So I rolled my Mavic Pro firmware back to .700 today

After much deliberation and courage-building, I was happy that I had finally done enough research and understood the risks involved in rolling back the firmware on my Mavic Pro.

In this thread, I’ll share my experiences and findings with you all :slight_smile:

There’s a fantastic video on YouTube by a guy called Steve, aka digdat0 that tells you pretty much all you need to know: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTpYaBQ6scE

So, on with the mod!

First things first, if you’ve upgraded your Mavic Pro to the latest v01.04.0100 there is no current way of rolling back. DJI are getting tighter and tighter on this with each new update. Word on the street is that the latest firmware has already been cracked so I’m sure it’ll only be a week or two before you can downgrade from this version, but as I type this today if you’re on v01.04.0100 you can not rollback to any other version.

Also while we’re talking version numbers, the latest DJI Assistant has things in place to prevent you tinkering. Check out this video as digdat0 has some links in the video description to download an older version of Assistant 2 that DOES allow you to modify stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eVG75ijYu8

My Mavic Pro was still on v01.04.0000 so I could downgrade. I wanted to go back to v01.03.0700 as it’s widely regarded as the most stable out there (alongside .400 (but that doesn’t support DJI Googles)).

The DJI Assistant will tell you the current version you’re on:

I won’t reinvent the wheel by telling you how to perform the rollback, the above video does a great job of that.

What I will share with you, in case you’re planning on doing the same thing, are my observations and experiences which differ ever-so-slightly from the video, just so you don’t get caught out :slight_smile:

Right then, get comfy and grab a :coffee: or :beer:

Make sure you allow plenty of time for this, with no interruptions - you need to concentrate! Allow an hour or so. Also, make sure everything is charged up before you begin. DJI themselves say you need a battery with +50% charge, but if that battery dies mid-update that’s it, game over, you’ll have a Mavic shaped door stop. Charge your batteries :slight_smile:

On to the update then!

One thing I recommend is to run everything as Administrator. So when you launch DJI Assistant 2 or DUMLdore, right click each one and choose the “Run as Administrator” option. Possibly not essential, but you need this to go smoothly so the less chance of issues, the better.

After copying the firmware to the aircraft and beginning the flashing process, I opened Assistant so I could monitor the progress. However, it just showed me the page with the firmware version numbers. I didn’t click anything as the red lights were flashing on the front and while pondering if I’d done the right thing or not the Assistant page suddenly refreshed itself (without me clicking) and it was on 8% already.

Another thing to note, this flashing process took at least twice as long than it does in his video, maybe even three times as long - perhaps his video was sped up for the sake of YouTube? Anyway, don’t panic, but again another reason to allow plenty of time and to have fully charged batteries when you begin.

During the update everything hung at 48% for a while. The battery then showed two dots in the middle, with one of those two flashing, while the outer two dots remained off. I was a bit concerned at this point but it soon sorted itself out though and carried on nicely.

It reboots a few times, maybe three or more. Some seem like ‘soft boots’ as you can hear a couple of clicks but you don’t get the diddly tune or the gimbal movements.

The flashing yellow light on rear turned solid red occasionally and stayed that way for a minute or two.

The fan stopped once during the update, only briefly. Then it stopped again at 82% - for longer this time - It seems to stop during reboots - fan seemed to stay off then right up to 99%

The aircraft did a final reboot at 99% then the fan came back on as usual and my Assistant said Update Complete.

PHEW!!

At this point I then turned off the Mavic and closed DJI Assistant.

Turned the Mavic back on again and connected it to the PC again. Opened Assistant to confirm it said I was now on .700

Sorted :+1:


Next step, which isn’t mentioned in the video, is you then need to adjust the firmware on ALL of your batteries to keep everything in sync and prevent any mismatch warnings in the GO4 app.

The battery that was in the bird at the time of flashing is done, you can forget that one now.

To roll the battery firmware back, I then turned off the Mavic, closed assistant again and unplugged the USB cable.

I then put battery # 2 in, powered on the Mavic, connected USB, opened Assistant and within 20 seconds this message popped up:

I said yes, hoping it wouldn’t then update my Mavic to the latest firmware!! :open_mouth:

Thankfully it didn’t :relieved:

The progress indication in Assistant then started at 20% (not sure where the first 19% went) and quickly went up to 100% - this only took a minute, maybe two.

It then automatically reboots the AC after the battery update is done.

That was it, just repeat that for each battery.

Battery # 4 didn’t prompt me at all, I rebooted the AC twice too - perhaps I hadn’t updated that battery previously?


With the aircraft and all the batteries rolled back to .700 it was now time to do the remote controller.

People say this isn’t necessary but my OCD said otherwise. I wanted everything to be on .700

To roll the firmware on the RC back, you must connect it to the PC before powering up the controller - Assistant doesn’t seem to see it if you do it in any other order.

