 is connected to the interface 11. The CPU 12 executes a predetermined program, performs image processing of a video signal, and performs processing on a peripheral device 14.
And so on. The CPU 12 has a flash ROM via an address bus and a data bus.
A (read only memory) 16 and a RAM (writable memory) 17 are connected, and the CPU 12 controls download with an external device using a data transfer program stored in the flash ROM 16. .

A delay line 18, a reset voltage setting circuit 19, and an AND circuit 20 for performing a self-reset are provided with an output terminal T1 and a reset terminal T2 of the CPU 12.
And placed between. Note that the above flash ROM 1
As 6, a writable memory such as another nonvolatile memory can be used.

FIG. 2 shows an operation of rewriting the version-up program data in the CPU 12.
The operation of the example will be described with reference to FIG. Rewriting of the upgraded version of the firmware program data is performed, for example, by storing the data in a notebook computer or the like, and connecting the notebook computer to the processor device 10 via the RS-232C interface 11.

In FIG. 2, at step 101, the RS
When the interruption of the −232C interface 11 is performed,
In the next step 102, it is determined whether or not the command is a control command for the peripheral device 14. If "Yes", the process proceeds to step 103, and a normal processing routine for the peripheral device 14 is executed. On the other hand, if "No" in step 102, the process proceeds to step 104, in which the internal normal processing is stopped, the data is saved, the processing in the scope is terminated, and the version upgrade program data is deleted. Execute a rewrite operation.

That is, in step 105, the data transfer program is copied (copied) from the flash ROM 16 to the RAM 17, and in the next step 106, the program counter is rewritten to the copied RAM 17, for example, to the head address. For example, as shown in FIG. 1, if the data transfer program Pa is stored in the flash ROM 16 from the address 6000 (H),
After copying the transfer program Pa to the RAM 17, the start address 8000 (H) is set in the program counter.

As a result, the data transfer program Pa is in an executable state, and thereafter, transfer (download) of the program data is started. That is,
In the next step 107, it is determined whether or not the transfer of the program data has been completed. Further, in step 108, it is determined whether or not the data has not been input.
Since both are "No", the process proceeds to step 109, and the input program is sequentially copied to the RAM 17 as a temporary save memory.

In this example, the data stored in the RAM 17 is copied to the ROM 16 for each predetermined capacity unit due to the nature of data writing in the flash ROM 16. For example, the data stored in the area 17 of the RAM 17 shown in FIG.
The program data is stored every 6 kbytes (this unit is arbitrary). Therefore, in step 110, it is determined whether or not the evacuation RAM 17 has free space.
In the case of No ", that is, when 256 kbytes of data have been stored, the process proceeds to step 111 to copy (overwrite copy) the 256 kbytes of program data to the flash ROM 16. Thus, the program data has a predetermined capacity Each time, it is sequentially moved and copied from the RAM 17 to the ROM 16.

When the transfer from the notebook computer is completed, a transfer (download) end signal is output. When the transfer end signal is received by the CPU 12, "Yes" is obtained in step 107. Move to step 112. In this step 112, it is determined whether or not the program data remains in the RAM 17, and if it remains (No), the program proceeds to step 11
In step 3, for example, the odd part in the E area of the RAM 17 is set to N
Fill with ULL. Then, in step 114, the remaining data is copied to the flash ROM 16 in a predetermined capacity unit, whereby the download of the firmware program data ends.

In the next step 115, the self-reset terminal T2 is set to Low, and thereafter, the process proceeds to a dummy loop in step 116 in which the reset time waits. That is, in FIG. 1, the AND circuit 20 is set to High by the reset voltage setting circuit 19, and the terminal T
1 is also set to High, but this terminal T1 is set to Lo.
to w. Then, the output of the AND circuit 20 becomes Low.
To set the reset terminal T2 to Low. As a result, the CPU 12 self-resets, and RA
In addition to clearing the data in M17, the head address of the program counter is returned to 0 in the flash ROM 16 to bring it to the initial state.

Note that the self-reset is not performed as described above,
The initial state can be set by a program. Further, in this example, the firmware program of the processor device 10 is targeted, but the present invention can be applied to rewriting of a firmware program in an electronic endoscope or a scope in which the processor device and the scope are integrated.

[0020]

As described above, according to the present invention,
The electronic endoscope device is provided with a rewritable memory for storing program data and a data transfer program, and an external device such as a personal computer is connected to the electronic endoscope device. Is downloaded to the electronic endoscope apparatus, and the data in the rewritable memory is rewritten.
The operations of manufacturing, transporting, and replacing the OM are omitted, and the firmware program data can be easily upgraded while the power of the device is turned on.

According to the third aspect of the present invention, it is easy to write the downloaded program data to the memory, and the state changed by the download processing can be easily returned to the initial setting by self-reset. There is.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a configuration of a control unit of an electronic endoscope apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating a ROM version-up operation in a CPU according to the embodiment;

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a configuration of a conventional electronic endoscope device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 2 Scope, 3,10 Processor, 9 ROM (UV-EPROM), 11 RS-232C interface, 12 CPU, 14 Peripheral device, 16 Flash ROM, 17 RAM, T2 Reset terminal.

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. An electronic endoscope device comprising a rewritable memory for storing firmware program data,
An external device storing the version-up program data is connected, the version-up program data is downloaded from the external device to the electronic endoscope device, and the control means of the electronic endoscope device stores the data in the rewritable memory. A method for upgrading the firmware of an electronic endoscope apparatus, in which data is rewritten to downloaded new program data. 2. An electronic endoscope apparatus having a firmware in a control unit, comprising: a rewritable memory for storing program data of the firmware; and a program for downloading the program data from an external device and storing the program data in a predetermined memory. An electronic endoscope device comprising: a data transfer program; and control means for rewriting data in the rewritable memory to downloaded version-up program data. 3. The control means, after once copying a data transfer program existing in the rewritable memory to another memory, newly writes the upgraded program data in the rewritable memory. 3. The method of upgrading the firmware for an electronic endoscope apparatus according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the self-reset is performed after the termination.