Renewing Dolby Captiview devices

[Ryan Gallagher]

Since DAS is the replacement I figure this belongs in afterlife.

Anyone swapped the internal batteries in Dolby Captiview user devices? Any risks in trying?

I ended up with 8 from a reseller (and have two Captiview dongles/Fidelio transmitters). The ones that power on long enough to test do in fact connect (we have CCAP license due to festivals already). Figured maybe I could offer them to my venue to hold us over until the renovation perhaps, or resell them as kits of 4 with the dongle and transmitter. I don't know of any local small festivals that could use them.

[Steve Guttag]

Afterlife is for home theatre (when movies, or possibly equipment leaves the commercial world and heads to residential). You are bound to get more notice on Captiview stuff in the regular Digital Cinema forum or possibly Ground Floor (where the units are used).

[Leo Enticknap]

Agreed with Steve that moving this to Digital Cinema would likely be a good idea. A lot of equipment that is no longer supported by the OEM is still in revenue-earning service.

Related to which, I have a theater with 11 x AccessLink/Fidelio/Craptiview sets. Last week they reported a customer complaint of no CCAPs, and asked me to check out all of them. To be honest, checking these systems is not something I'd been doing at PM calls, because there isn't really any planned maintenance you can do with them: they either work or they don't, and I'd been working on the assumption that regular functionality checks were part of management's start-of-day routine, and that I'd be notified if they found a problem.

Anyways, I found two major issues.

1 - The AccessLink 5V power supplies that power the Captiview side (not the USB wall warts that power the Fidelio side) are buggered in four out of the eleven screens (confirmed with a multimeter that there was an open circuit on the output). Dolby no longer sells them, but they gave me the specs (needs to be 5V, 5A, and the barrel connector is 2.5mm ID and 5.5mm OD). I have some on order from Amazon that should arrive today or tomorrow.

2 - I can't update their firmware. It's currently on 1.0.11, and when I upload the current version (1.1.0) into the /doremi/etc/rc.once folder, the file has disappeared after the reboot, but it still says that it's on 1.0.11. I opened a support case with Dolby, who believe that this unit likely has hardware damage to the flash memory that holds the OS, and therefore cannot be updated. I didn't try the others at the site, for fear of bricking them. But the weird thing is that we have a couple of Accesslinks at the shop as well, also on 1.0.11, and I hit the same problem with one of those. I can believe that one unit has this fault, but it would be a bit of a coincidence for two to be doing the same thing and for that reason.

[Ryan Gallagher]

I did crack a dead one open tonight, very user replaceable battery assuming it doesn't off itself when it loses voltage entirely. There is an annoying piece of foam covering all the battery details, and I dare not try to scrape it off with how puffy this li-po battery is. I'll have to open one of the ones that holds a charge and meter the battery.contacts later to learn nominal voltage. (But the fact it charges on USB 5v is probably a decent clue, maybe).

battery_out.jpg

I suppose I'll try moving a functional battery to a dead unit and make sure it revives before I order any batteries.

Apologies for posting in afterlife. Considering I owned them personally (and I'm not a film tech with that business myself), seemed to lie in an afterlife grey area.

[Leo Enticknap]

Thanks, Ryan. If you can get the foam off to reveal the info that would enable us to order aftermarket replacements without making the battery go up like the Hindenburg, that would be appreciated. I've still got a few customers who use these things.

But as you note and without wanting to sound overly alarmist, puffy li-poly = fire risk. If I were running a theater with these in use, I'd want to inspect them and replace any batteries that show signs of inflating, sooner rather than later.

And without wanting to sound overly smug, I'm relieved that our (MiT's) readers use a pair of AAs (one time or NiMH rechargeable: your choice), the risk of which is limited to leaking "Duracell goo"...

[Ryan Gallagher]

To be fair every cell phone and laptop these days poses similar fire risk. But they tend to get “noticed” as their performance degrades, unlike these that may get used rarely.