The process to roll the RC firmware back is pretty much the same as that for the main aircraft:

  1. Make sure Assistant can see it
  2. Close Assistant and open DUMLdore
  3. Take a backup of the current RC firmware
  4. Copy the new (well, old I guess) .700 RC firmware to the controller - do NOT copy the aircraft ‘bin’ files by mistake, you must use the RC firmware
  5. The screen on RC changes to say “UPGRADING”
  6. The RC will reboot itself within a couple of minutes

At this point, I thought I was done as the controller reverted to it’s usual “CONNECTING…” display.

So I opened Assistant and it said 72% done - but the remote said connecting :open_mouth:

Cue mild panic… had I successfully rolled back my bird and four batteries, then killed my controller?!

After a minute or two of worrying and debating my options, the Assistant suddenly jumped from 72% to 100% in the blink of an eye and said Update Complete!

Assistant then showed that the remote controller was indeed now on v01.03.0700 :smiley:


At this point I then turned everything off and went for a breather to calm my nerves :rofl:

I came back armed with more :coffee: then I turned on the RC, then the AC - and I made sure they both connected ok.

I then began tinkering with various parameters, but that’s a post for another day.

So that was it really.

Entire process took about 1.5hrs and two cups of strong coffee :+1:

Shout if you have any questions, I’ll help where I can!

Great article Rich.

Can I ask why you decided to do it? Were you having issues?

I went the other way and updated to 01.04.0100 over the weekend and she flew beautifully, so smoothly plus I get the fantastic benefit of being able to take panos with my Mavic now, something I’ve really missed since selling my Spark. Or can you also take panos with Go4 4.1.18 and 700 f/w?

I don’t know if I’ve just been lucky but I’ve always updated and never ever had an issue that I could put down to the firmware… The only issue I’ve ever had was with my first Mavic and it’s camera so that went back.

Video sped up 6x, no IS:

Low res pano example:

Cheers :+1:

I’m fed up of trying to fly locally near a stadium NFZ. Even if I take off from my back yard, half a mile away from the NFZ it still warns me to death! Driving me nuts now mate!

Ah, fair enough mate. I fly near to Brighton & Hove Albion’s ground sometimes and even when a mile or more away sometimes it still warns me (but allows me to fly). Did you sort your camera settings out? I’ve used more or less the same settings through all the firmware updates, D Cinelike & Landscape…

Yup, I did thanks @Peter - I’d forgotten the D-Cinelike setting :roll_eyes:

And some of that post can be found: HERE

As mentioned in that post, I got speaking to a guy by the name of Qoncussion who was really helpful.

He gave me this link, for anyone interested in tinkering with some of the more advanced settings buried inside the Mavic that DJI don’t provide you access to in the GO app :roll_eyes:

So grab another :coffee: and have a read of this blog post:

https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?2916078-DJI-Dashboard-How-To-tips-and-tricks-*MAVIC*

I’ve also joined the DJI Reverse Engineering group on Slack too - there are some seriously talented people working on this stuff :smiley: :+1:

Great read, i have been very busy so when I finally had time to switched on the bird straight away it was asking for firmware update:triumph::triumph:, im getting so sick of updates and I do find when I bought the bird when first released it flew fantastic and no distance problem or video lagging, updates are noticeable on restrictions more annoying alarms distance reduced video lagging.

I use dji goggles atm but want to go to Moverio BT sometime. So pointless me reverting as they have me by bollocks if i want to use expensive add-ons.

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Agreed, and this was the second biggest reason I rolled back (and will probably stay there now).

The .700 firmware supports DJI Goggles. Not sure about the Moverios though?

The Moverios aren’t affected by the Mavic firmware version and they’ll work with any Go4 version too so no worries there.

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I’m glad I found this thread.
I rolled my firmware back to 700 using NLD.
Was thinking of getting some goggles but didn’t know if I’d have to update the fw.
Cheers.

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I still fly my MP on .700 - I can’t see me ever moving away from it now :blush:

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Except Panos? :wink:

Actually, yes, that’s probably about the only thing missing.

But then Litchi can do that for me, regardless of firmware so perhaps it’s not technically missing :slight_smile:

I’ve done a pano manually, too … not that I’m recommending it. LOL!

I must try again and see if I can streamline.

Does anyone know if it’s possible to roll back from the very latest MP firmware?

i seem to remember that if you have rolled to the latest version you cannoy roll back any more than 3 versions

That’s within the DJI method. If that’s so, though, it probably makes it back far enough to then roll back further via the hack route … which, I guess, was my real question.

that was the reason i didnt update my MP 2 firmware 2 versions ago so if i still want to i can roll back to .700

I’m on modded 01.04.0100 … and happy with it … but if I can get back there somehow afterwards, I’d quite like to use the latest for a few weeks.

I’ve been following this thread on Mavic Pilots … and mostly it’s been quite silent.

However, in the last few days there have been several posts indicating/suggesting that it is possible to roll back to almost any version from the latest MP/MPP versions (perhaps other models other than M2P/Z) - I’ve not followed the detail).

So - anyone wanting to might like to read up on the methods that seem to work and try.

No guarantees! :wink:

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