[JASJAR, XDA Exec, MDA Pro Software Upgrading] Bonasa:
Motto: There is always hope. :eek: :mad: :confused: :)

Let me share with you, other xda forum members, the following story - I think it might be useful for some of those who already got problems with the upgrade procedures, and especially for those who just now contemplate to try their luck and launch the upgrade (to whatever WM version or AKU).

After successfully going through the reflashing procedure several times on my O2 XDA Exec precciousssss gadget (flashing Helmi_c 1.1 Crossbow, then JWright 06 and later JWright 08) I was confident enough (overconfident, perhaps?) to go on and reflash also my wife's i-Mate Jasjar (there were some issues all the same and I was recently thinking of restoring the factory defaults through the hard-reset).

JWright's ROM offers a very simple, almost luxurious, way to upgrade - basically the same as any of the official ROMs - just click the .exe file and pray. And there is the hitch - it says somewhere you need a 1.01 version of the Bootloader but I didn't know how to find out the version of the bootloader present on the unit in question without launching the bootloader itself through the "bulb - switch-on - reset" combination; and I admit (yes, the effect of over confidentiality, indeed) I was somehow too lazy to go and check (by the way, is there a way to find out what bootloader version you have other than the way mentioned above?). Somehow, perhaps, I thought the upgrade would indicate the bootloader mismatch prior to the system reflashing or what. And after all, the JasJar unit was purchased at almost the same time as my XDA Exec and there I knew I got a 2.0.1 bootloader version, so why to bother - silly me!

OK, here we go.

Flashing > "success" > unit "bricked" (no LED lights, USB unit not recognized by the PC, no signs of life of the poor thing not able to do anything but to accuse me by its doomy pathetic black screen of mishandling, asking me at the same time WHY have you done THIS to ME?) > moment of unpleasant, uneasy feelings comparable only to those created by a dozen of hamsters running their wheels in your stomach.

Now the good part of the novel:

Even before flashing my Exec for the first time, I diligently spent (a lot of) time reading all the relevant forum posts, downloaded emergency tools and was therefore prepared for the fact, that something might go terribly wrong.

Million thanks to all those who contributed to this forum sharing your knowledge and know-how, because based on your shared experience I was able to discover myself at the moment of utmost horror what the problem was (yes, in my case it was the bootloader issue - the JasJar got some 0.6 version of it - ever heard of it? I was considering the mtty Midget_1990's or the Mamaich's solution first, but then I recognized the boatloader's trickery and the right way to solve the crisis was in my case just to upgrade the bootloader through the known and somewhere here at this forum very well described ROMUpgradeUt bootloader procedure; to make the long story short, without the appropriate version of bootloader the unit will not boot, that's it).

Now the JasJar is fully recovered, happily running the WM6 Crosbow ROM, exactly as its O2 Xda Exec brother.

Lesson learnt

I strongly suggest that everybody does their homework in reading all relevant forum threads before venturing anywhere futher. It is only natural that after bricking the 1000 USD toy, most people will have problems to concentrate on anything of a substance and chances are, that instead of fixing the problem, you may mess everything up even more and end up in a deeper and hotter circle of hell without any return ticket.

And it needn't be like this, it is possible to avoid it!

I don't want to give anybody any false feeling of security and comfort due to my particular happy-end case. Every unit is perhaps slightly different, conditions are different (cable, PC OS...) etc, but most of the problems seem to have their solutions and by diligent reading of the relevant Xda forum posts, the chances of getting over the troubles through the shared know-how are high.

So stay cool and happy flashing.