These li-po packages are designed to inflate a little as a safety measure as they off-gas with age, and at least the devices presumably have a smart enough circuit to stop charging when full (as their display indicates).

But generally I agree, they have a shelf life that is not well published and should be replaced and disposed of properly when it is exceeded. Something that probably gets missed at ground level in most cinemas that have had them a while.

i have not tried asking Dolby for the battery part number yet, which might be fruitful. When all done I’ll cross post my findings in ground level.

[Ryan Gallagher]

Aside, did the display units also have flashable firmware? I do not own a management tablet which I understand was needed for fidelio programming.

Admittedly I have not perused full documentation yet, expect I’ll find answers there.
Edit, now I have, no mention of the batteries or firmware on displays in this version, just firmware on AccessLink.

https://fccid.io/2ADHX-CAPTIVIEWTX/U...al-2454126.pdf
(Perhaps that manual belongs in the Warehouse now).

[Ryan Gallagher]

Single Cell LiPo 3.7v (which is apparently the single cell LiPo standard voltage, 4.2v when fully charged)
Package size appears to be approx:
60mm long
38mm wide
5mm thick
(apologies don't know the name of the tiny battery connector, but pretty standard. 3mm wide at the plug end, 4mm wide at the flare) EDIT- Appears to be Micro JST 1.25 connector.

The dead ones do boot normally with a battery swap to one of the two still "good" batteries that came with them.

Out of 8 I've only got one "bad" one with a vertical line on the display and dimmer text relative to that, 2 with non-puffy 4.2v batteries, but rest just need new batteries it seems. Not bad for 80$ flea-bay purchase.

Edit to add photos of the guts:

IMG_6068.jpgIMG_6069.jpg
IMG_6066.jpgIMG_6067.jpg

[Ryan Gallagher]

A bit of careful peeling of the foam adhesive, reveals they are 503759 type LiPo (1300mAh) batteries

I'm 95% sure the connector is a JST 1.25 (micro JST). Rather than the JST 2.0 pitch ones which also seem common?

IMG_6070.jpg

[Leo Enticknap]

Easily available for ten bucks a piece on Scamazon. If the connector is wrong, one could always chop off the one from the dead battery and splice it to the new one using solder seals. Many thanks: this is very useful information. I have one site in particular that is still using this system and is unlikely to be able to invest in upgrading to one that is currently supported in the near future, and so having as much data as possible on aftermarket parts that will work is valuable.

There is no information on Dolby's website about updating Captiview receivers. There is about updating the transmitter dongle: attached. There is no "confidential - do not distribute" footer on this document, and only users who are actually logged in to F-T can download it from here, so I'm guessing that I'm OK to upload and attach.

[Ryan Gallagher]

Easily available for ten bucks a piece on Scamazon. If the connector is wrong, one could always chop off the one from the dead battery and splice it to the new one using solder seals. Many thanks: this is very useful information. I have one site in particular that is still using this system and is unlikely to be able to invest in upgrading to one that is currently supported in the near future, and so having as much data as possible on aftermarket parts that will work is valuable.

There is no information on Dolby's website about updating Captiview receivers. There is about updating the transmitter dongle: attached. There is no "confidential - do not distribute" footer on this document, and only users who are actually logged in to F-T can download it from here, so I'm guessing that I'm OK to upload and attach.

You're welcome! Yeah getting a battery with the proper tail and connector is not required. They also sell JST 1.25 tails separately if you are comfortable undoing kapton tape and soldering directly to battery boards.

My only caution with starting from a JST 2.0 connector is the wire guage also appears to step up, and may be difficult to route/fit in the case. That guage included with JST 1.25 appears to be a sweet spot for this case moulding. There is approx 6mm height clearance for splices to live on either side though, provided you have plan ahead with your leads length. The factory cable management is designed to route under the battery and over, but without the foam on the battery, you'd probably have enough room for the larger cable?