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Products > Specialized Products > USB > SUMS Simple Upgrade Management System (includes 1 SUMS Bootloader of your choice)

SUMS Simple Upgrade Management System (includes 1 SUMS Bootloader of your choice)
 
  Quantity in Basket: None
Code: SUMS
Price: $369.99
IN STOCK
RoHS Compliant: YES
 
  I understand that a SUMS Bootloader is required. (Purchase NOW to receive a $249.99 discount.)
 
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Simple Upgrade Management SYSTEM  (SUMS)

A Branded, Protected, Managed, Mechanized Bootloader System

by Trace Systems Inc.

Now you can safely, simply, and securely deliver your upgrade code in a way that is palatable to the customer, using a SYSTEM that automatically delivers your firmware upgrade by email, makes it dead simple for your non-technical end user to perform the upgrade at his own location, protects your firmware from theft or from being programmed into the wrong hardware model, and can lock the delivered firmware to the serial number in one specific customer's device.  We call it:

SUMS is a low cost ($369.99 for system + 1 bootloader, $249.99 for each additional bootloader), seamlessly integrated system that can help you easily manage upgrades across your entire product line, even for products that use different processors and have different types of connectivity (USB and Ethernet currently supported).

 Our new SUMS system is built upon our USB Bootloader Pro technology, but adds important extra capabilities:

  1. Protects your intellectual property in multiple ways, by encryption, by a Company_ID, Model_ID, and optional Serial Number

  2. Upgrade Manager actually collects everything together, encrypts it, and delivers it to your customer by email.

System Overview

 

Trace Systems’ S.U.M.S. Simple Upgrade Management SYSTEM (Ethernet bootloader shown above) is designed to allow your company to upgrade the firmware of your products in the field, by just emailing to your customer an upgrade software package that

  • Is extremely simple for the end user to operate (see right side screen shot above), so he cannot make an error – no confusing jargon or complicated looking controls to confuse him
  • Protects your company’s intellectual property in multiple ways:
    • Encrypts the firmware so it cannot be stolen or reverse engineered
    • Makes sure that only the right firmware can be programmed into your device:
      • Only devices from your company, and only the right hardware model, can be re-programmed with this firmware.
      • If you use the optional serial number, your firmware can only be programmed into the one specific hardware unit that is authorized to receive it.
  • Can provide your company with additional revenue streams: selling multiple firmware options for your hardware model. (For example, you can offer a Pro version at extra cost.) By using the optional serial number, you can make sure that the firmware option you sell can only be used by the customer that has PAID for it.

The S.U.M.S. software system consists of 4 main parts:

  1. The Bootloader Firmware, which coexists in the microcontroller’s program memory with the main firmware application you have written,

  2. A BLPROtected Bootloader PC Program, which you use yourself (in Developer mode), and which you also send to your users (set up to run for them in the simpler End User Mode).  This program reads the encrypted firmware file and communicates with the Bootloader Firmware during the firmware update process,

  3. A Protected Firmware File, which is an encrypted file that you send to your customers in order to perform a field upgrade of the firmware in your device, and

  4. The SUMS Upgrade Manager program, which you only use in your factory.  This program combines your hex file and with a Company ID, Model ID, and optional Serial Number into a single encrypted Protected Firmware File. The program also automates the process of collecting and emailing, to any customer, all the files that he needs to install a new version of your firmware in his hardware model.

When it’s time to send out an upgrade, the SUMS Upgrade Manager program not only creates the Protected Firmware File, but it can also that file together will all the other files that the customer needs into a WinZip archive, and automatically send it to him, attached to a customized email.

The Upgrade Manager program makes the process very simple and automated: just fill in a form, entering the customer's name and email address, the Hardware Model of the device that he owns (just select it from a list of the products in your product line), set the optional Serial Number, and select the hex file you intend to send him (from a list of files that are compatible with the device he owns).

 Then, just click the big orange button. That's it!

 

Supports Multiple Processors and Connectivity Types

And here's the best part: the system works with multiple processors and connectivity types, just by installing additional SUMS compatible BLPPROtected bootloaders.  You can start out with, say, a USB bootloader for the PIC18F4550, then later, add an Ethernet bootloader for the PIC32MX795F512L.  After you install the new bootloader, take a few minutes to do a simple one-time set up of Hardware Model and Firmware Product Version information for the new product(s) that use that new bootloader, and then use our easy drag and drop method to show which of your Firmware Product Versions are compatible with which of your Hardware Models.

What SUMS Does For You

  • Does everything that USB Bootloader Pro does, and a whole lot more!

  • No programming needed - ready to use

  • No need to recompile your own Main App code to work with our bootloader - use it as is!

  • Simple, automated mode for your non-technical End Users

  • Powerful Developer Mode for you & your technical and factory users

  • BRAND it yourself - customize company name and logo image with NO PC Programming At All.

  • Sends your firmware in an encrypted file that protects your intellectual property

  • Automatically collects files together, zips them up into a WinZip archive, customizes a cover letter, and emails it all to your customer!  All in about 20 seconds.

  • Protects against programming your firmware into the wrong device, or an unauthorized device

  • The system grows with your product line - when you develop a product with a different processor, just buy a new bootloader from us for that processor and connectivity type.  Your new bootloader installs right into the SUMS system, ready to work for just those of your products that need it.

  • Serial Number (known to both Bootloader Firmware and your Main App Firmware) allows you to charge your customers for new versions or new firmware "personalities" that work in your product. Opens up whole new revenue streams for your company!

Price, Availability and Initial Processor Support

There are many families of PIC microcontrollers, ranging from small PIC12 devices all the way up to the biggest PIC 32 chips. The characteristics vary wildly from one family to the next, so it is impossible to make a single bootloader that can work in all Microchip processor families.

For this reason, bootloaders for the SUMS System are sold for an individual processor group: those chips in a single processor family that have the same amount of program memory.  A single SUMS bootloader will support one kind of connectivity. (USB or Ethernet are the choices available at this time.)  At the moment, we have the initial version of this system working with three different BLPROtected bootloaders:

  • USB PIC18F4550 / 2550

  • USB PIC18F87J50 /67J50

  • Ethernet PIC32MX795F512 (L and H), PIC32MX695F512 (L and H)

 It is our intention to release enough compatible bootloaders over time, in families, to cover all of the applicable Microchip processors that work with these two types of modern connectivity (USB and Ethernet).  This will take some time, of course.  Please let us know which processors you are most interested in, so we can support the most popular processors first.

 This is the pricing model:

 SUMS System + 1 Bootloader of your choice -  $369.99

 Each additional SUM BLPROtected bootloader          $249.99




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